Plov

Elina and I met at the park slope food coop. We were in the basement working our food services shift. She was stuffing bags filled with Turkish figs, Spanish olives, and Indian spices and I was cutting, weighing and wrapping cheeses from all over the world when I heard her accent. I knew right away that she was Russian and when I found out that she was from Kazakhstan I really wanted to talk to her about food. When I found out that she was Russian, from Kazakhstan, and Jewish, well, I knew she’d be perfect for this blog. Luckily for me, she agreed to let me come to her home and interview her while she cooked a delicious Plov for her family and me. Our time together was lovely and our interview turned into such a natural conversation that I forgot to take pictures of the end result of the dinner.

Elina explained to me the nomadic nature of the Kazakh culture which resulted in dough and meat being the main ingredients in most of the cuisine. Her mother was Jewish but her father was not. Her mother learned to cook traditional Kazakh food from her husband’s mother, and soon became known as the Jewish woman who cooked the best traditional Kazakh food. Plov is a very common Central Asian dish, with variations throughout the region. While I chopped the carrots and Elina did most everything else, we had a talk about being Jewish in Kazakhstan.

During WWII many talented artists and intellectuals from Russia, Belarus, and Ukraine re-settled in Astana, the capital of Kazakhstan. When the war ended they stayed in the city and modernized it, creating a multicultural community. When Elina was growing up Jewish, she said she never felt any tension or problems because the city was open-minded and multicultural. Her mother, born in 1950, felt the same way and raised Elina as a Kazakh  like any other. Elina enjoyed living in Kazakhstan and had a great job and life there, but when she was 21 she left to be with her mother and grandmother who had moved to Israel because of the poor healthcare her grandmother was receiving in Astana. She lived there for 8 years. In 2001 she was on a bus that was partially exploded by a suicide bomber. She moved to New York City with her daughter two weeks later.

Elina understands Jewish food and culture through an Israeli lens, being that her upbringing was more Kazak than Jewish. It wasn’t until she moved to Israel that she thought about things in Jewish terms. When I asked what Jewish food was, she said it was Israeli food: Shwarma, hummus, falafel and gefilte fish.  (She thinks Israeli cheesecake is the best in the world.)

When I asked her how important Judaism is in her family now, she said it’s very important. She feels Jewish identified here and she wants her children to know the history of the Jewish people and to enroll them in a program for Jewish kids in Manhattan. She keeps the holidays at home and references what looks like a great cookbook, Adventures in Jewish Cooking, by Jeffrey Nathan. It includes modern takes on traditional holiday recipes. She highly recommended some of the recipes that she made for the previous Passover.

Our conversation went from Judaism to jobs, to travel and to the sometimes contentious relationships between mothers and daughters. The Plov sustained us throughout it all. It was a delicious meal and a wonderful conversation. 

This blog project has already given me a lot of pleasure, but getting to meet and talk with Elina has been a highlight so far.

Thanks, Elina!

Food is a mentality

Evelyn was born in Kiev, Ukraine. She came to the United States in 1990. After cooking a delicious meal for me and her daughter, Irene, Evelyn and I sat down and talked about what, if any, were the differences between Russian, Jewish and American food. Evelyn had some specific distinctions. She said that she cooked in Russia because she had to eat, not because it was a pleasurable experience.

In the Ukraine, she learned how to cook from magazines for women, which gave her tips that she wouldn’t have otherwise learned. In her words, Russian food is more about “how you perceive the eating”. In Kiev she learned how to make fruit preserves and other foods in order to stock a pantry for months if necessary. Ingredients were scarce and so there was no room for waste.  “You eat what’s available at the time.” She says that if a friend knows about a store selling chicken then you go to that store and buy and cook chicken. She also says that it’s about using all your resources. If there’s half a lemon in the refrigerator “just throw it in the compote.” It’s not a style, it’s a mentality.

In America on the other hand, Evelyn thinks there’s too much waste, but that it’s fun to cook. It’s easy to procure a range of ingredients and to try new things. She can’t pinpoint exactly what “American cooking” is, but it’s definitely different, in that it’s not done in a manner meant to preserve one’s life, but to enjoy it.

Like her daughter, Irene, Evelyn felt that Jewish food was completely different, in that it’s “traditional” foods, very specific things that are made on the holidays. It’s not “everyday” food. It’s gefilte fish, for example. Other than holiday food, it was hard for Evelyn to decide what was “Jewish”. She said that it was difficult because Jews lived throughout different countries, all over the world, and that they were influenced by local resources, cultures and climates. Sometimes Jews didn’t have choices and had to eat pork in order to survive, something she doesn’t have to worry about here.

"If it comes from a box its American - If it’s made from scratch its Russian."

Irene is 27 years old and was born in Kiev, Ukraine. She left with her family via Vienna and Italy, and came to Brooklyn, New York when she was 5. When she was in 5^th grade she moved to the Suburbs of Rockland County, where she still lives with her mother, Evelyn.  

Irene’s earliest food memories are of hot summers spent in Israel, eating hot soup for lunch. Every day there would be borscht, chicken soup, or a variety of vegetable soups. She says it must be a Russian thing because Americans never eat hot soup in the summer.

Irene says she learned about the differences between Russian and American food early on from her American and non-Russian school aged friends. “Their food was normal, our food was weird. They ate PB&J and sandwiches. I never ate that. We ate smoked fish, fish roe or simple caviar, liver, cow tongue.”

I asked how she would categorize Russian food. “Whatever my mom cooked from scratch.” For example, if her mother cooked chicken, rice and salad, which sounds like a pretty typical American dinner, it was made more “Russiany” by Evelyn. The chicken was ground up and made into Cutleti, the salad, unlike American salads, never had any lettuce, just fresh vegetables and olive oil as a dressing, and the rice might be Kasha.

What then is American food? “Anything that comes out of a box.”  Irene and her sister would make Rice a Roni or macaroni and cheese after school. “American food is much faster and easier to make than Russian food.” The answer was fast and simple.

The differences between Russian and American foods were easy for Irene to determine. Distinguishing the difference between Russian and Jewish foods was more difficult. Jewish food is “food that we eat on Jewish Holidays. Kugel, chicken, traditional things. It’s usually bland and over cooked. When I think of Jewish food I think of Kugel but we never made Kugel in my house.  I think of it because they always have it at synagogue on the holidays.”

So what about chopped liver? “Its Jewish-y but I consider it Russian food.  Olivier (Russian salad) is definitely Russian; we could eat it on Passover but we wouldn’t.  Jewish food is more American Ashkenazy style food that we eat at synagogue and at Jewish events. Herring? “Russian. Defintely Russian.”

We could have talked and even argued about food and ethnic categories all day, except there was delicious, homemade, decidedly Russian food to be eaten.

Chicken Soup

Since this blog is going to focus on food in the lives of Jewish Russian-Americans, I decided to ask Ukrainian mother and daughter duo Evelyn and Irene just what Jewish food, Russian food, and American food were. Before getting to the heart of the questions though, Evelyn gave us a thorough cooking lesson. We made chicken soup, kasha, salad and compote. In the end we couldn’t decide if it was Jewish or Russian, but it was most certainly delicious. Evelyn’s mother and a few friends joined us for dinner and the company, conversation and laughter made the Russian – Jewish experience even more authentic.



 

What is Soviet Salad?

The purpose of this blog is to explore culture, food and gender. As a Jewish American “foodie,” born to a Ukrainian mother, I would like to expand on these areas of research and focus a web blog on Jewish/Russian mother–daughter food culture.  More specifically, this social initiative would focus on Russian immigrants along with their American born (or “Americanized”) daughters to see if, and how, food culture, recipes, and attitudes towards food and cooking transcend borders and generations.

 

By using food as a foundation, this blog will explore how American-born Jewish women of Russian backgrounds relate to and understand their immigrant mothers’ ideas and practices with regards to food. This food/culture/gender blog will highlight how important food from the Russian-Jewish Diaspora is in shaping a society, a culture, a family, and a woman. Additionally, the blog will be a forum for sharing and learning about recipes from all over the former Soviet Union.

 

Enjoy and feel free to open up the discussion or add a recipe!

 

The year i started becoming Russian.

In 1985 I was like any other 7 year old American girl. I watched the Cosby show, had a crush on Kirk Cameron, wanted to be Madonna when I grew up, and knew how to make the fastest cobra knot in my class. I grew up in Brighton Beach, and at the time, my friends parents were from all over the world: Vietnam, El Salvador, Germany, Turkey. Some of my friends parents were “just American”, like mine, but mine were also Jewish, and so there was that. Unlike most of my friends, both of my parents were American. Sort of.

My mother’s Russianness isn’t something that was entirely hidden, but it also wasn’t very obvious. I never heard her speak Russian, or any language besides Brooklynese. I heard my grandparents’ accents and knew they were different from my mother’s, but I just assumed that’s how all old people talked, at least all the all the old people in Brighton.

In the spring of that year my grandmother’s younger brother Boris aka “Berchik” came to visit the United States from “Russia”. He didn’t speak English and I heard my grandmother, aunt, and mother speak in Russian together for the first time. I don’t remember all the details of their trip, but not surprisingly I do remember one which was related to food.

We took Berchik for a low key dinner at The Kings Plaza Diner. The idea was not to be too showy or fancy, just a nice, simple family dinner. My aunt ordered her uncle the steak. It arrived at the table first, and he thought it was for all of us to share. He almost cried when they told him it was just for him. He thought my mother and Aunt paid the restaurant to give us all giant sized portions. That was about all I remember about his visit.

A year or so after Berchik’s visit his older brother, Sasha, came next. I also don’t remember much about that visit, besides that Sasha brought his wife, Rema and they brought us chocolates from Russia. I didn’t like chocolate to begin with, but this chocolate smelled horrible. My father told us not to eat it. And my father eats everything. Sasha and Rema left, but I was told that they’d be back.

Four years later they came back. This time it was for good. Sasha and Rema moved from Russia to New York City, but they didn’t come alone. Berchik came with them and brought his wife Tanya and their son, Genna. Sasha’s daughter and her family also came, and some of their friends came too. Now there were about 15 new family members. Two of the couples were named Ina and Valery. I didn’t know which one was related to us and which ones weren’t. My brother and I referred to all of them collectively as “the Russians”, sometimes we still do.

Berchik, Tanya and Genna lived with us in our apartment in Brighton for the first 6 months of their American life. They didn’t speak English and my brother and I didn't speak Russian. I hated Genna, and he hated me. He is 6 years older than I am and we never got along. We still don’t. I liked Tanya because she wore a lot of colorful makeup and her blonde hair was always in a very high beehive.

Soon after they arrived my mother took Tanya to Aufrichtig's, which used to be the main grocery store in Brighton. (Now it’s probably a luxury Italian Fur shop.) When Tanya saw the produce display she pulled her smock up and started loading up the potatoes, bubby style. My mother realized what was happening and told her to take only what she needed and if she wanted more we could come back the next day. Tanya couldn’t believe Aufrichtig’s would be open the next day. I was so bored by this shopping trip. I could have been listening to Madonna.

When we came home from food shopping Tanya asked me to help her cook. My mother never asked me to help her cook and so I was surprised, and intrigued. She took out the potatoes and motioned for me to peel them. This wasn’t cooking, this was labor. I sucked it up and worked with her for hours. With my lame and lazy American pre-teen approach to help, she made vareniki and pilmeni, or what I used to call pierogi. She made so many that we had trays lining the kitchen and foyer floors in our apartment. There were too many to fit them all in the freezer. We gave some to my grandmother and to my aunt. I brought the vareniki and pilmeni for lunch every day for weeks. I was out of the sandwich swap at lunch, and my junior high school friends told me that I was Russian. I didn’t want to believe them, but I did love the lunch so much. Was I really Russian?

If I were Russian, as my friends kept insisting that I was, I knew I was different from the real Russian kids who went to my school. They didn’t speak English, they came in in the middle of the semester and they were much better at math than I was. They didn’t use hair gel, and none of them had Bon Jovi jean jackets. They were definitely not cool. And I was so cool. (Except that I know now that I was also definitely not cool.) It was later explained to me that I was Russian, I just wasn’t OTB. It was the first time I heard the expression and it didn’t make a lot of sense. My Russians flew here from Italy...

About my mother

My mother, Anna, was born in Dnipropetrovsk, Ukraine in 1951. Her father was born in Poland, and because of Polish support for Israel at the time, they were able to leave the anti-Semitism of the USSR behind and emigrate to the Middle East when she was 5 years old. With her mouth taped shut, my mother and her family boarded trains and boats for a long journey which led them to Israel 8 years after its birth. Hardly the advanced country that exists today, Israel was young and underdeveloped. Her family lived in a hut on a mountain side in Atlit.

A professional soccer player in the Dnipropetrovsk, my grandfather became a butcher and my grandmother, a former nurse, plucked chicken feathers for work. My grandfather brought home chicken fat and my mother and her sister ate Schmaltz sandwiches for lunch and dinner. It took five years to get a visa to come to the United States, where my grandfather had an uncle. They never planned to settle in Israel, as many did at the time. My grandfather had his heart set on America.

In 1961 little Anna was just 10 years old when she sailed towards Lady Liberty and arrived at Ellis Island.  Her first home was in Brighton Beach, Brooklyn, where she discovered what are still some of her favorite things: Television, Bugs Bunny, potato chips, pretzels, hot dogs and pizza. The new American family quickly learned and embraced the language of the land, and made it the tongue of the house as well. Now my mother has a thick Brooklyn accent. (Imagine a 5ft tall, blonde, female Donald Trump sans the comb over and sadly, the millions.) It didn’t take long before she started to forget Russian and Hebrew and schmaltz sandwiches. Fast forward 15 years and you’d never know about my mother’s journey or past. When asked the common “what are you?” question her answer is always the same: American. When I remind her of her birthplace she claims that it was just a geographical error, she was really meant to be born in the USA.

When she had children of her own, my mother never thought to teach us the Russian language, or to incorporate Russian culture at home. That was fine until 1985, when strange speaking relatives began to visit us from Russia.