End of the bridge: the hill had to have lunch on the sidewalk

When foreigners succeed in Lithuania, when they come and stay, I am generally very happy, because it is another confirmation that Lithuania can be good for everyone, and if the Lithuanians know it is bad for them, then I can shut them down immediately: yes An immigrant, having only learned the language, I can live, work and enjoy here, what bothers you, Lithuanian, except your own apathy and neglect?

Similarly, by the way, I was speaking in England, only speaking of the variety of benefits in English: there are no jobs or opportunities for them, but when Kęsc and Vyc arrive from Lithuania, as soon as they get off the bus, they find work and work and they try it the next day. He achieves it.

It has already happened that in the luxurious Naujamiestis of the capital, where I currently have my base for creativity and recreation, there is a center of Islamic culture and education near me, and next to it was a kebab next to it, which somehow did not It felt like a restaurant, taking tables outside, in them their central Asian-type bowls, and the neighborhood suddenly became a little more motley and cheery. There are people sitting there, some of them would probably face Uzbeks face to face, if I could guess why I had to work with people from Central Asia, and I can say that they are not Tajik or Kyrgyz unless I am wrong. Of course, one could be Afghan, but since the only language that many of them speak without their mother tongue is Russian, it may not be.

You can see that many of them are friends of the owners, or the owners themselves, but when the visitors arrive, they suddenly leave the best table: wherever you want, sit there, we will adapt, you are the guest. I could add to this that I could learn Lithuanian pubs from this behavior, where the host is often sitting at the best table, bringing a computer, pulling out paper, and making an office. Who are those guests? Coffee is mainly for itself.

We sat outside on the sidewalk at the intersection of Smolensko and Statybininkų streets; If I had longer legs, I could probably get to the crosswalk in a slipper without getting up from my chair. Wonderful feeling: like in Buenos Aires, where several restaurants with only a few tables inside place other places for guests right on the sidewalk.

The image and impression of foreign immigrants who speak a weak local language but offer their own food is also great: In North Los Angeles, we found a Uighur (persecuted Chinese Muslim) restaurant where only one person spoke very little English, but the food was amazing: Chinese and Central Asian Mix Progress and diversity come from that intertwining of civilization, and I congratulate you also a lot in Lithuania. Although I know that many Lithuanians may not like it because they feel insecure, they are complex and secretly consider themselves to be a second-class breed, and therefore they want purity and racial uniformity so that all people are equal to shrimp .

The Saffron restaurant menu reflects the cuisine of the Middle East and Central Asia, without much method: the authenticity here is just that it is the cuisine of poor and poor countries, and exactly the same as I have seen, for example, in Tashkent.

People who flaunt their thousand-euro barbecue and fox fetish pilaf recipes will likely receive a flap after seeing a photo of this pilaf at our neighborhood restaurant, where large chunks of meat are placed in rice and tomatoes and cucumbers are cut like an ax. By the way, there is nothing wrong if some man (or woman) likes to do pilaf and is proud of it. But if that man explains his pilaf to everyone twice a day and declares that his pilaf is the only authentic and REAL pilgrim west of Samarkand, then that man has big problems and must be isolated from society as much as those two-legged animals that explain to everyone how much they can drink, or those sports club visitors who yell or scream loudly when they lift their weights.

The pilaf was dry, not as greasy as some of our compatriots, but that is exactly what I have eaten in Central Asia. There, fatty meat is a luxury, and ordinary people are used to eating dry.

Mantai (meatballs so big in Central Asia), 4 euros, was also difficult, so to speak, very ‘al dente’, but I will emphasize once again that people from those countries eat them so often. The kitchen is not very optimized for Lithuanians, not at all like a Hesburger, which, according to Lithuanian tastes, turns sauce into burgers so much so that it fulfills the common diner’s dream of saturated food and dress shirts.

We order liulia kebab in two variants: plate and lavash. The minced meat was excellent, fair and another detail: it surprised the fries with its goodness. It is quite possible that their shopping carts, just thrown into a deep fryer, were really crispy on the outside and soft on the inside. Yes, french fries are not part of the superior gastronomy, I’m just saying that they were made very well. The kebab in lavash in its size and load was such that you could eat it whole and enough for the whole long weekend if you ate it on Saturday, you still doubt on Monday morning if you were already hungry or not. Real men don’t eat small skewers.

Finally, about the drinks. These are the drinks I drink most of the year: full of sugar, but not to mention Russian nostalgic knockoffs: a synthetic barberry-flavored gazirovke, a green window-cleaning tarchun and the so-called “Taiga Aroma” which is plagiarism cheap for me. Baikal, sold in childhood, which in turn was Russian glue plagiarism. Why the Russian lemonades? Because in Central Asia, Russian culture has always been considered superior, as has consumption and home culture. I met a Kazakh family whose son went to study in Moscow and my mother heard with pride from everyone that after two years she no longer spoke the Kazakh language, she only communicated in Russian. For the mother, it was a sign of civilization and achievement.

And when due to the high content of unhealthy sugar in those drinks, it was something very significant in the context of that cuisine: you see, only in the West there is sugar in excess of calories, and it is avoided: in poor societies all calories are good , carbohydrates (rice) and fats (fats). meat, tallow, bacon) is useful because the historical memory of the days when eating the most every day was a luxury.

We paid twenty five euros for two, with tips, and we did not want to eat everything, there were many.

This is not a place to find gastronomic wonders. However, if the body ever, maybe due to yesterday’s celebration or for some other reason, asks for some satiety and abnormal calories, and the Vilnius crowd is happy with the sight, then this place is just for you. . Four geese out of five.

Saffron Kebab Mangal, Smolensko str. 19 / 1F, Vilnius. Tel. +370 645 18191.
Office hours depending on the circumstances, call and ask.