retiredmartin

June 2026. Armenia.

Churches, beer, statues, mountains, lakes. But what about Armenian food ?

Well, there’s no obvious Chinese takeaway scene, but loads of pastries, and particularly good salads,

notably at the smart Yaghli family diner on Rijkov Street, Gyumri’s main pedestrianised dining street (500 dram to the £).

I love those menus with pictures; my Marseille salad better received than Mrs RM’s pumpkin soup.

Surprisingly, the culinary highlight came at one of the many roadside Food Courts (crazy name !),

where again the little £2 pots of salad (shown with burek) were the stars.

An experienced traveller from Helsinki told of her surprise at the prices in the smart modern places in Yerevan, pricier than the second city, where Gwoog Gastrohouse‘s well reviewed bistro had the most interesting menu of the week.

Traditional Panrkash and Dolma rolls (probably the vine leaves rolled by that lady on the commuter train) cost a tenner for both.

That jug of apricot compote in the pic cost almost as much as the meals, and it was easy to rack up steeper bills on the homemade lemonades in the heat.

The real bargain came on our second night in Gyumri, as we took refuge from the nightly downpour in the trad looking Karkandak bakery. More takeaway than diner, with a menu that I’ve just got ChatGPT to interpret for you.

“ChatGPT !” you cry, “stop using AI and track down a professional Armenian translater to do your dirty work for you“.

Well, I reckon this was the cheese and ham salad sandwich (“Cob !“).

With crusty bun, it was a stunner, Mrs RM’s pizza bread also a winner.

And with two bottles of lemonade, the bill came to a couple of quid, We need a branch here, NOW.