The first draw at Tun Lahmajo, a restaurant in Burbank lined with grainy woods to resemble a summer time cabin, is correct there within the title. A mottled, golden-edged lahmajo lands on almost each desk — or possibly three or 4 of them, for each individual in a bunch.
In Levantine Arabic, the dish is called lahm bi ajeen: actually, “meat with dough.” Armenians shortened the phrase and tailored the flatbread as their very own. Cooks at Tun Lahmajo stretch their floury palette almost as skinny as a water cracker, although the flavour has way more char and tang. Cooks smear on a silky-rough combination of seasoned beef and tomato paste proper to the brim, which regularly handsomely buckles within the warmth of baking.
They may arrive oval, or rounder, or someplace rectangular and in between. Their unpredictable magnificence is a reminder that an precise human somebody is within the kitchen shaping them. At all times, a server rushes them straight from the oven, once they’re directly crisp and flexible, on plates the place the crusty circumference hangs simply over the rim. A squarish wedge of lemon has been dropped on the lahmajo’s heart. Spritzing juice over the floor cuts the concentrated meatiness. Loads of clients request additional citrus.
I may cease right here, and it could suffice as a suggestion. The signature at Tun Lahmajo, constant and wonderful, has already been embraced by the Armenian group of Los Angeles, the most important diaspora inhabitants outdoors of Armenia. They’re preserving the place busy.
Within the months because the restaurant opened final summer time, although, the menu has saved increasing, to the purpose that it may be approached two methods: as a roster of consolation meals, and as a doorway into one delicacies’s lengthy and complex historical past.
Lahmajo goes into the oven. Recent baked lahmajo and Megrelakan khachapuri. (Ron De Angelis / For The Instances)
To stay with the bready theme a bit of longer: A single variation of lahmajo is offered, shellacked with cheese. However hedonistically tacky khachapuris — specialties of the Republic of Georgia, bordering Armenia to the north — yank my consideration away.
Adjarian khachapuri, the model tapered on the ends to resemble a canoe, will likely be remembered by meals obsessives for its second on the finish of final decade. Cheese fills its hull; after baking, the prepare dinner cracks over an egg or two with pats of butter to magnify the richness. Mix all of it with a spoon and voila: molten dip in a bread bowl.
To make the puffed Megrelakan (typically known as Megrelian) khachapuri, eggs and butter are folded into stretchy, grated sulguni cheese earlier than cooking. This one is the jewel. Servers carry it wobbling via the eating room, deflating like a souffle, after which they carve it into sixths on the desk utilizing a pizza wheel. Sizzling and irresistible, the feel is billowy, offset by the crisp, blistered fringes. Because the speckled pie cools and its substances settle and condense, an interesting salty-sharpness turns into extra overt.
Fish Khashlama sits on the heart of a ramification of dishes.
(Ron De Angelis / For The Instances)
Savory breads have been the main focus from the start, when Eduard Janibekyan and his household opened the primary Tun Lahmajo in Yerevan, the capital of Armenia, in 2008. (The restaurant area had initially been their ground-floor house. “Tun” is Armenian for “home.”) Because the enterprise discovered its rhythms, the Janibekyans had the bandwidth so as to add broader classes of homestyle dishes: chilly salads, roasted meats, a spread of soups and herbed stews. They mirrored the method, sped up, at their Burbank location.
L.A.’s greatest Armenian eating places are inclined to excel at one forte: the beautiful marinated and charcoal-grilled meats at Mini Kabob; the mulchy pleasures of the greens-filled flatbread at namesake Zhengyalov Hatz; the cured beef, stingingly spiced, packed into sandwiches at Sahag’s Basturma. That, or they serve Lebanese-Armenian menus that hint again to the longstanding diaspora group in Beirut. Presently, the best amongst our Lebanese-Armenian establishments is the Hollywood outpost of Carousel.
Mary Janibekyan and Arsen Sardaryan with their son Vahagn, a part of the household behind Tun Lahmajo.
(Ron De Angelis / For The Instances)
Only a few native locations delve into the regionally particular Armenian repertoire — what Janibekyan’s son Vladislav outlined in an interview as “Caucasian cuisine,” referring to the geographic space situated between the Black and Caspian seas broadly outlined because the Caucasus.
Sorting the roots of Armenian meals should take into consideration the aftermath of the genocidal killing of greater than 1 million Armenians beginning in 1915, and the almost 70 years beneath the Soviet regime that intently adopted and led to 1991. The landlocked nation, bordering Turkey and Iran to the west, has been a fought-over juncture for millenniums.
“Cultural and gastronomic exchange has been part and parcel of this region for ages … Armenians do not have a national cuisine in the same sense as nationalities that possessed a long history of statehood and well-defined frontiers,” wrote Irina Petrosian and David Underwood of their 2006 guide, “Armenian Food: Fact, Fiction & Folklore.” For the instance of lahmajo, the authors pointed to repatriated Armenians within the Sixties getting back from the Syrian metropolis of Aleppo as those who launched the dish to Yerevan.
How does all this advanced historical past inform a meal in Burbank?
1. Tun Lahmajo has already been embraced by the Armenian group of Los Angeles, the most important diaspora inhabitants outdoors of Armenia. (Ron De Angelis / For The Instances)
Order a starter of strained yogurt, its density someplace between mascarpone and cream cheese, to dollop over ripped hunks of lahmajo and convey silkiness to meats like lamb ribs roasted within the oven. I really like the best way qrchick, a ruddy soup jolted with pickled cabbage, slashes the richness of the khachapuris.
A dish of mildly spiced, sautéed beef and potatoes, each minimize into strips, has been made by Armenian cooks for therefore lengthy that nobody can fairly pinpoint the origin of its nickname. It’s known as “ker u sus,” which colloquially interprets as “shut up and eat.” If the mixture doesn’t immediately stoke your nostalgia, your inquisitive palate could also be extra stirred by ostri, garlicky spiced beef infused with dried pink chiles and fenugreek. Avelouk, a tangle of untamed sorrel served cool and garnished with crushed walnuts, brings a welcome infusion of inexperienced to the combo.
Khashlama is a class of brothy stews. An elemental variation made with lamb teeters on bland, however the generously sized fish khashlama is a summery pleasure, introduced out in a pot with hunks of trout (look ahead to bones), peeled potatoes and complete peppers, and heaped with dill, parsley and different feathery herbs.
Avelouk is served cool with a tangle of untamed sorrel served cool and garnished with crushed walnuts.
(Ron De Angelis / For The Instances)
If you happen to can tempo your lunch or dinner with leisure, ask for the standard and endearingly common chmur: Russets roasted within the oven for 40 minutes after which smooshed tableside, together with loads of butter, by a server wielding a wood masher.
I may race you down different rabbit holes, together with the Levantine shades of kebabs, shawarma, ishli (recognized elsewhere as kibbeh) and a bulghur-heavy riff on tabbouleh, or borscht and oil-glossed, Uzbekistani-style pilaf to swerve into Soviet-era holdovers. The menu is daunting, and in opposition to the various different highlights these selections every fee as tremendous sufficient.
In all probability there will likely be little room for dessert, however I have to level out the gata, a spherical pastry-cake hybrid served heat that hides an nearly custardy layer just below the highest crust. One may debate empires and authenticity over a ramification at Tun Lahmajo, or take its soulful cooking at face worth, however ultimately a standout meal concludes because it ought to start: with a bronzed factor of magnificence pulled sizzling from the oven.
Tun Lahmajo
2202 N. Glenoaks Blvd., Burbank, (626) 553-8717, instagram.com/tunlahmajo.usa
Costs: savory Armenian flatbreads and tacky breads $6.80 to $25, soups $12 to $14, salads $9 to $15, meats and stews $23 to $39, desserts $7 to $18.
Particulars: Open each day, 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. No alcohol (however attempt the natural “Armenian bouquet” tea). Lot and avenue parking.
Really helpful dishes: lahmajo, Megrelakan khachapuri, fish khashlama, ostri (spiced beef), strained yogurt, aveolouk (greens with walnut and pomegranate), gata (candy pastry-cake hybrid).
A diorama of the Janibekyan household dwelling in Armenia is perched in a nook on the wall at Tun Lahmajo.
(Ron De Angelis / For The Instances)
