[Review] Kinou - Basque Cuisine and French Wines

Located at the tail-end of Teck Lim Road, at the intersection between Keong Saik Road to Neil Road, Kinou is hard to miss if you are exploring the area for a restaurant or pub to wind down at for the day.

Helmed by Chef-owner Benjamin Tilatti, Kinou specialises in Basque cuisine, bringing flavours from one of Europe’s oldest and most distinctive cultures into tropical Singapore. An autonomous community in northern Spain, Basque Country is endowed with sea, mountains, and vineyards from which the Basque cuisine takes its ingredients.

Highly intertwined with their social activities, food is a way of life for the Basques and is highly regarded to be a part of their identity. With strong pride in their gastronomy, it paves the way for legacies of specialities to be passed down and for Basque Country to be recognised as the ‘paradise of Michelin star restaurants’.

Kinou’s menu is said to feature many Basque recipes from Chef Benjamin’s family that had been passed down from one generation to another, ensuing authentic flavours. In fact, Kinou is the nickname of Chef Benjamin’s mother, and it refers to the crusty end of the baguette loved by her. A fitting name for the restaurant indeed, given the family influence on the recipes and the restaurant’s tail end location.

We sampled the following sharing starters at Kinou, and think they work great as savoury bar bites or appetizers to tuck in together before a meal.

Baby squid, tender, chewy and lightly charred in chimichurri and aioli was a savory delight. We wiped the last dollop of the sauce off the plate with warm bread.

Next up we tried a traditional sausage plated artfully with red pepper sauce, chorizo sauce and squid ink. Salty, spicy and sweet, with crispy texture from the charred sausage skin, this will make a nice snack alongside a cold beer.

KOKOTXE ($24)
Pulled Pork Cheeks / Red Wine Sauce / Grandmother Puree

The potatoes cooked in duck fat were so fragrant and melt-the-mouth good. This dish alone is reason enough for the restaurant’s tagline “fat is life”, framed up near the entrance.