First,
THE WORST
I do not have a picture of the single worst meal I had in Russia... and I had it twice. Svetlana's cooking seemed to happen mostly in the late morning, while we were out doing stuff, and then she would reheat the plate and watch us hawkishly while we ate. The meat always seemed tough and stringy and a little off, like it had bdeen deeply frozen for a long time. Thanks to the microwave, there was always a little puddle of water beneath the food, which amplified gruesome textures a great deal. By the way, she was very adamant that we decide in advance exactly when we would be home for dinner, and was extremely disgruntled when we changed plans. Since the food was reheated anyway, why did she care so much? Кто знает -- who knows. It was a hard thing for adults used to planning their own meal times to deal with. Plus it made us feel really guilty about missing dinner, so I would often hurry home to a disappointing plate, usually rice or potatoes, a piece of meat, and the inescapable tea. Some dried up cucumbers and tomatoes if we were lucky.
One evening, I rushed in and sat down at the table, and Svetlana set down a particularly soupy plate. There were chunks of brown meat (?), rice and I think something with mayonnaise. It smelled not too bad. I attempted to spear a brown chunk, and my fork met with some resistance. A bad sign -- I became suspicious. I got the piece up to my mouth, and then when an unusual scent hit me I realized with horror that it was liver, I assume from a cow. Now, I don't mind liver if it is well-cooked, sliced thinly and browned with some onion in a velvety brown sauce. These were golf ball sized chunks, chewy from previous freezing and with the almost-rotten vapors of organ meats long past their prime. There were no onions to mask the taste, and Svetlana was watching me carefully. The liver-water puddle on the plate was not helping at all.
I eventually managed to eat all but one piece, cutting it into tiny tiny bits and hiding them in forkfuls of rice. However, as she was pretty skimpy with the rice this time, there wasn't quite enough to finish, and I had to claim utter fullness and excuse myself. Misha did not fare as well as I. Just imagine my horror when, perhaps 10 days later, I was presented with yet another wet plate of huge liver chunks. This time they were even bigger, wet on the bottom and dessicated on the top. There was no rice this time, and I simply could not do it. All the bad smells from the freezer seemed to have infused the already-disgusting organ, and I nearly gagged as I tried to put it in my mouth. Svetlana was beginning to glare at me ass I carefully ate around the liver; when I put down my fork, she asked me why I wasn't eating it. "You don't like it." "No, it's good... I just... don't eat this much at home." "Why don't you like it?" "I guess I'm not very hungry..." "Anton [her son-in-law, who always devoured everything with great gusto, adding to my guilt] will eat it. Give him your plate." I did, and he devoured it as usual.
For obvious reasons, this meal stands out as the worst, but another runs a very close second... the moldy fish. I had this twice as well. The "fish" was encased in some sort of crumby breading, I really have no idea what kind of fish it was. It was glutinous and sort of flaky, with basically no flavor, except for what was added by the breading (I think), and that was: mold. I might expect fish to taste off or rotten, at the worst, but moldiness is not something that I ever expected to associate with seafood. It tasted very similar to moldy bread, and it was bizarre and utterly disgusting. The first time was worse, but I was so discouraged by the first moldy fish experience that I couldn't even finish it the second time, even though the mold taste was much more faint. I have no idea how this happened, I assume that the breading was already moldy before the fish ever got lost in the depths of the freezer. This was indubitably the most unpleasant seafood experience I have ever had.
This next experience was not so much about terrible flavor, as it was a major disappointment and a typical Russian food experience. When we were in Moscow, we went to Izmailova market, a sprawling open-air market selling everything from cheap tourist tchotchkes to the most unbelievable centuries-old antiques. There was gorgeous jewellery, housewares, furniture, and decorative stuff, awesome Soviet posters (the Yuri Gagarin ones were like $600+!), vintage clothes (some oddly American hipster-y), and many many other wonderful things. We all bought a lot of stuff, and wandered around for several hours. It was very hot, and this place was unbelievably huge; maybe the equivalent of 10 blocks or more. There was a large section selling only rugs, one selling only silver, one just posters, etc. I suspect we didn't even see half of it. I want to go back with several thousand dollars, prepared to stimulate the local economy! Anyway, we really enjoyed the market, but it was totally exhausting. After 5 weeks of Russia, we were all very fatigued anyway, and Izmailova was completely overwhelming. After a few hours we were desperately hungry, and I spied a kiosk. I ordered salami sandwiches for the three of us. The sandwich turned out to be one piece of dry bread (Russian bread is very dense, perhaps this explains why the loaves are about half the size of American loaves. The bread usually has an intense rye or grainy flavor, and is very dense and can be quite stiff and dry), topped with two one-inch pieces of salami. After walking around for a minimum of 6 hours, this was simply not going to cut it, and I nearly cried as we sat on the wooden floor of the deck and tried to enjoy our "lunch." Later I got a falafel-like thing to quell the pangs; it was actually quite good. I was continually frustrated by the miniscule portions; I don't see how people can operate on such tiny amounts of nourishment. I got the feeling that people thought I was gluttonous, but I was just so hungry all the time!
This trend was well-illustrated at another meal after a long journey. Some of our group took the train to Petrazavodsk, in Karelia, to see the island of Kizhi, an incredible UNESCO World Heritage Site (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kizhi). It was fascinating and most beautiful; the natural beauty and peace of the surroundings were a welcome change from the grime of Petersburg. The jewels of Kizhi are its astounding wooden churches, built in the 1700s without the aid of any nails. Here are a few pictures to give you an idea:
Anyway, we took an overnight train from Petersburg to Patrozavodsk, which was really quite fun. In traditional Russian fashion, we brought lots of beer and food, and, excited about our adventure, we slept very little and had a great time. So great, in fact, that the provodnitsa (the lady who rules the train car, brings around the tea, and wakes you when the train is stopping) had to reprimand us. Believe me, you want to be on her good side! So we were very tired and really looking forward to breakfast when we got to the desolate little station in Karelia. It was still very early, maybe 7 something, so we had a lot of time to kill before we could actually go to the island of Kizhi. They seemed very unprepared for our arrival at the station restaurant; there were still decorations up from the "disco" the night before (or maybe it was a wedding), and the waitresses were surly and looked hungover. After some wrangling by our fearless leader, Krista, breakfast was served:
This was the most pathetic breakfast I have ever had. That "juice" seemed to be corn syrup heavily diluted with water. There was some sort of little pastry suggesting apple flavor, and a little triangle of something potato-y. And of course, there was Nescafe.
We were all so disappointed that we were practically silent during breakfast. I couldn't even finish mine (it was that flavorless and melancholic), and it wasn't cheap by Russian standards, maybe $9 or so. What a bummer! But later we had some delicious blini from a stand, and plenty of ice cream (Russians LOVE ice cream!), so it wasn't a complete bust on the food front.
A few other low points included: Jesse's meat in "sharp sauce," which seemed to be mostly tomatoes floating in oil; the aforementioned frequent herring surprise/mayonnaise salad; and this beer:
Actually, I couldn't even bring myself to try it. The 2-liter bottle made me suspicious, and the violently negative reactions of my comrades ensured the rapid fading of my curiosity. Disgusting! Jesse says it was like the warm end of a 40oz -- ugh.
And now on to...
THE BEST
One thing that Russians do very very well is pickles:
Here we have delicious pickled cucumbers, garlic, and what I suspect are cucumber stems (but I'm really not sure). Pickle plates were very much the same most places we ordered them, and were always very vinegary and delicious. The supposed cucumber stems were a little fibrous, long and green, and tender. Any ideas as to what they might be if they're not cucumber stems? Anyway, they are delicious, and an absolute necessity when drinking in Russia. I also found that they helped to cut the grease and the blandness of much Russian food.
Another thing that I failed to get many photos of is the hilarious naming of dishes in English. Unfortunately I failed to note most of them and now have forgotten, but we did see advertised "trout stranger," a dish called "from a pork's neck" (what from a pork's neck, I wonder?), as well as the intriguing
I also frequently enjoyed "all sorts from a pickle" at our main café hangout. Tasty!
There are many astonishing snack foods in Russia, including a plethora of dried fish products. I still have a whole Russian dried fish in my freezer, actually! But the chips really are incredible -- some of the flavors are just plain weird, but some are utterly delicious. My favorite was the crab flavor, though I also liked the caviar ones (I don't even like real caviar). Jesse really liked the little ham & cheese flavored crackers. All these super-salty, crunchy things go perfectly with a nice warm Baltika! I sure wish I could have brought some home with me -- they are delectable.
We were really scarfing them down at the train station as we we waited to leave for Moscow, which brings me to another best: train travel.
Much to my surprise, train travel in Russia is marvelously efficient. You can absolutely depend on your train's on-time arrival and departure, and everything is set up with the utmost efficiency. They arrange the trains so that even if the trip is relatively short, say a few hours direct, they make the night trains go more slowly so you can rest some on the overnight -- ingenious! Naturally I took the opportunity to pack heavy nourishment for the trip:
I think we ate nearly all of it. It's a good thing too, because it would be a loooong time until we found nourishment again in Moscow. See Jesse's blog (www.jankyswankys.blogspot.com) for more details on that part of the journey.
Unfortunately I don't have a picture of this meal, but after Jesse, Rose and I had spent an extremely taxing day seeing the Kremlin (we had to get in line three times to get tickets to see the armory, but it was worth it! Those diamonds were absolutely dazzling!), we sank exhausted to the grass outside its walls. There was a hot dog (хот дог) stand just outside one of the gates, and we each devoured at least 2 hot dogs, accompanied by coldish beers (!), and then fell asleep in the grass. It was very hot, we were exhausted, and the cheap food and beer tasted amazing. It was perfect, and we were absolutely ready to head for home the next day.
And now on to the final best... probably the single most satisfying eating experience of the whole trip: the Helsinki airport. We had a few hours here, and after the turmoil and confusion of Sheremetyevo, the Helsinki airport seemed like heaven. It was so clean and quiet it felt like a library, and very well designed, with pale wood, lots of windows, and plenty of little seats and things to look at. All the staff were young, attractive, and very hip (some even had neck tattoos!), and they all seemed happy to help us on our way. One young man even walked me all the way back to the check in desk from customs so I could check my contraband vodka (he was supposed to confiscate it). All the staff were so friendly and helpful that it seemed surreal, in stark contrast to Russians (they have a certain charm, and can really open up when you've properly proven yourself, but no one could rightly call them a smiling and friendly people). Delighted with our smooth exodus from Russia, we all sat in the café and spent what was probably an astronomical amount on sandwiches and snacks -- I didn't care or notice at all. In any case, the snacks were good -- they had flavor! And they made me full! And they didn't include mayonnaise! Also, you could pay in any currency, which was cool. And it was just such a blessed relief to have everything going smoothly. Perhaps the only thing that I can say definitively about Russia is that almost nothing will go the way you expect it to, which is both intriguing and unbelievably frustrating. Here I am with my Puffet ice cream sandwich, saying пока to Russia:
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