Russian cuisine is a mixture of many cultural traditions. rus- sian cuisine includes all kinds of vegetables, mushrooms, meat, milk products, honey, fruits and berries, and a variety of wheat, barley, and rye grains. the russian people have always been gourmets. many names of russian dishes and liquors have become international. for ex- ample: vodka, mini, piroshki, pelmeni. in moscow restaurants you can taste the traditional russian fish soup “ukha” with a huge crawfish. there is a big choice of appetizers, soups on the menu: russian meat soup with fresh cab- bage — shchi, meat and fish soup — solyanka, kidney soup with dills — rassolnik, fish soup — ukha, okroshka soup, green sorrel soup and cold beetroot soup — svekolnik. for snacks the guests can taste cold meat dishes: ham, cold boiled pork — buzhenina, jellied tongue, meat jelly with horse- radish sauce and various salads. the waiters recommend the guests pressed and red caviar, salmon, stuffed pike-perch, stur- geon in aspic, herring, marinated herring, smoked sprats and so on. the guests can also choose blini with caviar and salmon. for the main course the guests can order sturgeon of any kind — boiled, steamed or on a spit. there are a lot of meat dishes on the menu: roast veal, beef-stroganoff, minced meat wrapped in cabbage leaves — golubtsi, roast chicken, roast duck, goose stuffed with apples and sauerkraut, and so on. russians are great lovers of pelmeni, small siberian meat pies boiled in broth. russian cooking has a great variety of desserts. kissel has been a favorite dish for many centuries. kissel is made from fresh or dried fruits or from berries. for dessert you can also have ap- ples baked with sugar, fruit and berry juice. russian cuisine is famous for a large variety of milk products: cottage cheese — tvorog, thick sour cream — smetana, and russian yogurts — kefir and ryazhenka. the guests can taste various russian pies. they are pies with fish filling — rasstegai, a pie with meat or cabbage filling — kulebiaka, open tarts with curd — vatrushki. russian honey-cakes are called prianiki, thick о-shaped rolls are called boubliki, dry о-shaped rolls are called baranki or sooshki. wheat loaves have dozens of varieties. as to rye bread, russians eat more of it than any nation in the world — a peculiarity of the russian diet.
