Russian winter - everything is covered with a thick eider-down of snow. The frost bites your nose and ears. It’s not really cold – nature is just trying to remind people that it’s winter outside. The air smells of snow, Christmas coming up, and something simple and warm. The door creaks open and the hot steam and tasty smell envelops the man with comfort. The coat, hat, scarf, gloves and warm winter boots are gone, and the host’s careful hands are already guiding you towards the table. Just in time for the first shot of Vodka while the hostess is still busy with the first course. It feels like a little flame that has went down your stomach and started to heat up your cold body. You take a piece of salted herring with some onion onto your fork quickly and put it straight into your mouth! A bit of cold meat or suet follows it – or maybe a piece of sweet-smelling pie to put out the fire burning in your throat? What is Russian pie like? OH! Russians have always treated bread and pastry with a lot of respect. Russian pie is something like a baked wrap filled with p?t?. Russian pies are always big – the size of the entire baking tray. There are various pie fillings – meat, mushrooms, fish, and cabbage. There’s also one really tasty thing called kulebyaka. It is an oval pie stuffed with salmon or some other fish. What else do we have on the table? Pickles, sauerkraut, caviar, the list goes on.

Are you ready for the second shot? Wait a moment! The hostess is walking into the dining room with a tureen. What’s in it? Of course, one of the traditional Russian liquid dishes: soup, uha, and shchi. During the fast they are served with vegetable oil. However, today is the ferial day, so the hostess added some meat and a spoon of sour cream into it. There are so many types of soups! Plain potato soup or a soup with groats is pretty much like mush. Maybe it’s a cabbage soup, shchi, really tasty and nutritious. And what about uha?! Only the freshest fish deserves to be put into this soup! There’s some carrot, onion, dill and parsley added. A bowl of hot soup is what you really need in the winter - it spreads warmth all through your body chasing the cold away. In the summer, Russians eat cold soups like okroshka which cools you down real well.

Done with the soup? Time to have a little break – the first hunger is satisfied, the cold is forgotten, and all of your problems are slowly fading away, but where’s our charming hostess? Here she comes! There’s a huge dish in her hands with a hill of boiled potatoes or crumbly cereal in it. Fish appears on the table next to it: boiled, fried, salted, jellied, roasted, dried, stuffed with porridge, mushrooms, vegetables or telnaya (cooked in a special way – boneless fillet covered with skin). And the meat is here too – a whole roasted chicken or goose along with a porkchop fried with garlic. Don’t forget to treat it with some grated horseradish or garlic. Feel free to taste salads made of cucumbers, cabbage, beet or black radish.

It feels like you won’t be able to eat another bite; however a pony of vodka appears in front of you next to a round, high, tasty-smelling pillar. It’s made of thin, almost transparent pancakes – bliny. They are made of wheat or buckwheat flour. How do you eat them? Don’t hesitate to put anything you see on the table into the middle of the pancake – caviar, mushrooms, fish, sour cream, butter, honey, jam – wrap it up just like the hosts do and enjoy!

At last they are clearing the table. But what’s that? Here comes the fat, puffing samovar. On its side appear the jugs filled with kvass (fragrant risen beverage) and sbiten (water boiled with herbs and honey). The plates are filled again, but now with pies, patties, rasstegai, kulebyakas, cookies and pryaniki, which are big hard honey cookies and, of course, varenya which are berries and fruits in thick, sweet syrup. Tea-time!

That’s it – time to take a book and read about the peculiarities of Russian meals. However, it seems to be too hard – too hard to keep your eyes open and you float away into the happiest days of your childhood.