Culinary Diplomacy: First Ukrainian Restaurant Joins the Michelin Guide
This month, the first Ukrainian restaurant, Anelya, located in Chicago, has been included in the prestigious Michelin gastronomic guide. The restaurant specialises in a modern interpretation of traditional Ukrainian cuisine and aims to promote the Ukrainian tradition in the United States, according to the restaurant's website.
The menu is based on classic dishes such as borscht, varenyky, dumplings, banosh, as well as original desserts, including Kyiv cake and creamy Napoleon. The restaurant also offers a variety of drinks, such as craft cocktails and wines made in Ukraine.
As previously reported by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine, the owner and chef Johnny Clarke was inspired to open the restaurant by a visit to Kharkiv during the Russian war in 2023, where his own grandmother Anelya Ochatynska was born, after whom he named the restaurant.
Johnny Clark said he was very close to his grandmother, who moved to Ohio after World War II. Anelya was born in Ukraine in 1924 and survived the Holodomor, artificially created by Stalin in the early 1930s, and forced labour in Nazi German camps.
‘When the war broke out, something just sparked in me. I think it was the stories I learnt as a child. And it just made me do something. But there wasn't much I could do except cook. And I felt like I had an opportunity - and a responsibility - to spread Ukrainian food and culture because it's under attack again,’ he said.
Johnny Clarke calls his restaurant a ‘small political statement’ and explains that he wants to show people that this is ‘not Russian food with a twist’, but Ukrainian cuisine.
In the summer of 2022, UNESCO even added Ukrainian borscht to the list of intangible cultural heritage in need of protection. From whom? First of all, from the Russians, who have long wanted to steal the iconic dish from their neighbours and call it their own invention. Now this scheme will never work for them, because people all over the world are willing to cook borscht, emphasising that it is a delicious and nutritious Ukrainian beetroot soup.
