Barabba, Store Kongensgade 34, 1264 Copenhagen, Denmark

If only I'd paid attention in R.E.

Taster menus can be a gamble. At their best, they’re a peepshow into the kinetograph of a chef’s limbic system, where quotes and references are pulled from a mental Rolodex, shaped by the lens of seasonality. There’s a melody and rhythm where everything unfolds in a way that’s so highly choreographed that it appears effortless, as one dish rolls into the next, as if by its own volition.

But at their worst, taster menus function like State visits to an autocracy. Once they’ve got you locked in, all colour falls away as a procession of exhibits designed to impress only raises questions about resource management. The menu becomes a whistle-stop tour detailing the corrosive effects of being surrounded by Yes Men, conducted as if you’ve also been living under a rock.

via Instagram

Copenhagen’s ‘Barabba’ is named after Barabbas—the jammy git who, despite being a murdering, robbing, Devil-representing enemy of the Roman state—Pontius Pilate decided to set free instead of Jesus, leaving the poor sod to get crucified.

Today, ‘Barabba’ can mean an outcast, rebel or rapscallion, likely reflective of how owner Riccardo Marcon, who scoffs at the mention of the New Nordic movement, must view Barabbas’ place in the culinary landscape. But it originally meant scoundrel, bandit or villain—and I’m inclined to agree. Running a taster menu alongside its regular menu, Barabba offers a cold, semi-calculated State visit where moments of greatness seemingly appear by accident, before mediocrity quickly resumes toeing the party line.

Sly-handed from the outset, the first course turns out to be an amuse-bouche. A sliver of dried pumpkin forms a taco shell, filled with shredded pork and house-made (imagine that) kimchi, served on what else, but a whole plant pot’s worth of pumpkin seeds. Underseasoned to the point of implying Covid, it’s only got texture going for it: snap, crackle and mush.

Luckily, the focaccia, despite its density, is superb. A hefty, bobbled dome releasing steam from its cross like one of those aromatherapy diffusers if you were trying to align your chakras with rosemary, olive oil and salt.

A celebration of red kuri squash is expressed with loops, purée and emulsion and feels more like a mountain made from a molehill in a bid to make up the numbers. Lifted by macerated kumquat and a textbook tarragon oil, it limps to the finish as a Work In Progress rather than something intentional.

Known for their spaghetti with butter, Colatura di Alici and non-specific caviar, we take the upsell for another 290DKK. We’d been eagerly anticipating it in the run-up to our visit; something that Barabba eke out even further because they forgot that we ordered it, with barely a shrug from the staff.

As suspected, the slug of caviar is an eye-rollingly oligarchical attempt to gild the lily. What begins life as a bale of silk then congeals rapidly against the clock, sealing the warmth inside, causing the core to seep with melted butter that in the end, is more like sorting through greasy wattle and daub.

Me, after the spaghetti

It might resemble The Hulk in the foetal position having been thoroughly bukkake’d, but this dish of smoked gnocchi, kale, blue cheese and salted lemon signals an uptick. Each piece has that tender bounce with the satin exterior of a dunked marshmallow, the blue cheese thankfully restrained, imparting a mellowed piquant funk rather than an open palm slap of stench.

As you might hope, pasta is Barabba’s strong suit and, to their credit, the oxtail ravioli, celeriac and vanilla broth is the stand-out dish by some margin. Despite the inconsistent filling, the broth is ethereal as it is crystal-clear, lapping against a cumuli of celeriac purée propping up its gently pickled discs. I immediately regret not ordering this twice with bread and slinging our hook.

Grilled duck breast, burnt radicchio and chestnut. When a well-trodden path like this springs up on a menu, I’m excited to see the restaurant’s take. Instead, this one sneers at you from the kitchen; it knows it’s boring but thinks you’re a pleb, so, tick—another course done, chef. The chestnut purée is grainy, but that’s the least of it.

In a true rapscallion move, they’ve had the chutzpah to obscure how overcooked the duck is with an over-reduced pan sauce—as if they hadn’t anticipated it being eaten. It reminds me of North Korea’s ‘Peace Village’ where windows are painted on and lights are turned on for nobody, in some adolescent attempt at deception. The radicchio, however, is reminiscent of the sootiness that characterised many childhood barbecues, but this is less a Ratatouille moment and more representative of how low the bar is.

Kijong-dong, “Peace Village”, NK

There’s a tactic used by hostage takers that involves making their captives believe they’ll be killed for days on end. A series of false alarms designed to break the spirit and induce docility that supposedly reduces the chance of struggle when their turn eventually comes. This is one of those taster menus, with the two desserts causing me to hang my head as thoughts of The Before Times play out in my brain; the oxtail ravioli is now a figment of my imagination. I just want this to end.

The dish of Lovita plums, hibiscus and salted chocolate sorbet doesn’t work. Although the sorbet is exemplary—a chilled silk that melts down into a moody, cocoa hit—it’s unable to balance the clawing acerbity.

An overbaked dome of carrot cake that doesn’t taste like carrot, conceals a caramel core with chunks of candied stem ginger, surrounded by globules of vanilla custard, mealy with half-cooked cornstarch, is better suited to pasting up wanted posters in a crosswind. The Amaranth leaves appear to be there for Instagram, which is saying something.

Finally, two measures of limoncello that taste like car air fresheners steeped in diesel offer a suitably counterfeit finish to a largely hoodwink of a meal.

Barabba is an ideal name, just not for the edgy reasons it thinks. This is a taster menu that punishes your curiosity rather than rewards it, which is funny when Marcon, with all the toe-curling, main character syndrome of almost every Chef’s Table protagonist, muses in an interview: “Give people the truth and they are going to reward you for it”. If that doesn’t sound like a grifter, I don’t know what does.