Diora opens the world of Uzbek cuisine

@X BTO Byline attribution italic:Daily Herald Correspondent

It's certainly no easy feat to run a restaurant, including trying to please the generally flimsy crowd of “foodies,” in the current whirlwind of economic uncertainty. It's a mystery to me why anyone would subject himself to long, exhausting hours, an unpredictable market and a capricious audience that can insult you on the Web on a whim.

Try to be an ethnic restaurant, representing a country few could point out on a map, and the ante gets raised. Try to be an Uzbek restaurant in Buffalo Grove, in an otherwise ordinary strip mall, and there is more than a slight chance you sink into the abyss of disinterest faster than you can boil your oxtail soup.

Perhaps that's why I was so pleasantly rewarded when I happened upon a place as quietly elegant as Diora — a restaurant which impressed us on so many levels and so unexpectedly, we felt like we were being courted by the cuisine and ambience, and by the time we left, we had silly, satisfied grins on our faces.

We stopped in for a Sunday dinner around 6 p.m., to a completely empty dining room bathed in the maroons of the tablecloths and walls, that reflected in the entire wall length of mirrors. A single flat-screen television adorned the opposite wall.

Over the course of the evening the place filled up, but for that first half-hour, we had it all to ourselves, including the expertise of owner Lenny Gelfond, who greeted us and spent no less than 10 minutes explaining each item on the menu, how everything is cooked, the highlights and where he sources his never-frozen beef and lamb, (Wisconsin, via a once-a-week trip), his wine, and beer — including one “raw” Uzbek one. Lenny's wife — Dee is in the kitchen, cooking up the home-style dishes.

Breads and doughs are a big part of Uzbek cuisine, and its central role was confirmed on more than one occasion — from the hot, homemade and crisply outfitted round bread rolls, to a taste of the ultimate comfort food — lamb and beef samsas — flaky, baked puff pastry domes filled with sauteed onions and juicy chopped meat with a delicate spice.

A vegetable soup with tiny noodles and even tinier meaty dumplings was made to order specifically for us as something we “should like very much.” And we did.

The rest of the menu uniquely combined Eastern European with the Middle Eastern: a starter of ox tails and beef tongue meat plate; shish kebabs, including a ground beef “Lula” kebab; or a qovurma lagmon — homemade pasta fried with lamb, tomatoes and herbs.

Each menu item we inquired about was explained to us in detail — from the origins of the dark red, super sweet Georgian wine to the salads and main dishes. These good, honest and knowledgeable recommendations from the owner — including sayings like “no, you've had this before, I've got something better for you” meant we could trust pretty much everything he brought our way.

The chicken kebab stabbed on a skewer was generous, crispy skinned chunks of chicken thighs, surrounded by Diora potatoes — thin, round slices of potato fried like chips and curled with crispness on the outside, but with a deliciously soft middle.

A pilaf Bayram, (Bayram is a Turkish word for celebration, religious or secular) was one of the crown jewels of the menu — a heap of hot yellow rice, moist and crunchy where it had absorbed the frying oil, studded with sweet raisins and small, perfectly salty cubed pieces of lamb.

Even a simple salad of tomatoes, onions and dill with a little olive oil was as satisfying as any salad I've eaten on location in Europe.

Dessert too was made on the spot — a rich, decadent Napoleon of crispy, rhomb-shaped baklava dough layers each carefully alternated with the richest, sweetest cream filling we'd tasted in a while. After multiple inquires, Lenny would only allow that there was a bit of condensed milk in there bringing on all that sweetness.

Ÿ Restaurant reviews are based on one anonymous visit. The Daily Herald does not review restaurants it cannot recommend.

Diora Restaurant

1034 Weiland Road, Buffalo Grove

(847) 419-0400; diorarestaurant.com

<b>Cuisine: </b>Uzbek

<b>Setting: </b>Small, elegant space enlivened with mirrors and burgundy tablecloths

<b>Entrees:</b> $7.99 to $13.98

<b>Hours: </b>11 a.m. to 9 p.m. Wednesday and Thursday; 11 a.m. to 10:30 p.m. Friday; 11 a.m. to 11:30 p.m. Saturday; 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. Sunday