In September 2018, The Foodalist attended the Twins Garden Farm Festival in Moscow and had the chance to interview the brothers, Ivan and Serguey Berezutskiy.
I. & S.: We grew up in the South of Russia in a small town. And so the love for good products and good vegetables was developed in us there. Then we moved, we lived in St. Petersburg for a long time, and then we came Moscow.
I. & S.: It is a very interesting story. My brother was preparing for the Young Chef S. Pellegrino Cooking Cup, and I had an idea: let’s build a restaurant together! And he said: “okay, if you help me and I win, he , we’ll open a restaurant. If I don’t win, we won’t open a restaurant.” And he won. And we opened a restaurant. Today, 25 persons are working here.
I. & S.: Because in Russia, a farm for one restaurant, there was no such thing. This is a year-round farm, in which we control every vegetable, milk, plant and animal. Because the most important thing is that for us, gastronomy at the restaurant begins with a seed.
Also because we needed the best products. And now I think that we have the best products, the best quality in Russia.
Our farm is located in the region of Kaluga, South West of Moscow.
I. & S.: At the farm we have 150 different types of vegetables, chickens, goats, cows, ducks, a large pond where we cultivate 5 species of fish, and crayfish as well. There is an open ground, a pond where we grow fish. We even have a chickens bus!
70-80 % of our products are sourced from the farm.
We also have a lab where we experience new processes about the vegetables. All six months we work on vegetables. We either concentrate the taste of the vegetables by removing liquid or we add liquid to the products to concentrate the taste. We even have created vegetable wines. We have 8 sorts of vegetables wines now.
I. & S.: It’s very good, we like it. We complement each other very well. We’re kind of the same person, but we’re actually totally different.
I. & S.: Timiryazev Academy gave us great help. In Russia there was no full-cycle farm for restaurants. That’s why we asked them to help us organize. We needed help to understand how it all works.
I. & S.: The idea was developing itself because we have a real farm, it is not fiction. We wanted to organize an event here, to invite our guests from all over the world, our friends from all over the world, to make a great dinner, prepared only with the products from our farm.
I. & S.: We have now made a great story: we have created the first organic farm for a restaurant in Russia. We want to go further. Recycling is a big deal for us. We want the waste from the restaurant, to go to the farm, to be recycled into compost, and to make somehow a complete system, a full cycle.
We also wish that everyone gets to know about this restaurant and that people come specially to our restaurant from all over the world.
We want toglorify Russian cuisine, Russian gastronomy, Russian ingredients all over the world. Because we have something to be proud of.
I. & S.: Probably mushrooms, slow-cooked in a Russian oven, it’s super-typical for Russian cuisine. These are not just the standard borsch and caviar. Mushrooms are more used in Russia than other ingredients because they are everywhere.
I. & S.: Of course, History has influenced Russian cuisine. In any case, History has much influence, the influence was exerted by the French at the time and by other countries. Like any country. There was, and there is now development of Russian cuisine.
I. & S.: Thank you!
