Expensive Comfort Food

Trip Start Sep 18, 2008
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Trip End Sep 26, 2008


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Flag of Russian Federation  , Central Russia,
Wednesday, September 24, 2008

Expensive comfort food is how I describe my dining experience in Russia.  After walking through the extravagant palaces and museums, sitting down and ordering a meal was dull and bland in comparison.  I welcomed the warm and hearty dishes after the first couple of meals because it was nice to heat up my stomach after coming in from the cold.  The next few meals I tried to check off my list the typical Russian foods I needed to try - Stroganoff, Borscht, ravioli-dumplings, meat-filled pastries, herring and caviar.  I tried them all with the exception of herring.  The main dishes were usually some kind of meat like beef or pork, with dill and heavy sour cream served on top of everything.  There were no sides, if you ordered salmon for example the only thing you got was a slab of fish in a heavy cream and butter sauce.  I tried the salmon caviar which tasted very fishy to me, but I was told that the good caviar is not supposed to be fishy.  I spent on average $25-40 a meal that was like an equivalent of a hot roast beef sandwich with mashed potatoes in the U.S.

After several meals I was ready to try something different and missing the fruits and vegetables I usually eat.  Unfortunately there was really nothing else to be found, so I was stuck with more Stroganoff and dumplings.  Kathie says to me, "I haven't pooped in three days!"  I suddenly realized it was the same for me.  We found there was very little variety of restaurants in Russia, and with the exception of sushi there were no other kinds of ethnic foods served.  The restaurant scene is not nearly as lively as the large cities in the U.S. because for Russians dining out is reserved for special occcasions and the rest of the patrons are tourists.  I wasn't too surprised by that because most of the restaurants we entered we more than half empty and when we got the bill we would rather stay home too.
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