A Solyanka Soup Diary

Although I enjoyed many a Greek salad in Greece, fish and chips in England, and wonderful cheeses in France, there was no better cultural food I enjoyed more than the Solyanka soups I had during my time in Eastern Europe. Solyanka is a spicy and sour soup that can transform its self with nearly anything you have around your kitchen. It is most often make with left over meat but you can also have it with mushrooms or fish.  

It is nearly always served with black olives but the best bowl I ever ate had a green olive in it. Lemon slices and a dollop of sour cream are also mandatory.  It seems to me the cheaper the meat the better and I could never imagine a steak quality meat in it dish. Some of the best I've had seemed to be bologna or mystery meat. Which leads to another point, there has to be a nice sheen of oil on top of from all the blending ingredients. My favorite also had edible lemon slices [peels cut off] and some just added the slices for a burst of sour. As I said, there are a million varieties which is part of the fun.  

Here are photos of nearly every Solyanka dish I had while in Ukraine and Latvia and they demonstrate the variety of the soup . I'm sure I missed a soup here and here but I don't think I missed too many. 

Enjoyed March 4th, 2013

Enjoyed April 4th, 2013

Enjoyed March 8th, 2013

Enjoyed March 10th, 2013

Enjoyed March 28th, 2013

Enjoyed April 1st, 2013

Enjoyed May 9th, 2013

Enjoyed February 11th, 2013

Enjoyed February 15th, 2013

Enjoyed March 6th, 2013

Enjoyed March 14th, 2013

Enjoyed March 26th, 2013

Every other Solyanka soup I had was from a restaurant or cafe except this last one. This particular soup came to our kitchen from our friends in the Kharkiv Rotary Club and was the only true "home made" dish that we had.

And here they are all together:

The Love More Garage

One of my first posts on this blog was about Lawrence's Love Garage and it was sad to find that while we abroad in Ukraine the famous garage door was painted over and replaced with a slightly less universal message. But while walking to campus the other day I was happy to see that the garage was red again with a similar yet slightly different message.

2014 May Be My Lucky Year

I wasn't able to head back to Wisconsin for the Christmas holiday this year but a week later my parents came to Kansas for a visit. We celebrated the holiday with traditional English feast of a Christmas goose and for desert some Christmas pudding. A tradition we always follow is to bake an English six pence into the pudding and whoever finds the coin while chowing down on their piece of the pudding is sure to have a lucky year.  

I found the coin this year and I took a little a little bit out of it before realizing what I had.  

This year's Christmas pudding was the first that my mother had made on her own after my Grandmother [who was from England and brought our family this tradition] passed away .

Remember To Check Your Pockets!

Ukraine Is Game To You?

Another week and the protests continue...and John McCain decided to visit the protesters in Kiev this week as well which helps bring attention to the events in America.

 

One Less Lenin Statue

Ever since Ukrainian President Viktor Yankukovich's decision to not sign trade agreements with the European Union, most of Ukraine has been in a state of continual political protest. I say most of Ukraine because the city that Laura and I lived in, Kharkiv, has not had many protests at all and the famous Freedom Square [which I've written about many, many times] near where we lived has been blocked off so potential protesters can't get to it to hold their rallies. That's what happens when you are just 40 kilometers from the Russian border. [This blog has some photos of the barricades around Freedom Square.]

The largest rallies have been taking place in Kiev in Independence Square.  Whenever Laura and I would stay in Kiev we would try to find an apartment or hostel around the Square [which I also wrote about many, many times] so we would have been in the thick of it.  Here is an amazing video of the protest taken by someone who climbed up the huge Christmas tree that is in the Square [the embedded video sometimes does not work but you can always see it here]:



In a surprising turn, last night the Lenin statue in Kiev was destroyed by protesters.  The statue itself was the focus of one of m favorite winter photos from our year abroad.  To me it looks like Lenin is smuggling some snowballs or as one of my friends said, he might be holding a snow white kitten.  I'm glad I got to see it before it was gone for good.

Here a photo of the statue on the ground that may come to symbolize the protests in Kiev:

Riga Apartment Singing

While we were living in Riga, Latvia we shared our apartment with an opera singer and in the afternoons we could sometimes hear her practicing.  Here's a sample of what we enjoy throughout the summer.