Showcasing the best in Uzbek hospitality
Taj Restaurant (out of 4) Address: 1698 Eglinton Ave. W. (near Dufferin St.), 647-231-1477, facebook.com/TAJ-Restaurant282739815479810 Chef: Djovidkhon Buzrukov Hours: Tuesday to Saturday, noon to 9 p.m.; Sunday, noon to 8 p.m. Reservations: Yes Wheelchair access: No Price: Dinner for two with tea, tax and tip: $50
Djovidkhon Buzrukov hears the doorbell and comes out of the kitchen beaming.
“Dobro pozhalovat,” he says in Russian, throwing his hands wide.
Taj Restaurant serves the food of Uzbekistan, a former Soviet republic in Central Asia. Russian is the lingua franca here, but we don’t speak that language, we tell Buzrukov.
“No problem. Welcome!” he swiftly responds in English, ushering us to a plastic-covered table.
And so begins a leisurely and enjoyable meal built on tea, lamb and warm hospitality.
The room may be sterile, but Taj treats diners like esteemed guests. Soviet fave Taj (“crown” in Uzbek) opened two months ago on a stretch of Eglinton St. W. with Argentine, Filipino, Hungarian and Jamaican restaurants. Not for nothing does the local BIA call it “Toronto’s International Market.”
Simple and mild, Uzbek cuisine appeals to Soviet émigrés, such as the health coach from Kazakhstan who tells me Taj’s dumplings are “the flavour of my childhood.”
Taj is Toronto’s second Uzbek restaurant, after Puff Samosa in Scarborough.
“Uzbek food is very popular in the former Soviet Union. ‘We miss this food,’ customers tell me,” says Buzrukov, a Samarkand native who cooks his mother’s recipes. Rising delight There is tea ($3.99), of course, thanks to the Silk Road.
Pretty cups from Tashkent are painted with cotton flowers, harvested in Uzbekistan with forced labour.
Next comes the food consultation. The short, laminated menu is mostly for show.
Instead, Buzrukov gauges your curiosity and hunger with a few questions. No knowledge of Uzbek cooking is required. He describes each dish clearly, proposing a succession of plates both exotic and familiar. You’d be wise to put yourself in his hands. Thus we start with homemade round bread ($3.99) from the tandoor oven decoratively stamped in the centre. Dumplings Taj uses limited seasonings — salt, cumin, parsley — to good effect. Ditto the multiple iterations of flour and water the kitchen turns into puffy bread, thin wrappers and crisp shells.
Oiled dough encloses minced lamb and onion for manti ($10.99). The massive steamed dumplings resemble their tiny Turkish equivalents in name only.
Baked samsa filled with lamb and pumpkin ($3.99) use puff pastry. Different dough, this one thin and flaky, turns up in a dessert ($3.99) layered with butter cream and dusted with coconut.
It’s his wife’s creation, Buzrukov says, best eaten by hand. Love for plov Uzbek’s celebration dish, plov, is represented here; lightly oiled rice threaded with carrot, plump raisins, soft lamb and whole cumin seeds ($9.99). The sweet-savoury combination is entirely pleasant.
Stronger tasting is a kebab of lamb ribs ($10.99) with melt-in-the-mouth potatoes. It requires a salad to balance the richness. Paperthin slices of tomatoes, peppers and cucumber ($4.95) in oil and vinegar do the trick.
At meal’s end, Buzrukov walks us to the door according to Uzbek custom. He bows slightly, holding his hand to his heart.
The gesture signifies respect. Consider it returned from a restaurant critic. apataki@thestar.ca Twitter @amypataki