olha pryymak

Minimal decor, old style furniture and young knowledgeable  spunky stuff – this is why the place was rated in the top 50 best restaurants in the world… in spite of serving traditional British cuisine.

oil on panel 15×15 cm, 2009,  sold

Another cafe scene, of a gentleman being lost in his thoughts. Maybe he is thinking of upcoming birthday, and how fleeting time is. The cozy restaurant I chose for a setting is the Chaat – Bangladeshi kitchen/teahouse on Redchurch street in Shoreditch – a great gem in the sea of restaurants in the neighboring Brick Lane. Unlike the lot, this place has to it a cool indie feel and offers great home cooked food.

oil on panel 15×15 cm

Please email me if you would like to own this piece (at $75 USD).

Looking for a fine dining experience, Yuri Uzzband and me came to Korona Vitovta – the best restaurant in Lutsk, standing right at the door of the Lubart castle.  It  all started well, the funnest part came with the bill. at the dinner.  We had one glass of wine each,  and the bill modestly displayed six of each ?! ‘Funny,” thought I and went asking about this number 6. “The foreigner (Yuri) asked for a “big” glass of wine,” explained Luda (our waitress).

By now you (who spent some time in Ukraine) all know  that Ukrainian menus like to trick you with items priced by grams, and then the waiters take the liberty at judging how many of those grams your wallet can handle.   Luda’s stab at this problem exceeded all expectations: 6×50=300 grams of wine. “Why didn’t you bring us the whole bottle in that “big” glass?” we asked, very annoyed. “You should have declined the glass when you saw it was 300 gram”. “Forgot my measuring cup at home,”  I defiantly thought. The worst part was that the wine in question was flat. Be on guard if you see too many kinds of wine by the glass in the menu. It could have been sitting open for months, like ours did.

Appalled at this Luda’s lame attempt to trick us, we demonstratively payed the $25 per glass, promising we’d tell every expat to avoid the place. So now you now.  Btw, with the quick poll via blackberry among his “high-flying” friends Yuri Uzzband concluded, that $25 per glass could  cost at only other place in the word – the Beverly Hills Hotel bar!