26: The Chef Who Turned his Restaurant into a Bomb Shelter
26: The Chef Who Turned his Restaurant into a Bomb Shelter
The special psychology of war, and discovering you can act
Hi there,
I’ve been traveling for some war-related reporting in Lithuania and Finland, but in between I’ve been housesitting for some friends in Sweden whose lovely home includes a small farm where they raise chickens and sheep. A couple of days ago, I was walking one of the dogs, a loveable tank of a Labrador who still hasn’t outgrown his puppy exuberance. One of the chickens had gotten out from the pasture where they normally spend the day, and before I could realize what was happening, the dog lunged for it. Hen in mouth, he would no longer let me get near him and nothing I could do—not my shouts, not my futile attempts to corner him, not the raw lamb meat I tried to offer as an alternative—induced him to release the poor bird. When, hours later, he finally left the dead carcass on the doorstep, I found myself sobbing uncontrollably.
I’ve spent enough time on farms that I’m normally not undone by the death of animals. But this—even while I could recognize it as the product of a young dog’s instinct—felt like violence, and I had been powerless to stop it. What reduced me to tears, I think, was the way that moment echoed the much deeper, ongoing feelings of helplessness that many of us feel about Ukraine.
And so I offer a story of its opposite. It’s a story about someone who, although even a month could never have imagined the circumstances in which he and his fellow citizens now find themselves, has discovered he can act. Ievgen Klopotenko is one of Ukraine’s best-known chefs. Now, astonishingly, he is feeding hundreds of soldiers and refugees a day, and has turned his Kyiv restaurant into bomb shelter.
You can support the work of Ievgen and his team directly, by donating here. There are also links to other international campaigns with which he is working in the story below, as well as a special section in the calendar at the end about Copenhagen fundraising events. Finally, although I’m making this issue free to everyone, should you choose to subscribe—thanks to everyone who did that last week—I’ll continue donating the fees to World Central Kitchen and Cook For Ukraine. It’s not much, but it makes me feel slightly less helpless.
Thanks for reading,
Lisa
When I ask Ievgen Klopotenko how he spent the day before Russia invaded his country, he laughs. “We have a fun game in Ukraine now,” he says by phone. “You call a friend and you ask ‘what day is it today?’ He won’t be able to tell you, because we no longer have things like, ‘oh it’s eight o'clock we should go and take a coffee, or today is Friday and that means you go to the restaurant or oh, it’s Saturday and that means tomorrow you get to be with the family. No, all we know is that it’s been 15 days of war.”
Ievgen and I spoke on March 11, when, after those 15 days of war, he was taking his family to a safer location in Ukraine. The following day, he would return, alone, to Kyiv because despite the danger, he felt compelled to go back and do what he could to help the Ukrainian cause. “I should do what I can do: I can organize, I can cook,” he said. “I want to be useful.”
Klopotenko has spent his career making himself useful to the cause of Ukrainian cuisine. As a cookbook author and former Master Chef Ukraine winner, he began showcasing local ingredients and historic techniques, a focus that intensified when he opened his restaurant, 100 Years Back Into the Future, in 2019. Thanks to a menu that features dishes like fried honey bees with black pepper and sorrel, and pork ribs baked in kvass, he has become one of the country’s most acclaimed chefs.
Like many people in Ukraine, he both knew the war was coming, and didn’t believe it would really happen. “For 3 months, every time you turned on the news, it was ‘Tomorrow Russia Will Attack,” he recalls. “And then you’d wake up, and Russia hadn’t attacked. Two and a half months of the same song–you get used to it, and you get used to the idea that it won’t happen. Like it’s just a game of the Russian government.”
The game ended on February 24. The day before had been a busy one for Ievgen. He runs a program to improve the food in school cafeterias and that morning, he had a meeting with the team from the First Lady’s office for how they could advance it further. He also occasionally holds immersive, theater-like programs at the restaurant, and he had done one of those during the day too. Finally, he got a massage, because his shoulder was bothering him. Somewhere in the middle of all that, his sister called him to tell him that her car had broken down, and she wanted to make sure he would be around the following day, in case anything happened. “It was as if she knew,” he says.
He slept through the first Russian volleys and only learned that the invasion had begun when his business partner called. “My phone was on silent, but for some reason it rang anyway,” he says. “When I picked up, all she said was, ‘the war has started.” The scenarios started running through his head: all the World War II movies he had seen, the bombings, people crying, the bloodshed. “You feel a lot of adrenaline in that moment, but you don’t know what it means. Is your city going to be bombed? For the first couple of hours we didn’t have any information, and that was the scariest thing. Because you’re just imagining all the worst things that could happen.”
But that was only with part of his brain. The other part, he says, “was telling you to act.” He was in the car within minutes after his partner called, and at his sister’s within minutes after that. “I understood that I was responsible for my people, that I couldn’t panic.” They drove out of town, watching the sky for planes, their first stop a village where they hoped they would be safe.
He left his family there, and returned to Kyiv. The capital had shut down initially, but when Russia’s plan to take the city in three days did not come to fruition, everyone got to work. There was a lot of social pressure on men to do the ‘manly’ thing and take up arms, but Ievgen didn’t think that was the best use of his skills. “I could pick up a gun, but someone will kill me very fast,” he says wryly. “I think it’s more efficient for me to do something I’m good at. “
On the Monday following the invasion, he began repurposing his kitchens–one at the restaurant, the other a ‘dark’ kitchen he had opened for takeaway during the pandemic—as a kind of frontline canteen to feed anyone who needs feeding. “Sometimes it’s for the civil army, sometimes just for citizens,” Ievgen says. “It doesn’t matter who they are. It’s for Ukraine’s future.”
He’s aided not only by his own staff, but by volunteers across the city and country–many of them with experience from the first Russian invasion in 2014—who organize logistics, supplies, and distribution. “I can call up and say I’ve got 20 kilos of chicken and nothing else today,” he says. “And this person will arrange to have more chicken brought to the restaurant, and maybe some vegetables too.” They’ve also gotten help from World Central Kitchen, the NGO founded by chef José Andrés, to feed people in crisis zones. Iegven and his team now make anywhere between 500-1500 meals a day.
He also turned his restaurant into a bomb shelter. The dining room is on the second floor, but the kitchen and other parts of the restaurant are underground, so every time the air raid sirens go off, people from the neighborhood run to its basement; sometimes, they end up sleeping there.
He’s also involved in several international initiatives to collect money for his country. In addition to supporting the #CookForUkraine project, he helped launch an international campaign, called #MakeBorschtNotWar, that raise funds not only by encouraging chefs and restaurants to add the traditional Ukrainian soup to their menus and donate the proceeds, but also by asking home cooks to post their versions on social media. “I know it seems like such a small thing, but it helps a lot,” he says. “It tells Ukrainians that we’re not alone.”
Like every other Ukrainian, Klopotenko has found himself in a situation he could not even imagine just three weeks ago, and he still sounds a little astonished by the resilience he and his fellow citizens have found within themselves. “At first, it’s just fear,” Ievgen says. “But then you think maybe the army is going to stop the invasion, and you feel some small relief, like things aren’t so bad. Then the next day you’re worried again, that you’re not safe. And then, you kind of get used to it. ”
He pauses, and tries to clarify. “The first [air raid] alarm was awful. Now it goes off and you keep sipping your tea,” he says. “It’s a very special psychology. You never get 100% used to it, but after a while you start joking, ‘please rocket can you just strike me because I can’t be running to the basement five times a day.’”
Since the time we spoke, Ievgen has opened another kitchen in Lviv, in the west, where he and his team are cooking for Ukrainians displaced by the war, including those who are fleeing from the horrific violence in Mariupol. But even as he shuttles now between those who have lost their homes and those, back in Kyiv, who are still clinging to them, he has managed to find something worthwhile . “The war has united Ukraine,” he says. “So you have fear, but it isn’t as strong as it was before. And now you have a little hope too.”
Upcoming Events in Copenhagen
A special section for Ukraine fundraisers tops the calendar, followed by other food-and-drink related events that may be of interest. If you’ve got an event coming up that you’d like to see on the calendar, please send it to bord@substack.com
Events to Aid Ukraine
21 Mar: Borscht fundraiser at KBH+. With help from Cafe Stadion, the cultural center KBH+ in Nørrebro offers borscht and garlic bread, in exchange for donations to aid Ukraine.
27 March: Angelika Lunch to raise funds for Ukraine. Restaurant Geranium revives its all-vegetable popup for one day, to raise money for Unicef Ukraine.
27 March: Slava Ukraini Fundraiser at St Pauli 54. A celebration of Ukrainian drinks (with snacks), with help from Oinofilia, Melin Vin, Juuls, Moravin, Empirical and others, to raise money for medical supplies to Ukraine.
Other Events
25 Mar: Brøens Gadekøkken Reopens. The street food mecca returns with old favorites like Strutto CPH and Lola Impact, and new additions including Poulette and District Tonkin. With live music and special offers all weekend.
26 Mar: Amass Blackout Dinner. To raise awareness around Earth Hour, chefs Magnus Petterson (Selma), Kyumin Hanh (Kadeau), Kamilla Seidler (Lola) and Nick Curtain (Alouette) join Matt Orlando to cook a dinner without electricity.
26 Mar: Afterservice at Fiskebar. Lumpfish roe Kebabs and a latenight dance floor, with music from Lulu Rouge
26-27 March: Johnny’s MASTER x Kona. Chef John Javier, the force behind the acclaimed restaurants Master (Sydney) and Happy Paradise (Hong Kong) brings his take on Chinese cuisine to Kona’s omakase kitchen.
31 March: Emilie Qvist at Vipp Supper Club. The chef of Medvind in Hanstholm brings her exciting approach to fresh seafood to Islands Brygge for one night.
1-2 April: Reffen Street Food Reopens. The other Copenhagen street food mecca reopens on Mar 30, but celebrates over the weekend with live music and the debut of its new nightclub, Werkstatt
4 April: Salon on Salted Fish. Microbiologist Susanne Knøchel from Copenhagen University and chef Matt Orlando from Amass talk about the past and future of salt-cured fish.