Forest and garden at Shinok

Let others go to forests or gardens, come to Shinok instead: mushroom novelties, pine needle extract and other seasonal gifts.

“Yes, truly I loved autumn-tide … when the evening gatherings in the huts have begun.” This quote from Dostoyevsky perfectly sums up the new season at Shinok. It’s so nice to hide from inclement weather in a cosy “hut”, gather together all your relatives and friends and fully reap the fruits of autumn. The restaurant’s chef Elena Nikiforova will delight you with new dishes from forest mushrooms and other specialties.

On Shinok’s menu you can find dishes from garden and forest produce, which home style Ukrainian cuisine is so famous for. Mushroom novelties are grouped in the “forest” part of the menu. These are pies with mushrooms (130 roubles), and salad with pickled honey mushrooms, butter mushrooms and porcini mushrooms with walnut sauce and sour cream (590 roubles), and hearty mushroom noodles (620 roubles), and roasted porcini mushrooms, boletus and chanterelles (890 roubles), and vareniki with crushed potatoes, mushrooms and cracklings (590 roubles). Amateur mushroom hunters will find a lot of interesting items on the main menu. For example, assorted mushrooms of Shinok’s own salting (790 roubles), fried potatoes with porcini mushrooms (780 roubles) or chanterelles (690 roubles), porcini mushroom julienne baked in a crispy homemade bun (620 roubles). For a snack, nettle caviar is a must (420 roubles). In the forest there is wildfowl and other animals, so it is recommended that hunters focus on roast duck legs stewed with apples and dried cranberries (1,390 roubles) and an impressive dish for two – a rabbit baked in cream sauce with thyme (2,900 roubles).

Forest sweets are a separate topic. Here, there is jam from pine cones straight from Kabardino-Balkaria (290 roubles). And an absolutely unique product – honey with pine needle extract (170 roubles). Regular inclusion of pine needles in your diet will spare you from worrying about immune system (pine needles are a natural immunomodulator), cholesterol, nervous and cardiovascular system problems; you will begin to regularly get enough sleep and feel younger and stronger – after all, it is no coincidence that pine needle extracts are used to make additives for athletes, children and weakened people. At Shinok, honey with an extract of silver fir, cedar, fir or juniper is served.

In the “garden” of the restaurant you can find any root vegetables, greens, superfoods in the form of green sprouts and other vegetables. You can immediately, without much ado, order a box of fresh vegetables (650 roubles) and homemade pickles from berries and vegetables (590 roubles) in large quantities. Note the steeped watermelon (210 roubles) made according to grandma’s old recipe with Antonovka apples. Cheese lovers will like a salad with a mix of baked and pickled beets, with sunflower sprouts and pea shoots and homemade goat cheese in pistachio crumbs (590 roubles). There are many variations of eggplants: from Melanzane a funghetto to aubergines in adjika sauce. Golden potato pancakes are served with sour cream (510 roubles). And for dessert – vareniki with cherries and raspberry sauce (9 pieces for 690 roubles) and all sorts of jam (from 95 roubles).

The whole of autumn is not enough to try everything! So, don’t delay. Hurry to Shinok.