Along with another Lazarenko beauty, Passa Tempo, the wine bar just two doors west, Culina is the kind of eatery that makes me glad to write about food in Edmonton.

The fare is fresh and inventive, the staff warm and accommodating. The room is stylish, but not intimidating.

After Culina opened in the spring of 2004, Lazarenko went on to open three more drinking and dining establishments in the B.C. Interior where he lived while getting the new properties up and running. Now he’s back in Edmonton after scaling back his involvement in the B.C. establishments.

Lazarenko’s new goal is to concentrate on a refurbished menu for Culina Mill Creek, and a new twist for Passa Tempo. At the same time, he’ll be brainstorming with his sister, chef Cindy Lazarenko, the owner and cooking chops at Culina Highlands, to bring a fresh spin to dishes there.

In Edmonton, where so many restaurants were once something else (Culina Mill Creek was Bruno’s Italian Restaurant; Culina Highlands used to be Bacon), rebirth is a well-worn theme. But this spring, it has extra resonance for him.

“I’m looking forward to coming back and to working with Cindy, getting back into Culina Mill Creek, promoting the wine bar,” says Lazarenko, who is still hauling furniture back from B.C.

He’s got some new ideas for the menus at both Culinas, a few vegan tricks involving things like nutritional yeast and cashew cheese (trust me, both these things taste better than they sound).

Cooking for his B.C. clientele, many of whom were devoted locavores and/or vegetarians — people who were conscious of the environmental impact of their food choices — taught him a lot.

“It makes you think about how to put real flavour into a dish,” he muses. Enthusiasm for local foods (Culina’s beef is from Vegreville’s Spring Creek Ranch, for instance) is a hot food trend, but for Lazarenko, learning to work with what God gave you goes way back. He is, in the simplest terms, a self-made chef and entrepreneur who entered the business 20 years ago knowing exactly nothing, but with a fierce ambition and a deep curiosity.

At 20, he started out as a bartender at Boccalino, the Italian joint once run by longtime Edmonton restaurateur Peter Johner. He also began to volunteer at Normand’s restaurant one day a week. ”That was like cooking school for me,” he recalls. Johner realized he was going to lose Lazarenko if he didn’t provide more opportunities for growth, so he offered him a chance to learn every position in the restaurant, from dishwasher to maitre d’ to cook. Early on, Lazarenko realized he wanted to run a restaurant. ”Peter always said if you’re going to be a restaurateur, you have to be a chef. Otherwise you’ll always be at the mercy of your chefs,” he recalls.

So Lazarenko became a chef. He learned to make everything from pizzas to tiramisu. He learned about all the non-glamorous things like food and labour costs. In 1993, he and Johner opened Pack Rat Louie in Old Strathcona. In 18 months, Lazarenko was running the kitchen. He spent more than eight years at Pack Rat. In 2001, he and Cindy worked at Savoy restaurant together, teaching Edmontonians to love tapas. Then in 2004, the Bruno’s Italian Restaurant space became available. And so Culina was born (the name comes from a combination of “kalyna,” the Ukrainian word for high-bush cranberry, and the word “culinary”). In 2005, Passa Tempo emerged. Then, in 2006, Lazarenko took a handful of Edmonton staffers and moved to Osoyoos to launch the first of the three eateries there.

“That was probably a little aggressive,” says Lazarenko in retrospect. But at the time, he wanted to give his staff opportunities to learn how to create great food and a great environment, as Johner had done for him. Now he’s back, looking for new opportunities, along with his sister, Cindy, to fine-tune his Edmonton investment. Inspired by his staff, many of whom have small children, Lazarenko is introducing a kids menu to Culina Mill Creek (the dishes — such as Zoe’s Salmon and Mashed Potatoes — are to be named after staff offspring). There’s a fifth-anniversary party and contest — with prizes — in the works.

“I have a hard time sitting still,” says Lazarenko. “I’m always thinking about the next project.”

lfaulder@thejournal.canwest.com
Read my blog, Eat My Words, at edmontonjournal.com/blogs