Quick test “The title of the best lunch in Eastern Helsinki would have been earned with the wildest twist” – the wild food restaurant collapsed

Last Skutta, a restaurant opened in the autumn in Itäkeskus, has quickly gained solid popularity with locals. The best lunch in Eastern Helsinki, loyal customers glow on social media.

A beloved child has many names. Depending on the source, Skutta is an art bistro, a wild food restaurant or a living room in Eastern Helsinki. In practice, it currently offers lunch on weekdays, brunch once a month and occasional events combining food and art – the restaurant is located inside the cultural center Stoa.

Scout the kitchen is piloted by a restaurateur Jyrki Tsutsunen and chef Antti Rämö.

Tsutsunen is known for, among other things, various experimental pop up events and wild food courses. Skutta’s lunches are also promised to be home-cooked at the “wildest twist”: local ingredients and seasonal delicacies from the woods. Occasionally, lunch has been served with dandelion sauce, wild mushrooms and a lake fish sauce.

Given the promises, the lunch menu on Tuesday in April is a little disappointing. Nothing in it suggests wildness. Options include chorizo ​​paprika pasta with buffalomozzarella, sweet potatoes and chickpeas in satay sauce or breaded flounder with pea puree.

We choose fish and vegetable options. They arrive about a quarter after waiting. The flounder is succulent, but the dose is dominated by a large amount of lemon mayonnaise. It rolls under the delicate taste of pea puree. The whole is tasty but greasy. Vegel lunch is better balanced. The full-bodied sweet satay sauce rounds out sweet potatoes, chickpeas and rice into a nice comfort-like whole. However, there is no particularly original dose.

In Skutta’s Finnish channels, Jyrki Tsutsu is called an “art chef”. Perhaps artistry comes out more sometimes sometimes, we pondered with a companion at the dinner table. But then we taste the bread, or really the spread. The sour root focaccia baked in Skutta’s kitchen is good, but the paste with it is even better. At first glance, it could be thought of as hummus. However, the taste is much more interesting: rich, sour and salty.

What is this, I ask the waitress.

“House spread of fermented sunflower seeds.”

Here is finally the promised wildest twist. In the future, it would be more visible in the doses themselves. Then the title of the best lunch in Eastern Helsinki would certainly have been earned.

Now comes the feeling that Skutta has the capacity to do so, but for some reason they are not fully utilized.

The stoa serves lunch on weekdays and a Saturday brunch once a month. Picture: Juhani Niiranen HS