Helsinki, Finland

Ragu on Ludviginkatu serves à la carte, fixed menu Ragu or Chef’s surprise menu (with 3, 4 or 5 courses). Our choice was Chef’s menu (57€) with wine menu (49€). We skipped the sparkling this time and got first served bread plate (4 different types with 4 different spreads), not bad at all.

First course, white fish with puikula-potato came with nice Italian Sauvignon Blanc. All the wines (at least on the wine package) are Italian. Good start in my opinion, even though some other thought the fish was too salty. Next one was a real gimmick, tartar with smoked mozzarella. The dish was served in closed jar, once opened, the smoke came out. Might have said that was a bit cheesy and cheap trick, but the smokiness on the mozzarella complemented nicely the excellent tartar so I thought it actually suited this particular dish very well. This was also my favorite from the whole menu. But the wine pairing did not quite make a great combination (can’t even remember the grape now, but it was white wine with some hint of apple).

After cold starters came Parma ham with warm Jerusalem artichoke soup/sauce. OK, but nothing special there. For the main was venison shank. The meat melted in your mouth, but mine would have needed some basic salt and pepper. I wonder if salt was forgotten, as I rarely need extra salt and others did not share my opinion.

Dessert was quite basic Crème brûlée with raspberry sorbet. Followed the same pattern as two previous dishes, good but nothing extraordinaire.

So overall good but my expectations were a little bit higher. Nevertheless, would go again without a question. Some dishes left me wondering were they trying to fit too many components on one dish. Sometimes simpler is better.