Ravintola Grön

Olivia Shanler

If you ask most people to name their top culinary destinations, I guarantee that none of them would have listed Finland. Commonly associated with happiness, Nordic landscapes, and carbon-neutral policies, most people wouldn’t think of Helsinki, the Finnish capital, as a culinary mecca. Having visited Finland this summer, I wouldn’t say that the food scene I experienced in Helsinki was as well-established as those of Paris, Tokyo, or Rome (the country still bares the permanent effects of its fairly recent Soviet occupation), but the cultural values of equality, sustainability, honesty, and quality shined in every meal I enjoyed. While I ate at a wide variety of restaurants, from casual salad-focused joints, to upscale French bistros, and even an innovative bar themed after a laundromat, one meal that surprised me the most was my dinner at Ravintola Grön, the restaurant that somehow remains humble, celebrating good ingredients and good times, while also possessing a coveted Michelin star.

Grön offers a set menu based on seasonal, high-quality Finnish and Nordic produce, reflecting the natural flow of ingredients throughout the year. Offering two menu options, traditional and vegan/vegetarian, they have different tasting courses throughout Winter, Spring, Summer, and Autumn. They source ingredients from producers around the country, the forest, the ocean, and their own farm, aiming to highlight them when they are at their absolute best. The restaurant seats only 18, and offers an open kitchen. The executive chef and owner, Toni Kostian, calls Grön “a tribute to creativity, the wild, and us all.” After my experience here, I can without a doubt vouch for the creativity of the chefs, the homage paid to Finnish nature and culture, and the celebration of dining itself.

The 13 course tasting menu started off strong with a dish of white fish, wood sorrel, coriander seeds, and wild horseradish. A fine overlay of thinly sliced, delicate wild horseradish and wood sorrel root complemented a perfectly tender white fish ceviche, awakening my palate with tangy and sour flavors.

The second course, one of their more Instagram-famous dishes, was the tomato, oregano, and kombu pie. Served in a delicately crispy crust, the tomato and oregano confit with red currant brought to mind the freshness of summer produce, and the vibrancy of fresh herbs. The familiar flavors transported me back to my childhood, evoking flavors similar to pizza. This dish was a fun tactile experience (I was instructed to eat with my hands, not utensils), and the deliberate craftsmanship blew me away, down to the structural integrity of the tart shell (which stayed intact, not crumbling over my hands as I ate) and the kombu seaweed seasoning brushed over the tart’s exterior.

The next dish of grilled and cream corn, blueberries, and Rossini caviar, was a delight, and the natural sweetness of the grilled corn played well with the blueberries. I can never say no to caviar, and found the saltiness to compliment the sweeter flavors of the dish.

Then came more caviar: salmon roe served with a new harvest potato. Buttery, comforting, and rich, the fondant new potatoes topped with delicate onion flowers and roe evoked a lightness in a dish that could have easily been too heavy and decadent.

Half-eaten new potatoes (photographic evidence that the phone doesn’t alway eat first)

The garden beans with black currant leaf, aged pork shank, and pork rib broth with more caviar boasted vibrant green colors that reminded me of the Finnish countryside I had explored earlier in the day, but at this point, I was feeling that the menu may have been too caviar-heavy. Sometimes, including so much of one ingredient can make a tasting menu feel gimmicky, but the heavy inclusion of this “black gold” is due to the Russian influences on Finnish cuisine and culture.

The next dish was one of my favorites, and that was the barbeque morels au farchi, spruce shoot, and summer truffle sauce. A harmony of mushrooms, a foamy yet velvety sauce enrobed tiny morels, delicately stuffed with chicken and truffle, and topped with a tender spruce shoot. This was definitely one of the most unique dishes on the menu, and I was amazed at the skill and innovation behind this dish, as well as the sheer talent of the chefs to stuff the tiny morels. I had also never had spruce shoot before, and I found the texture to be springy, fresh, and mild. This paired well with the luxurious truffle sauce and intense flavors of the dish.

Next, we ate honey, fennel pollen, and thyme Brioche bread with house-churned butter, which had a pleasantly crispy exterior that complemented the luscious butter. The next dish of lobster tail, roasted summer carrot, and honey fudge sauce was tender, sweet, and decadent. By contrast, the Finnish lamb rack grilled on top of juniper wood with spring garlic and a cabbage mille feuille was hearty and rustic, a celebration of Arctic winters and the harsh yet beautiful Finnish countryside.

Lobster with carrots and honey fudge sauce

After enjoying these courses, it was time for a palate cleanser, then dessert. A dish of white currant, lemon verbena, Finnish ginger, and bee pollen came next, and the fresh citrus flavor of the lemon verbena sorbet prepared me for the several dessert items.

My personal favorite dessert was the grilled strawberry ice cream with quince meringue and summer flowers. Topped with a delightfully chewy strawberry gelee (which brought to mind the Fruit Roll-Ups of my childhood), the grilled strawberry ice cream was vastly different from the average strawberry ice cream found in grocery stores. This dish delivered a punch of fruity flavor, and the textures of the chilly ice cream and fluffy meringue blew me away. I’m usually not a fan of strawberry ice cream, but the deepness of the flavor and the many textures of this dish made it one of my favorites of the night.

We finished our meal with a round of small dessert plates designed to showcase Finnish ingredients and nature. The sorrel pate de fruit was perfectly chewy, with a crisp sugary exterior, and a burst of tangy flavor. Commonly foraged in the Finnish forests, sorrel is eaten by the several types of deer native to Finland, and also by hungry hikers looking for a quick alpine snack. Next, celebrating the popular liquorice candy beloved by Finns, we ate the kombu “liquorice” with muscovado (an unrefined brown sugar) and lemon thyme. This dish simulated liquorice, but is actually made from kombu, a type of algae, marinated in brown sugar and other flavors. The texture similarity between this dish and the penny candy liquorice at Finnish grocery stores is uncanny, and I found this to be a unique and innovative dish.

Next, we enjoyed the chocolate tartlet with summer berries and raspberry ganache. Have I eaten many chocolate and berry desserts in my day? Yes. Is this the most unique dessert on the planet? No. But was it delicious, you may ask? Without a doubt, yes. The raspberry ganache formed the tart shell on these bite-size treats, and the summer berries reminded me of the berries I foraged for in the woods earlier on my trip to Finland. I found this dish to be a welcome addition to the dessert round of my meal, and I thought that it showcased the fruit flavors beautifully.

The next dish of the meadowsweet caramel was visually stunning. Served in the form of little chocolate eggs in a realistic bird’s nest, the meadow sweet caramels were as fun to eat as they were delicious. An herb commonly found in damp European meadows, meadowsweet can be foraged and used to treat a variety of maladies. The meadowsweet added a pleasantly light bitterness to the chocolate that offset the sweetness of the caramel. In the end, however, I thought this was a weaker point of the dessert round, as the visual presentation was my favorite part.

My meal at Ravintola Grön was not perfect, the desserts had some weak points, and not all of the dishes stood out to me equally. However, the intention of this tasting menu is not to be perfect, it is to represent Finnish cuisine, ingredients, and culture in the form of fine dining. When I think of my meal at Ravintola Grön, I think of the food being delicious, but I also think of Finland, and an appreciation for the country that produced my meal. When I think of the meal I enjoyed, I remember life events from my time in Finland, from foraging for mushrooms and berries with a wildlife photographer, to seeing 6 moose graze in a field of clover at sunrise, to thrifting the perfect top at a store frequented by Finnish teens, and the feeling of jumping into the Baltic sea after a sauna session. While my meal at Ravintola Grön was not perfect, to me, it was perfectly Finnish, and as Grön’s head chef, Toni Kostian, says, “It happens often that the best food memories [need] a lot more than just food, [they need] good people, fresh ingredients, and the perfect surrounding!”