Restaurant Muru was Henri Alén’s first own restaurant. Now he has given up ownership of the restaurant.
– I’m in a good mood. Rarely does anything go without something annoying, restaurateur and chef Henri Alen tells his feelings about the news announced yesterday Thursday.
Alen, Timo Linnamäki and Samuil Angelov announced that they would share the restaurants they previously owned together.
Alén and Linnamäki sold the Muru group restaurants Muru, Pastis, Fiasco? and Villa Lilla. In the deal, Alén and Linnamäki acquired the shares of Finnjävel, Prego and children’s food manufacturer Muru-Baby, which were part of the Muru Group.
The change has been discussed for a long time, and according to Alén, discussions have been held for about a year.
– Each of us said what would be the most important restaurant for us if we could choose. For Samu (Angelov) they were Muru, Pastis and importing Muru into the wine country. For me, Finnjävel is my own child, which I haven’t had time to focus on enough.
The most difficult step was to find out the value of the business operations and to ask the tax authorities for preliminary decisions, so that the deal is not canceled or there is an outrageous bill afterwards. Applying for an advance ruling was a months-long process.
Founded in 2010, Muru is Alén’s first own restaurant. Alén states that the atmosphere would be different if he had sold his share to someone else.
Alén says directly that the buyer really matters. He would not have negotiated deals with a large and well-known restaurant chain.
– I wouldn’t have sold to them. Then I’d be desperate. Now one of its founders remains in Muru’s shoes. The restaurant’s heritage will not change.
In 2012, Muru was restaurant of the year. Sommelier Nicolas Thieulon, chef Timo Linnamäki, chef Henri Alén and sommelier Samuil Angelov are in the party mood. PEKKA KARHUNEN/KL
Alén lavishly praises Muru’s kitchen pilot Karoliina Narkiniemää.
– I have nothing to worry about, because he is such a damn hard bone.
Alén laughs that over the years he has accumulated a lot of funny memories from restaurants, especially Muru.
One is from the very beginning, when Muru was being renovated. Previously, a Chinese restaurant was located in the same premises, the entire interior of which was demolished on Muru road.
Inside the bar counter, Alén found a cash stash of around 300 euros. Rumor has it that gambling would have been practiced in the same business premises sometime in the past decades.
– I think it’s a wonderfully romantic story, Alén recalls later.
According to Alén, the covered windows in the back room also indicated that a small amount of gambling had been practiced. The money was also in coins.
We decided to use the money wisely.
– We ordered hodars for three hundred euros, and we paid with coins.
Another funny coincidence was when, in the early 2010s, Michelin and Nokia tires sent a sticker to be glued to the restaurant’s window from their cooperation teams. Muru’s gang decided not to stick a sticker on their big and beautiful windows that had just been cleaned.
Instead, the sticker ended up on the back window of the restaurant’s van, after all, it had both a window and a door. One evening, Alén received a call in Muru’s kitchen, where it turned out that an English customer was worried that the restaurant was moving all the time.
– We found out that there was a microchip in the sticker, thanks to which Apista was able to locate the location of the restaurant.
The sticker could no longer be removed from the van and the car ended up at a scrapyard, so the sticker might be in Tattarisuo by now.
In 2016, chefs and restaurateurs Tommi Tuominen and Henri Alén will present their new restaurant Finnjäveli, or rather its construction site. Since then, the restaurant has moved next to Taidehalli on Ainonkatu. Kari Pekonen
Some trends are born by accident. That’s how it happened in Muru too.
– We read in Hesar that in Muru there is a wonderful way for waiters to kneel right next to the customer. The reporter found it annoying that the waiter came close. However, we started to notice the same way in other restaurants as well, says Alén.
The truth was that Muru’s restaurant hall was downright cacophonous before the acoustic panels installed on the ceiling. The commotion was so loud that the waiter couldn’t hear anything if he wasn’t right next to the customer.
– I only saw the lips move, but did not hear what the customer said.
In Helsingin Sanoma’s assessment, Satikutia also received Angelov’s way of touching the customer’s shoulder when wishing him a good evening. From this, Murun’s poppoo got the idea to buy an advertisement in a newspaper that had been printed on it The Frank Pappa Show and The tribe of Holopainen the legendary sentence slightly modified: “Restaurant Muru. Touch each other”.
You can also say that Muru was one of the first bistros. At least there were first granny plates, which nowadays are everywhere.
Muruu plates were bought because they were so cheap.
– We bought a full rear container of a car from an antique store in Kalajoki, because we couldn’t afford new ones. It wasn’t a style choice, Alén reveals.
Restaurant Muru hall in 2013. Samuil Angelov on the stairs, Timo Linnamäki in the middle and Henri Alén on the right. TIINA SOMERPURO/KL
Now he wants to focus properly on Finnjävel. According to Alén, the concept still has so much more to offer.
On the side of Finnjävel Sal (the other is the Michelin-starred restaurant Salonki), there will be buffet brunch, an endless cake table, and Finnish baked goodies in the spring.
Alén still has a strong passion for cooking.
– I like and enjoy working in the restaurant kitchen.
Possibly a new restaurant is coming at some point. But the best restaurants are created when you don’t search for them or calculate too much. Instead, you have to have a vision that you know cannot be left undone.