Once again, I came across a publication about “terrible Soviet food” and “kosh-sh-sh-mar” products.
Like, what did the Soviet people eat?
Firstly - porridge for breakfast (or even for lunch and dinner). What a nightmare.
Secondly, soups are fatty, rich, death to health. Such soups are a disgrace to cooking and the entire nation! Whether it is the case for the French - light, delicate purees. And we have cabbage soup with cabbage, you know.
And also - sausages with sausage, inedible. And they ate the chicken - the one that some called "the blue bird", and others called the "running bird". And for a side dish to terrible meat products - potatoes or pasta.
What about bananas? Just imagine, they were only bought in Moscow. And then - by chance, even in Moscow there were no bananas in abundance during the terrible Soviet times!
And on this, the author made a trick, which was supposed to give originality. He did not nod in the direction of the West - they say, they already ate better there. He launched into memories of how good it was before the revolution - blancmange, red, blue and striped, sturgeon with sevruga, grapes that the clerks knew how to let go so that not a single crushed berry, Chukhonskoe butter, game and other beaten poultry... And other gifts from good meat yards villagers.
The only thing the person forgot to clarify: all this pleased 5-10 percent of the population. Another ten percent ate much more modestly. And about eighty percent - that is, the peasantry and, a little later, the workers, lead their existence from conditionally well-fed to completely hungry, with an interval of "half-starving."
Famine happened regularly. Without delving into historical distances, one can recall the famine of 1891-1892, which engulfed 29 provinces, the famine of 1897-1898 - the center and southeast of the country, the famine of 1901 - 17 provinces, 1905 - 22 provinces.
They will object to me that hunger is periods that arise due to circumstances beyond the control of people - droughts or, conversely, floods, from the whims of nature.
But let's remember what the chemist and agronomist A. N. Engelhardt (his "Letters from the Village")
- Anyone who knows the village, who knows the situation and life of the peasants, does not need statistical data and calculations to know that we are selling grain abroad not out of excess... In a person from the intellectual class, such a doubt is understandable, because it is simply impossible to believe how this is how people live, not have eaten. And yet this is really so. Not that they have not eaten at all, but malnourished, live from hand to mouth, eat all sorts of rubbish. Wheat, good clean rye, we send abroad, to the Germans, who will not eat any rubbish... Our the peasant farmer does not have enough wheat bread for the baby's nipple, the woman chews the rye crust that she eats, puts a rag - suck.
Here it is, and stellate sturgeon, and grapes, where there is not a single crushed berry on the bunch.
Rich soups and cereals - for many residents of the Russian Empire, this was an unattainable dream that came true. as well as the sausages and sausages, which are now scolded by snobs.
The population of the USSR got the opportunity to IS. Not to live from hand to mouth, but IS. And at the same time, their diet at times, which is now vilified, was quite normal.
At the time of the crunch of the French roll, the bulk of the population ate black bread (and even then with admixtures).
Why am I writing this? Without praising the times gone by, no. Just for the sake of fair treatment. Years go by, our ideas about proper and satisfying nutrition change, our attitude to food changes. And if you really undertake to judge the cuisine of the past, then if you please do it impartially, taking into account both the general situation and the historical development of both the country and the whole society.
And when you start doing this, you understand: there is nothing to scold.