Scan Magazine
| Restaurant of the Month
|
Norway
Cato Pedersen Wara grew up in Mallorca and brought his Spanish cooking to Oslo.
Quale, romesco and chantarelles at Bon Lio.
Restaurant of the Month, Norway
Wonderfully Spanish Going out for a meal in Norway used to be a formal undertaking. It was perhaps because Norwegians didn’t use to go out so often, that when they did, they preferred for things to be a certain way. But in 2013, in an old wooden house in Fredensborgveien, a new kind of restaurant was born. By Eva-Kristin U. Pedersen
|
So relaxed in fact, that it borders on disorderly. The music is a bit louder than in other places, the temperature slightly higher, the interior is somewhat disorganised. Even the food is continuously changing. 102
|
Issue 147
|
Bon Lio aims for perfect imperfection. In short, it’s a mess. But it’s a good mess. It’s Bon Lio.
In this extraordinary atmosphere, guests can enjoy contemporary Spanish food with a twist: the ingredients are almost exclusively Norwegian. The only exception are those products that really cannot be reproduced outside of Spain, like the Pata Negra.
No fixed menu
Quality and sustainability
“We don’t really have a menu. It changes all the time, depending on what ingredients are available. We use whatever seasonal products are available and create from that,” says Cato Pedersen Wara, who owns Bon Lio together with his wife, Kitty Knutzen. “The most important thing to us is that clients feel welcome and relaxed
The reasons are sustainability and quality. Bon Lio takes extreme care to ensure that ingredients are the very best available and that they are in season. “It is very important to us to use local, organic food and to make use of the excellent ingredients we have available here in Norway. In the end, that’s what they do in
Photos: Margrethe Myhrer
Inspired by high-end Spanish chefs that opened small gastrobars and served cuisine in less pretentious scenery to make ends meet during the financial crisis, Bon Lio set out to give Norwegian clients something new: superb food in a very relaxed atmosphere.
October 2022
while they’re here. We take care of them as if they were coming to our home.”