Sea Food: Where Japanese oysters, bluefin tuna and ama ebi shrimp are served in Sochi. Sea Food: Where Japanese oysters, bluefin tuna and ama ebi shrimp are served in Sochi Oyster bar ama

The only, exclusive, unique, exotic - these epithets are often evidence of poor language skills of a person who describes something and falls into the sin of grandiloquent banality. However, in the case of the Ama oyster bar in the St. Petersburg suburban resort Okhta Park, this is just a statement of facts.

"Ohta Park"is located just 10 km from St. Petersburg. The ski base with a self-made lift, created by a group of enthusiasts, after a large-scale reconstruction in December 2015, turned into a high-quality off-season resort with nine slopes of different difficulty levels, a ski school, one and a half kilometers of paths of a forest skating rink among pine trees, three lines of cottages, a bath complex and an outdoor heated pool . It will become off-season in the summer, when skaters will be replaced by cyclists, and skiers and snowboarders will get on roller skates and skateboards or begin to master the rope park.

The restaurateur Oksana Bychkova (the author of the oyster bar "DOK" and the fish Seafood Market located in Sochi) turned out to be in the center of this fun whirlwind. The oyster bar designed by Oksana turned out to be an outstanding phenomenon for St. Petersburg. Firstly, because there is not a single oyster bar in the Northern capital at all. Surprisingly for a city in which at the beginning of the 19th century it was a common custom to go to the spit of Vasilyevsky Island to eat oysters: it was there that Dutch ships with delicate goods came. Secondly, because it is located not in the historical center of the city (which, however, can happen), but outside it. The restaurateur rightly believes that skiers travel more than usual, and therefore can fully appreciate the efforts that Ama is making to ensure that eleven types of oysters, including Pacific, Korean and Japanese, are not transferred to its aquariums, and nowhere else in Russia presented shellfish from Japan.

From the famous Tsukiji market in Tokyo, Irregularly shaped flat kumamoto oyster shells (690 rubles), filled with the sweet body of a clam, are brought to Amu, quite voluminous, but not fleshy akasaka (950 rubles), with a delicate texture and mild taste, in which balance the sweetness and salt of sea water, acce (690 rubles) with the most expected taste, murozza (690 rubles) with a long sweetish aftertaste. Japanese oysters in general have a more delicate texture and sweetness over time, while Russian oysters are brackish and leave a taste of the sea on the lips. An example of this is the DOK oyster (650 rubles), named after the Sochi restaurant Bychkova, which is mined only for the restaurateur's projects.

From Japan, on the other hand, planes send outwardly similar to a giant mussel tairagai (1,250 rubles / 100 g) with meat more tender and tastier than a scallop and a slender sweetish taste, abalone (3,150 rubles / 100 g), whose dense, slightly harsh body is cut into the thinnest petals for sashimi, trepang with a pronounced sea taste (1,750 rubles/100 g), trumpeter (1,550 rubles/100 g).

The sea monster, as the Japanese call the mollusk sadzae (3,150 rubles/100 g), lives in exceptionally clean water, so not only its dense body is served in sashimi, but also the liver, lightly seized with soy sauce. The quivering natures are especially impressed by mirugay (guidak) (dark - 1,100 rubles / 100 g, light - 1,150 rubles / 100 g). This mollusk grows up to one and a half meters and weighs up to a kilogram with a relatively small and fragile shell. His dense, slightly crispy body is cut into sashimi, and the mantle is bathed in soy sauce.

In general, all this exotic should be eaten exclusively raw, in the form of sashimi. They are served in the traditional Japanese style, much like it is done on Tsukiji: with a Japanese shiso mint leaf with a mild sweet taste, a slightly bitter chrysanthemum flower, and a refreshingly crispy daikon straw. All this greenery must certainly be eaten in order to feel the cloudy haze of overflowing taste.

A very special gastronomic reality opens up to those who decide to try oyster cocktails. Smoked oyster with burdock root, Sanse pepper and colored algae caviar (690 rubles), milk oyster with caramel, almost candy mini-crab in sweet spices, touching with its miniature size, coconut mousse, with edamame, lime zest and ponzu sauce ( 780 rubles), the sonorous fresh taste of an oyster with orange juice, cilantro, lime and Heinz ketchup (600 rubles), beloved by the Japanese, and six other combinations show the life of oysters in a completely different light. By the way, alcoholic options are recommended to be consumed instantly (oysters quickly absorb alcohols), first after eating the mollusk, and then drinking it down.

Conservatively minded gourmets are addressed to a sea soup of Black Sea mussels, katran and rapans (740 rubles, served with fried red mullet and saffron aioli), pilaf with rapans, White Sea mussels (940 rubles) in three versions - in tomato sauce with lemon confit, in white wine with herbs or in a creamy sauce with blue cheese, king crab phalanges (1,530 rubles), rapana julienne (330 rubles) with a rich, darkish taste and a lot of other things that are so great to drink on a sunny day well-chosen wines. If you get tired of staring at the skiers cutting through the slope, just look up at the desperate blue of the sky, lick your lips and feel the taste of the sea.

Leningrad region, Vsevolozhsk district, Syargi village, ski resort"Ohta Park"

Food made from water has always been the basis of the menu in Sochi restaurants. And yet, if at the beginning of the 2000s, guests, as a rule, were offered traditional Black Sea red mullet and flounder, today, in the assortment of self-respecting establishments there are gifts from almost all seas and oceans. What's more, the latest trend allows guests to choose their own "wild" product and dozens of ways to prepare it. Using the example of three restaurants, we tell where Japanese oysters, bluefin tuna and ama ebi shrimp are served in Sochi.

Sperm whale

Oyster bar "Kashalot" - Mecca for lovers of sea food. The entire range here is made up of oysters and all kinds of seafood delicacies. The menu is experimental, chef Oleg Poboev improvises with might and main with flavors and seasonal ingredients. By the way, recently the menu was updated, adding autumn shades. Now here you can try tataki with Japanese sorrel, ginger cream sauce, Cointreau orange and lotus in sakura, cod in parma with sage, cechevitto with sun-dried tomato and baked pumpkin, trout fillet on perlotto with herbs and vegetable autumn ratatouille, mussels in baked pepper lecho with anchovy oil and Italian flatbread. If you like something unusual, the chef insists on a personal call: based on your preferences, he will definitely come up with something amazing for your arrival.

But don't be afraid to come here if you have never tried oysters or don't know how to open and eat them correctly - here you will always be told all the subtleties of oysters. In Kashalot, they sincerely want to make seafood accessible and understandable, so they will definitely teach you all the features of this cuisine and even tell you how to distinguish all kinds of mollusks from each other. Therefore, feel free to come in, ask questions and taste, be it oysters, ceviche, spizula, crabs, lobsters. In addition, all these delicacies are now becoming not only desirable, but also affordable, as the bar adheres to the position of remaining primarily a democratic bar.

Every detail here is saturated with the sea, not only the kitchen. For example, at the entrance there is a large aquarium with live seafood, a sperm whale settled on the wine cabinet, and on weekends parties are held here under the telling name “Sea Dances”.

D.O.M

Fish cuisine is one of the main specialties of the new executive chef Aziz Saffar. Therefore, there is nothing surprising in the fact that the second floor of the restaurant complex will be completely dedicated to seafood: aquariums with live mollusks, crabs and other reptiles from the abyss, a huge floor with fresh fish and, of course, a completely renovated kitchen. The concept of the new menu is very clear, but at the same time original: no ready-made dishes, no fully formed positions - there is only a "wild" product and dozens of variations of its preparation. All the guest needs to do is to choose the fish they like, for example, and then the method of its preparation: ceviche, sashimi, deep-fried or baked in sea salt, with vegetables or steamed. Oysters can be ordered raw or baked, you can also choose a sauce for mussels - such is the ubiquitous craft.

The fish assortment came out no less original - this season the focus is on Japan, which means that you can get lost on the menu among kinki, kinmendai, shimaji, ama ebi shrimp and shirogai clams. Instead of the usual Khasan and New Zealand oysters - the mysterious ogatsu, iwate, akke. Of course, there will be guests from the Atlantic, as well as local seafood in the form of red mullet and flounder. The menu itself will change depending on the season and supplies (by the way, they are direct from Japan, so there is no doubt about the freshness of the fish). A special relationship in this whole fish story is given to tuna: Aziz Saffar will cut a multi-kilogram carcass of bluefin tuna from Japan on his own in front of guests, and they, in turn, will be able to choose the part they like, for example, the most tender abdominal called “o-toro”.

La Terrazza

Restaurant La Terrazza reveals itself, albeit partially, already from the cover: a winning geolocation - close to the sea, but with the necessary privacy, a name that immediately refers to some trattoria in Piazza del Plebiscito in Naples, an inviting and cozy interior with an abundance of wood and air tones. The cuisine at La Terrazza is a classic, collected from all the provinces of the Apennine Peninsula, with a very strong emphasis on seafood and fish cooking (Mediterranean, after all). If pasta, then with mussels or more intriguing vongole, or capellini with seafood or linguine with crayfish necks (a crazy combination not only for taste buds, but also for Instagram).

On the chef's menu (which, by the way, changes every season), you can find such unique items as pumpkin cream soup with shrimp and Cointreau, or hake fillet with porcini mushrooms, spinach and saffron sauce. In the Fish and Seafood list, in addition to the usual and obligatory sea bass giltheads, there are octopus and Thermidor crab, each of which will be cooked at your discretion, as well as light Black Sea shades in the form, for example, completely unexpected flounder cutlets. But there is also Italian salmon soup, oysters, scallops with fennel and pizza with tuna, which are necessary for any sea restaurant - sea lovers really have plenty to choose from. Of course, there was also a decent wine list: classics from Bordeaux, Chablis from Burgundy, New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc, wines from Chile, the USA, Austria, Spain and Australia.

The oyster bar "Ama", which opened at the beginning of the year in the territory of the ski resort "Okhta-Park" in St. Petersburg and suspended its work after just a couple of months, will start working again only in December. This was reported to The Village by representatives of the institution.

The decision to temporarily close it is due to the fact that, as a year-round resort, Okhta Park turned out to be underdeveloped and there are few visitors in the summer.

At the same time, the owners report that already in late August or early September, Ama will open a representative office in Moscow. This time the oyster bar will be located in the city center, but the format will resemble a St. Petersburg establishment.

For the owner of "Ama" Oksana Bychkova, the Moscow project will be the fourth: in addition to the St. Petersburg bar, she is the owner of two establishments in Sochi - the oyster bar "Doc" and the democratic Seafood Market fish restaurant.

In each of them, Bychkova combines the functions of the brand chef and the main ideologist, and considers the main task to preserve the natural taste of sea delicacies. The seafood and shellfish in her oyster bars are served raw, made into sushi and sashimi, or baked for minutes. In addition, an important item on the menu is oyster cocktails, which are prepared using Japanese sauces, rare spices and alcohol.

OKSANA BYCHKOVA

bar owner

"Ama" in St. Petersburg will open again in December 2016, simultaneously with the start of the ski season. We will start working when the time for winter sports comes. Perhaps next year, if Okhta-Park gains strength and establishes itself as a year-round resort, we will support them and work in the summer too.

The results for autumn and winter are excellent. We are glad that we are open, that we are involved in a new project. We managed to gather our audience very quickly, moreover, the audience was quite prepared, including those exclusive mollusks that we offered, in addition to the well-known oysters, spizola, anadara and others. There were really a lot of exclusives, and the guests accepted everything perfectly.

In early autumn we open in Moscow. In the center. Location will be confirmed a little later. We will definitely bring all the best, what is not yet in Moscow, but what was already in St. Petersburg. And, of course, during these six months we have got new clams, oyster cocktails, new interesting finds, which we will be able to show in Moscow a little earlier.

The very word "AMA", translated from Japanese, means a diver for shellfish and pearls. And this, as you understand, is not accidental: the menu of the new oyster bar in St. Petersburg is obligatory. It is worth mentioning separately that most of the marine reptiles presented in the map arrive from the Tokyo Tsukiji market (Tsukiji). Our correspondent in St. Petersburg Polina Koroleva talks about all this in more detail.

The AMA Oyster Bar is a unique place in many ways. Let's start with the fact that the most appropriate form of clothing in this establishment is a ski suit, which is associated with a very unusual location: in the all-season resort "Okhta Park". Secondly, AMA attracts not by the name of the designer who designed the interior and not by the eminent chef, but by its gastronomic specialization in the freshest seafood.

The owner of the bar is Oksana Bychkova, a gourmet and the author of two other similar projects: the Sochi oyster loft Doc and the Sea Food Market.