Traditional basic food of local grill bars remains popular on Helsinki's Fleminginkatu
By Riku Jokinen
The stove was just switched on, which means that the kitchen in the restaurant Cella will open in an hour from now. However, hungry people start showing up already at three in the afternoon.
"You can get first aid for your worst hunger pangs at the sausage counter of the Alepa grocery store", says chef Ilkka Lehto to the most impatient of them.
Cella, which opened on Fleminginkatu in 1969, used to be known as a haunt for artists and culture types. Now the best draw is the chef, who will visit the dining room from time to time.
"Little children will come and say, here comes the crazy cook", Lehto says.
Lehto, who is practicing for his retirement, has run the kitchen at Cella for seven years. The menu is very basic: filets, steaks, fish, meatballs, and mashed potatoes.
The portions are unashamedly large, and also unashamedly good.
Lehto was taught how to cook these same foods at restaurant school in the early 1960s, and he made them later at the hotels Kalastajatorppa and Marski.
"I have not recommended anything since Urho Kekkonen died. He ate food prepared by me many times, so I do not dare make any recommendations."
The floor is covered with red wall-to-wall carpeting and the furnishings are from the Mexican restaurant in the Hotel Torni from the 1960s.
Careful consideration is given to new dishes, because Finns are slow to learn. "Mannerheim looked down from the wall with an accusatory face, which meant that we simply had to take vorschmack onto the menu."
The pizza oven has been sold. "If word got around that Cella has good pizza, the pizza entrepreneurs in the nearby area would have to go on the dole", Lehto explains.
Small restaurants serving traditional Finnish home food are reportedly in fashion again. Slussen, "traditional Helsinki grill bar" was recently opened in the Punavuori district, and received much media attention. Inspired by the Japanese film Ruokala Lokki, Japanese tourists are being encouraged to eat at the Kahvila Suomi in Punavuori.
Restaurant owners on Fleminginkatu roll their eyes at such trends. The number of neighbourhood restaurants has decreased here as well, but those that remain are quite popular.
"It used to be that the best food was in beer joints, which had the best drunks", Aimo Lahdelma says, after his meal in the Bullman restaurant.
Lawyers have had lunch in all of the locations in the area at least once. Lahdelma and his lunch mates Jaakko Seitola and Kari Patronen list about half a dozen food bars in the area, which have been replaced in the 1990s by a pizzeria or an Asian restaurant.
Even in the infamous Syntipukki ("Scapegoat") nearby, the food was good.
"Eat by day, fight by night. Or shoot", Lahdelma recalls.
Bullman is famous among neighbourhood hangover sufferers for their massive servings. The favourite items on the menu are meatballs, or vendace with mashed potatoes.
At the beginning of the year one more grill bar almost disappeared, when the owner of the Grilli Flemari wanted to give up his business.
"With emotion, and not intelligence", is how Staffan Mathlin describes the sentimental thoughts of the three men who took it over.
Each of the restaurant professionals had visited the grill bar that had been established in 1974.
"This place is stuck in the 1970s", Mathlin says, pointing to the old carpeting, wall panels, and sofas, but it does not appear to bother him at all.
Workers and bank clerks frequent the place for lunch, but the owners have not yet reached their goals. Mathlin laments that groups of women eating together have not found the grill bar. Instead, they gather in large numbers at the somewhat trendier Soul Kitchen on the other side of the street.
The Grilli Flemari will undergo gradual changes, as it becomes more profitable. The menu was changed already in January, because the previous owner had jumped "out the frying pan into the fire" with respect to his meat. The new owners are proud of the quality of the meat the place serves.
"You can get filets meat at every gas station cafe, but everyone knows what they taste like", Mathlin says.
Helsingin Sanomat / First published in print 29.10.2006
RIKU JOKINEN / Helsingin Sanomat
riku.jokinen@hs.fi
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| 31.10.2006 - THIS WEEK |
 Traditional basic food of local grill bars remains popular on Helsinki's Fleminginkatu |
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