In the new restaurant, Under Wonder, you can start a gourmet jaunt at dinnertime and easily make it last until breakfast.
Yes, the venue is open 24/7 – an unusual timeframe for middle-to-upper class eateries in the capital. The interior also makes one lose sense of time and place. The food, however, fails to keep up with the astounding ambience. But let’s slice it all up in turn.
Under Wonder was in scaffoldings for more than two years. A curious sign instructed the gawkers to stop staring. Crowds passing by the Kyiv cinema near the Lva Tolstogo metro station wondered if the construction would turn into another luxury clothes outlet – an unmistakable feature of Chervonoarmiyska Street.
The facade of chess window frames with stained glass on the ground floor luckily turned out to be a restaurant. Spread down into the basement, its unusual decor is worth a little discovery tour. Pitched as steamed punk, it looks like the classic French-Italian place fused with mechanical outcrops. Dress Victorian period with modern details and you’ll get Under Wonder.
The upstairs area is for smokers, and the two non-smoking lounges downstairs are reminiscent of wine cellars’ nooks with curvy floors and ceilings.
As you enter, an imposing spider-lag table carves the upstairs in half. Decorated with a pompous vase, it works as a serving table from which the waiters quickly fetch condiments, olives and bread.
The absence of such a table downstairs was felt acutely as it took over 40 minutes for the order to arrive. To be fair, a small salmon tart made it to our table halfway through the waiting. It was presented as compliments from the chef but perceived as an apology. Albeit delicious, it whet the appetite to such a degree that we were starving.
The menu lived up to the Western style of the eatery. A two-page spread with five-six entries per course was simple and to the point. If you wanted meat, you could start with a duck consomme and move on to rabbit provencal – listed in the same section to ease the selection process. If you wanted veggies, there was a minestrone soup followed by tagliatelle with white mushrooms. Caprese and Ceasar’s salads, along with Carpaccio, completed the expected offers in an Italian cuisine restaurant.
We quickly settled for a steamed Legurian-style sterlet (Hr 99) and rabbit rolled in bacon (Hr 89). For the garnish, the springtime green color of spinach in parmesan and pine nut sauce (Hr 39) and broccoli in creamy cheese sauce (Hr 39) seemed liked an attractive option.
Since it took a while for the kitchen staff to catch a rabbit and snag the fish, we focused on the interior. Big mirrors meshed well with the exposed brick walls of the underground non-smoking lounge. Then there were the blueberry couches draped in warm velvet. Stacks of newspapers slept next to thick purple and white candles in wall openings. Sadly, the candles weren’t lit, but the light bulbs in metal caps mixed with floating classic chandeliers, and fed the brain with plenty of bright ideas.
Creative, bohemian relaxing and soothing would be the right words to describe the atmosphere. It’s good both for a romantic dinner and a friendly get-together. I would have easily stayed until breakfast and studied another room peculiar for its open bar had the food lived up to the mood of the place.
The waitress skinned the starlet on a special table right in front of us. It was a promising start, but it ended right there. The fish had little flesh and was rather bland – the slice of lemon inside was not enough to make it savory. The sterlet would make for a good entry for those on diet.
The rabbit rolls were fine, as were the spinach and broccoli in creamy dressing. However, I would not order either of them again. The Opera cake (Hr 61), however, exceeded our expectations. Layers of chocolate sponge cake soaked in almond won over even those who usually skip deserts.
The small portions didn’t mesh well with the restaurant’s warm character. It calls for a hearty stew and a big lasagna to complement its classy, underground feel. It seems that the owners played too long with decorating and had little energy left for cuisine. Sadly, every other eatery in Kyiv follows the same pattern of exquisite interiors and featureless cooking.
Kyiv Post staff writer Yuliya Popova can be reached at [email protected].
Under Wonder
21 Chervonoarmiyska, 234-2181
Open 24 hours
Average meal: 150
