“My favorite Azerbaijani restaurant is ____. It’s much easier to fill in that blank when the restaurant in question is Mexican, Vietnamese or French.
Before sitting down to eat at Anar Usubov’s Bistro 4293, I’d read his website’s headline, “Mediterranean Restaurant & Bar.” That made me think of Mica Talmor’s Pomella, at the other end of Piedmont Avenue, which sadly closed in May. When describing her cuisine, Talmor included Levantine, Maghrebi, North African, Eastern European and Middle Eastern food as relevant influences.
In a similar fashion, Usubov is using the term “Mediterranean” as a point of entry for diners who are unfamiliar with his home country’s cooking. Bistro 4293 serves a hummus trio ($17)—plain, basil and grilled red peppers—but the texture is entirely different from Pomella’s. Talmor whipped her chickpeas into a smooth frenzy. Chef Teymur Piriyev, and his sous chef and wife, Gunay, prefer to make a chunkier version. The dip made with basil is particularly well-suited to the blank flavor canvas that is a naked chickpea. Fresh, herby basil spices it up and changes its neutral beige color to a pleasant and pale shade of green.
In a phone interview, Usubov explained that Azerbaijani food is informed by centuries of cultural traditions. “You can actually get similar tastes by trying Iranian, Afghani or Armenian cuisine,” he said. Azerbaijan shares its borders with Georgia, Armenia, Iran and the Caspian Sea. But each country, he noted, adds their own ingredients and creative takes on many of the same dishes.
In chef Piriyev’s saffron flame chicken ($30), I recognized flavors adjacent to that of a Persian joojeh kabob, or grilled chicken skewers. The flame chicken is cooked on the bone and, like its Persian equivalent, served with a confit tomato. Pairing the slowly blistered tomato with a seasoned piece of chicken is an absolutely succulent combination.
Usubov, who grew up on a farm, said that Bistro 4293 embraces farm-to-table cooking. He notes that the Piriyevs are also not taking short cuts in the kitchen when it comes to making all the dishes. Citing dolmas as an example, he said, “We buy grape leaves from Turkey. It’s a specific tender grape leaf, which is not supposed to be thick.” The chefs wrap them all by hand. “It’s a lot of labor; can you imagine like four to five hundred pieces [a day]?”
They take the same approach with their eggplant rolls ($15). Thin slices of grilled eggplant wrap a walnut and onion mixture that’s made as thick as the hummus. The vegetarian at our table initially thought the rolls were filled with ground meat, but our server confirmed it was merely the texture of the ground walnuts.
The word “Mediterranean” recurred on the menu for the preparation of lamb chops ($44) and sea bass ($36). Again, the Middle Eastern influences are just as prevalent, and, in both cases, just as delicious. I remember momentarily turning my head away from the plate of fish, bathed in a lemon butter sauce and served with mashed potatoes, only to find it, upon a second glance, wiped completely clean.
Bistro 4293 is located in Dopo’s old space at the top of the bustling avenue. After spending three years readying the place, Usubov opened the restaurant in June. He tried out a few chefs before finding the Piriyevs on the messaging site Telegram. The couple posted that they were moving to California from Atlanta and looking for an opportunity to cook. “We talked on the phone, and I told him my vision and he told me his,” Usubov recalled. “That’s how we came up with the concept of the restaurant.”
Usubov believes there are more Azerbaijani restaurants on the East Coast than here on the West Coast. But in addition to introducing more Bay Area diners to the cuisine, the restaurant is a poignant reminder of the food he grew up eating. Usubov writes about his journey to San Francisco on the “About Us” tab on the restaurant’s website: “In 1992, everything changed. The military occupation and massacre forced my family to flee, and we spent nearly a decade in a refugee tent camp. Those years shaped who I am in every way.”
He and his family fled during an early phase of a conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia over the region of Nagorno-Karabakh. After the Soviet Union dissolved, the former satellites entered into a territorial dispute that displaced hundreds of thousands of citizens on both sides of their shared borders. In the refugee camps, Usubov had to contend with starvation, malnutrition and not having “good, sanitized water.” Living under those conditions, he said, has affected him to this day. He revealed, “Even now, if I don’t eat bread whenever I eat a meal, I feel like I’m not full, which comes from that poverty, right?”
Bistro 4293, open Tue to Sun 11:30am-2:30pm and 5-10pm. 4293 Piedmont Ave., Oakland. 510.775.5039. bistro4293.com.
