Getting ready for New Year... Russian-style

So here I am on a bitterly cold, icy Sunday morning in Sheffield. I could've been doing so many relaxing things... sipping tea while reading a Sunday newspaper, taking the dog for a walk (I don't have a dog, but it sounds relaxing, but I'll make do by watching idiots freezing their ass off taking their whippets for a walk) or watching TV (then again, it's Sunday morning and a choice of religion, cartoons or cooking - that's separately of course, together would be kind of weird... a Bible-bashing Bugs Bunny baking biscuits?). But no, with just four days till New Year, talk has turned to the preparations. There's a Russian in the house... peanuts, crisps and booze will not suffice...

Happy New Year!

Concerned parents

My in-laws, in Siberia, sent several messages because they were worried about us after seeing Sheffield on the Russian news and how it had been affected by the snow.

Sheffield, Dec. 2014

Photo of the Month

One of the things I miss about Russia is the guarantee of snow and the beauty it can bring.

Crisis? What Crisis?

President Putin's major end of year press conference glossed over the current situation in Russia, almost echoing Jim Сallaghan's dismissiveness, paraphrased and immortalised in the Sun headline, "Crisis? What Crisis?"

source

So, what's the feeling among 'ordinary Russians'?

Ouch!

When the Rouble started falling last Tuesday (16/12/14), I saw that the Apple shop was down.

16/12/14 offline

So...

It almost brings a tear to my eye...

... well, not quite. The Guardian reports that the tumbling Rouble saw the owners of two English football clubs take big hits.

Alisher Usmanov, Arsenal owner, lost £517million over 48 hours. I don't know who to feel sorrier for; him, down to his last £8.5bn, or the Arsenal fans who may have to continue complaining about the club's reluctance to spend freely in the transfer market.

Usmanov

Meanwhile...

Masyanya

Masyanya (Масяня) is a popular Russian cartoon character created by Oleg Kuvaev and his mult.ru studio and first appeared in 2001 on the Internet.

I can't stand New Year.

the evil eye...

It's been in the news that, in honour of the final Hobbit film having its Russian premier, an art group, Svechenie, had wanted to place a holographic Eye of Sauron on a Moscow skyscraper to mark the occasion.

The proposed design.

However...

The Devil and the Deep Blue Sea

I have little sympathy for governments. They play their games against each other and confuse the country's interests with their own and friends' interests, meanwhile forgetting their citizens' needs. Without taking sides in what's been happening in Russia and Ukraine recently, my sympathies lie only with the ordinary people.

Ukraine is a country caught between two differing beasts - the EU/ the West and Russia. It's like divorced parents offering increasingly larger presents to win the child's affection. The reality is that there is no wisdom of Solomon being dispensed. Nor is there one, genuine mother willing to give up her child rather than it being torn asunder. The death toll of 4300 is sickening figure for geopolitical posturing.

Discussing Peace

Salad Olivier - the history

When I first arrived in Russia and started talking to students about food, it quickly became apparent that the two most popular Russian dishes in their eyes were pelmeniy and Olivier Salad. It was to their astonishment that I'd heard of neither.

Going off at a slight tangent, I once nearly made a group of Russian teenagers cry by telling them that Russian vodka wasn't the best in the world (seriously) and 'proving' this claim by pointing out, with a straight face, that Finnish vodka was about 4 times the price because of the relative quality (not true - it's tax) and that even Britain produced better vodka but Russia refused to import it so as to not lower the status of the domestic product (again not true - hell, I don't even know if the UK distills any, but it was a great lie and fun to see a class full of quivering lips and actually so angrily animated in English to defend their prized, national drink).

In the biggest blow to the collective, Russian, culinary ego since then, I'll start by pointing out the fact (yes, fact, not some fibs to tease a class) that one of Russia's most (self-)acclaimed dishes was created by the francophone, Lucien Olivier, probably Belgian, who had trained in French haute cuisine. Not Russian... cue lots of trembling lower lips...

New Year Comes Early (Recipe - Olivier Salad)

It's clear that New Year is coming... my wife's is getting cravings for salad. Not the British-style soggy lettuce, but the full-on Russian salads. The urges could not be contained and she decided on Salat Olivier, so here's the recipe...