HALF A STEP AWAY FROM "EATING" TO "TASTING"

We need to keep abreast of things in today's world with its hustle and bustle and same old eating habits and to get away from this routine and satisfy not only our material and everyday needs, but also our cultural and intellectual pursuits, we set off for the theatre, exhibitions, and...good restaurants.

As we well know, good food is not just a means of satisfying one's body needs, but also our tastes. This was well known in ancient times when sumptuous banquets were arranged, where gastronomy became a cult and food was the product of labour and skill, menus were prepared in advance and there was a set time for each dish. And even in today's world the art of good food has long since become a fashionable trend, although at the same time this sometimes seems an unnecessary luxury to the average consumer.

Food as an art form 

Natalya Golumb is a young food expert but well known in high gourmet circles who has succeeded in turning a hobby into a major skill and the routine process of food preparation into an art form. However, having already baked her first pie at the age of four, she is now an unsurpassed amateur-expert (and now a category 4 chef) in everything to do with good food and she always speaks about food as an art form. "Indeed, it is not without reason that the very best recipes that go into my cooking are variations of simple popular dishes made to perfection. These are recipes that have stood the test of time," she says. Food, she says, is not just a means of satisfying one's hunger. It is the result of centuries of different layers, and a serious and spiritual approach to its preparation is akin to the inspiration that a painter or a composer feels when he is creating his latest masterpiece. National cuisine is just as much a part of our cultural and historical heritage as literature, music and the epics.

Natalya did not reach her present standing overnight. She graduated from the Azerbaijani State Oil Academy in Baku and worked for some time in banks and in business. But her love of good food became a hobby, a pleasant (and let's not deny it a useful) interest. "Friends would always be ringing me up and asking for the recipe for this or that dish," she told R+ "so I decided to open my own journal on one of the social networks."

The page with enticing recipes and colourful photographs of prepared dishes rapidly became popular among all lovers of cooking whose numbers steadily increased… Now Natalya is the head of a number of projects, is preparing to publish a book and menus for a prestigious restaurant and has her own team of chefs. And she has been helped along this path by a sincere love for her job.

What does a cookery expert and connoisseur mean by good food? Why is there a need for it, and why is it that expensive restaurants which offer a wide range of dishes, nice presentation, a comfortable atmosphere and stylish d?cor are never empty, despite the high prices? It is simply because top-class cooking - "haute cuisine" - is something which should satisfy not just our physiological need for food, but also our high and delicate aesthetic senses. And this goes beyond the bounds of the normal utilitarian concept of the art of food. "It is not for nothing," Natalya says, "that in the past people used to say not 'yest' [to dine] but 'kushat' [to eat], which comes from the word 'vkushat' [to taste], in other words to derive pleasure from the unhurried, considered and contemplative intake of food."

To Azerbaijan for recipes 

Azerbaijan is a country of the most rich culinary traditions and tasty dishes which may be combined with the best known dishes of world cuisine. "Our country could easily become attractive for food tourism," Natalya says. "For example, if one visits any rural district in Azerbaijan one can knock on any door. One will be cordially welcomed, offered the tastiest local dishes and not be asked any money for it. Imagine how many people would come here for a feast!"

And we have all the prerequisites for this: it is not for nothing that foreign tourists and guests go away with a definite feeling of pleasure and rave about our national dishes: Yarpag dolma [stuffed vine leaves], Dusbara [kind of dumplings], Qutab [pancakes]. However, Natalya says, some dishes are unusual for Europeans who believe them to be too fatty. "And this is understandable," she says, "because every country's cuisine is normal for the people who live there, whereas it will seem exotic to visitors: too salty, sharp or fatty. For example, in the East, in Japan and China, it is usual to add to the five well-known senses one more - a sense of taste. And to satisfy this sense taste boosters and other components are added to the dishes."   Taste boosters are sodium glutamate, which we all know, and which we are accustomed to accepting merely as a chemical and synthetic additive to "harmful" products and an indelible attribute of fast-food, whereas in China this is a compulsory food additive.

The same applies to our dishes that are unusual for Europeans. Natalya is currently working on the menu for a well-known restaurant in the city. Fusion versions of Azerbaijani national dishes that have been slightly altered and improved have been introduced to this menu. "We are trying to do the same as the great French chef Paul Bocuse used to do," Natalya says. "He would take the best known dishes of all the regions of France and change their appearance a bit so that the whole world would come to his country with its culinary traditions."

Only according to the rules 

At the same time our food, Natalya says, is not without its problems. Not least among these is the lack of development in the sphere of raw material supplies. It is common knowledge that the majority of products from which the best known European culinary dishes are prepared are imported from abroad. It is natural that this puts up the cost of ready-made products considerably. At the same time, Azerbaijan has excellent resources for the development of the agrarian sphere. "We even have such a little known plant as wild asparagus," Natalya says. She says it grows in a number of regions in the country and is used in a very limited way in cooking.

If there is one gastronomic problem in the country - raw materials - then there is another of a purely mental nature. "As far as our people are concerned, eating well means eating at home," Natalya smiles, "because most people when they visit expensive restaurants order the same dishes or variations on them." Our public is not yet ready for new sophisticated tastes.

But that's what it seems from the outside. "Inside", in the kitchen, the situation is not so simple. Whereas in the west, the profession of a cook, and especially a chef, is something very prestigious and honourable, and many people go to restaurants because of the chef, here they assume the not very flattering status of a servant, not to mention the fact that this is a serious affront to his pride and, let's be honest, his pocket. Such an attitude also puts a serious brake on the development of his skill and creativity. "Most of our top chefs often admit to me that they are literally bristling with new ideas but they can't carry them out because they are forced to prepare food 'according to the rules' of the management of the restaurant," Natalya says.

"An Azerbaijani chef recently came back from a culinary competition in Russia with a gold medal. He came back, he said, with loads of new ideas… But the holiday was over, the work routine began and it was difficult to apply his new ideas. But there are few people who are aware that there are cooks in Azerbaijan who are justifiably contending for the title of top-class chefs, "haute couture", for example pupils of the late great Sah-Huseyn Karimov, who did for Azerbaijani cuisine what Paul Bocuse did for French. 

…Gastronomy, haute cuisine, is appealing but it also comes across as rather complicated. Today many housewives and working women have become literally stuck in a routine of ordinary jobs and "quick soups". But just as a queen can be made of any housewife, so a masterpiece can be made from even the simplest dish! As a culinary expert with many years of experience, Natalya confidently says: anyone can cook, there are no complicated dishes just time-consuming. And even the most inexperienced person can prepare a sophisticated "multi-stage" dish. The most important thing, as they say, is having the desire - the desire to be a little magician or an artist - use your dish like a canvas and your ingredients like brushes and your friends and loved ones will be grateful to you for your little masterpieces.