Kachka is diving into the world of mid-day dining at its new digs on SE 11th. The Slavic/Russian/Soviet restaurant from James Beard nominated chef Bonnie Morales just launched its lunch service, with thin filled blini, dumplings, and skewers to nosh in its sun-soaked dining room.
A few of the restaurant’s blini, filled with things like beet-cured salmon and smoked veal breast, are only available during lunch. On a recent research trip to Eastern Europe, the team fell in love with the popular lunchtime blini, and decided to add their own version to the menu loosely inspired by the version from Russian fast food chain Teremok. The veal blin comes with litovsky cheese, sauerkraut, and spicy mustard, while a lighter beet-cured salmon blin gets a dose of parsley sauce, cornflowers, and pickled celery hearts. The Caesar Blin, filled with a Caesar-like salad and optional fried smelts, also appears on the dinner menu.
Kachka’s lunch also includes several hits from its dinner menu: Dumplings filled with farmer’s cheese or veal are available in bowls with optional broth, as well as zakuski like Herring Under a Fur Coat and raspberry soup. Its new location now has a mangal, a Russian grill often used for skewers called shashliki. For lunch, shashliki range from Azeri-style sturgeon to lamb kebab, with the option of adding house-baked lepyoshka (grilled Uzbek bread) or achichuk salad made with tomato and dill.
The restaurant’s lunch is available from 11:30 a.m. to 2 p.m., with optional reservations or walk-ins.
Update, August 7, 2018, 11:20 a.m.
This story has been updated to include more information about the blini.
Correction: This story has been corrected to show the Caesar Blin is also available for dinner, not just lunch.
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