New Year

I just got back from Ukraine. It was so fun, and my first time celebrating New Year Russian style. New Year is the main holiday in Russia and in many former soviet countries, including Ukraine.

One of the most important aspects (the aspect?) of celebrating is the novagodniy stol (New Year's Table). This is the dinner table, laid out with tons of different zakuski (appetizers), salat (salads) etc, etc. Sometimes all food for the meal is laid out at once on the table, other times the starters are on the table, and then hot food comes out of the kitchen, and then more hot food, and then of course, tea and dessert!

We saw 4 different New Year's tables on this visit. I don't know if I can even remember everything that I ate, but here's my best attempt at a list. Recipes for some of these to come. I've given some links to my favorite Russian cooking website. It's in Russian but there are pictures, too.

Salati (Salads):
-Shuba (Herring in a Fur Coat, ours had the beets on top)
-Kapusta (Preserved Cabbage with Horseradish)
-Mimosa (Fish and Egg)
-Olivier (very classic one, mostly potatoes)
-Vinagret (very classic, it has beets)
-Grated carrots with garlic
-"Korean" spicy carrots (posted about these before)
-"Happy New Year" salad
-Green salad topped with radish and red caviar
-Crab and corn salad

Zakuski (Appetizers):
-Kalbasa (Salami)
-Eggplant caviar
-Buterbrot C Ikroi (Buttered bread with red caviar)
-Olives
-Fried pieces of white fish
-Fried pieces of veal
-Stuffed goose's neck
-Holodyets (meat in gelatin)
-Pechenochniy Tort (non-sweet cake made from liver)
-Fried chicken cutlets
-Salted fish (trout, some tasty white one I don't know, salmon)
-Homemade prunes (delicious)
-Homemade conserved tomatoes
-Marinated mushrooms
-Salmon and cheese rolls
-Stuffed mushrooms
-Quince fried with sugar
-Preserved apples

Hot dishes or Main dishes:
-Boiled and salted goose (this is a Tatar dish and DELICIOUS)
-Belyash
-Pelmeni served with Georgian plum sauce
-Braised meat with quince and potatoes
-Cooked duck with apples
-Broth (from goose)
-Plov (with chicken)
-Indian spicy potatoes (I made these)
-A baked chicken stuffed with bread stuffing, American style (but with Russian flavors...dill, parsley, celery root, carrots, parsley root, tarragon, onion and garlic). Everyone was amazed by the idea of stuffing a chicken with bread!

Desserts:
-Thick blini (made with yeast)
-Kievskiy Tort
-Bannaniy Tort
-Tiramisu (not like it's Italian namesake, but good)
-Some tasty jam cookies
-Lots of honey straight from the dacha
-Pineapple
-Homemade jams (cherry, raspberry)

Drinks:
-Balsam from Bashkortostan
-Balsam from Tatarstan
-French white wine and Champagne (our gift)
-White wine from Crimea (BAD)
-Red wine from Crimea (not half bad)
-"Champagne" from Odessa (pretty good)
-Vodka
-Samagon (homemade alcohol) from honey
-Kompot

You know what, I'm sure I've forgotten something! But that's a lot, isn't it? I hope I can manage to find the recipes for more of those things, because they were all really tasty.

Also, this new year I managed to make my first good toast in Russian. I had tried twice before, but this time, I finally managed a really good one.