Don't lose the experience of the past. More than twenty years have passed since the first edition of this book, and almost thirty years have passed since its actual creation. Over the years, great changes have occurred, including in assessing the importance of culinary skills both for society as a whole and for an individual family - the main unit of society.

The view of culinary skills as one of the foundations for strengthening the family both in social and health terms has now become ubiquitous and dominant. The interest of a wide range of people in the history, theory and practice of cooking, in the acquisition and study of culinary literature, has sharply increased. And this stimulates the release of cookbooks.

However, along with the desire to quickly saturate the market with literature in high demand, there appeared the danger of the spread of hasty, compilative, eclectic books. The fact is that for many decades, public catering was dominated by erroneous or superficial, simplified rules and methods, standards and technical conditions, which gradually became a mandatory norm and thereby prevented the assimilation and preservation of the classical rules of culinary skill created over centuries.

An absurd tradition developed to regulate cookbooks, their contents, the range of dishes and their dosage down to the gram, and to make the very recipes of dishes directly dependent on the products currently available in stores.

Unfortunately, it was forgotten that cookbooks and recipes are notes of culinary art that cannot be changed, just as parts of any instruments cannot be deleted from the score of a symphony just because the industry did not fulfill the plan for their production. As a result of simplification of classical culinary recipes, exclusion and replacement of some products with others, culinary skills gradually degraded both in public catering, in restaurant cuisine, and in home cooking, because all types of cookery literature, both educational, popular or scientific, were subject to leveling.

Usually all the shortcomings of catering are blamed on the quality of the products. However, the only indicator of the quality of a product is its freshness. Stale product should not be used for cooking at all. Staleness is an irremovable vice. If by “poor quality” we mean, as is often done, insufficient fatness of the meat or, conversely, its increased fat content, or its frozen state, or the bonyness of partial fish, contamination of vegetables, etc., then from a culinary point of view such “negative » properties are not an obstacle to creating high-quality dishes. This is what the Chinese proverb means: “There are no bad foods, only bad cooks.” Moreover, from the most ordinary products, guided by a complete, detailed, detailed recipe that does not bypass or hush up all the subtleties of cooking, even a person who is not very knowledgeable in cooking can prepare an excellent dish.

This is why cookbooks should not be dependent on the availability of food in a particular area or person. Only by capturing the culinary ideal will they play their main role: to be the guardians and bearers of the best culinary traditions, and to contribute to the correct culinary education of the nation.

It has been noticed that people who have mastered certain culinary skills and recipes in their youth develop certain tastes in accordance with this, and with great difficulty they switch to other cooking methods or to a different range of dishes, and most often they never part with something. then habitual, mastered, familiar, being always subjectively confident that the familiar cannot be worse. That is why mistakes in the culinary education of the masses are corrected extremely slowly - as a rule, it takes the life of one, or even two or three generations. From here it is clear that allowing, and even more so disseminating, replicating any erroneous ideas in the field of culinary skills, wittingly or unwittingly introducing bad culinary tastes, and even more so turning them into fashion, is far from a harmless activity.

I will give just a few examples of harmful culinary recommendations that led to a deterioration in the quality and taste of dishes and were nevertheless repeated from book to book: soaking frozen fish, thawing frozen meat before cooking, breading meat, fish, vegetables in breadcrumbs (instead of flour), leaving foam in meat and fish soups and the introduction of pasteurized “bagged” milk (instead of boiled milk) into various purees and other culinary products, etc.

All these recommendations have one thing in common: they do not come from centuries-old culinary practice, but from erroneous, far-fetched ideas, allegedly explained by considerations of “hygiene”, preservation of vitamins, proteins, etc., and not by considerations of culinary rules and the tasks of improving the taste of dishes, when it is extremely important how this or that culinary technique, heat or cold processing affects the consistency and taste of food raw materials, improves or worsens it.

In the same way, some of the product combinations mastered by public catering turned into standard, stable combinations, for example: salad with mayonnaise (instead of individual salad dressings), fish in tomato sauce, sausages with green peas, sausage with stewed cabbage, pasta with minced meat, cottage cheese and cottage cheese casseroles and other products with sour cream, although in terms of taste these combinations are far from ideal, and dishes with tomato seasoning are even rough.

This is how the standardization of public tastes took place, mass culinary habits were cultivated, and the inability and unwillingness to try one’s own version, not one recommended by someone, was instilled. Standards were widely applied to home food. In general, in cooking there has been a tendency towards simplifying the composition of dishes, reducing and primitivizing methods of processing raw products, simplifying “kitchen work” as a result of discarding some indispensable small operations, without which it is impossible to obtain high-quality food. Simplifications often seemed trivial, that is, so insignificant that they were not given any importance and were forgotten about.

It is not surprising, therefore, that culinary subtleties sometimes become simply irreplaceable for new generations. Let me give you one small example.

None of the cookbooks published over the last half century draws the consumer’s attention to the fact that all sea fish, and especially herring and mackerel, need to remove the subscale (film) skin, no matter how thin it may be, and in river fish and lake fish, if they are absolutely fresh, fresh, you don’t even have to remove the scales - fry, cook the fish soup along with it.

Today, in public catering, even flounder is cooked with the skin, the thickness of which reaches 2-2.5 mm. And at one of the best canneries in the country, fish is placed into delicious canned mackerel without removing the top thin skin (film), which not only worsens the taste of the product, but also sharply reduces its shelf life: such products spoil twice as fast as the theoretically stipulated period. Due to non-compliance with this culinary “trifle”, the state and consumers suffer colossal losses.

With the introduction of “progressive, modern” technology, there is essentially a process of oblivion of the skills and techniques of culinary craftsmanship accumulated over centuries of practice. But the art of cooking is based on the assimilation of experience gained in the past, so there is no need to “invent” or “invent” in cooking now, when creativity in this area is reduced to nothing. On the contrary, we must carefully collect, restore and preserve what the best culinary thought and practice has achieved over the centuries. Not to lose the experience of the past is the main task of modern cooking.

But since in the history of the development of cooking there were many different directions, the question naturally arises, what are the criteria for right and wrong in cooking, what should be preferred? After all, it would seem that in this area one cannot argue about tastes at all? Of course, we are not talking about choosing the best two hundred from a thousand dishes and not about which of the famous different peoples rational cooking techniques to prefer and which to discard. The point is that in the evolution of the culinary art of all nations there were both main directions of its development and branches and sleeves. Some of them led to a dead end and became obsolete. Others stayed for a long time. Moreover, even incorrect, but fashionable trends sometimes flourished magnificently. It is impossible to determine at the moment of development which direction is the main one and which is ephemeral - a retrospective look at the history of cooking is necessary. Only in this way is the core, main direction that best meets the needs of the majority of humanity revealed, and the temporary, artificially supported sometimes by fashion, sometimes by economic circumstances, becomes obvious.

In winter, fatty pies with meat and eggs, pancakes, salted pork lard, roast meat combined with pickles and pickles from vegetables, mushrooms, berries and fruits will not seem heavy.

So the time of year itself regulates and determines the main guidelines in the menu and menu selection, and if you follow this wisely and consistently, then there will be no special problems does not occur with repetition or boring food.

As for selecting the menu for a specific lunch, it is necessary and important to follow one classic rule: products used in four or three servings should not be repeated. This applies primarily to the base of the dishes. So, for example, if snacks include vegetables and mushrooms, then the first should be meat, the second should be fish, and the third should be flour, egg, dairy or fruit. Side dishes for main courses should not be repeated. For example, a menu that includes chicken soup with rice for the first course, cutlets with rice for the second, and fruit and berry compote with rice croquettes for the third, is poorly composed, and such a lunch, despite all its nutritional value, will seem tasteless. In the same way, you should avoid using potatoes as a component in salads, soups, and as a puree for the second course.

In addition, it is necessary that heavy and light dishes follow each other alternately.

So, for example, after a vegetarian green soup it is good to serve a fatty lamb dish or, conversely, after a fatty, rich borscht or kharcho, it is best to serve a light fish second course, for example a veal, after which you can again serve a dense third - Guryev porridge, egg fruit babka with jelly, etc.

Composing a table sequentially from dishes of the same national cuisine in compliance with the specified rules gives it harmony. For in this case, the harmonious selection of all components of each dish and their totality is the result of centuries of folk experience.

However, when selecting a menu consisting of dishes from different national cuisines, achieving overall taste harmony is more difficult.

At the same time, a correctly compiled, tasteful menu of dishes from different national cuisines is not only legitimate, but also extremely enriches the table. This selection is especially appropriate when compiling a festive table menu.

In this case, much depends on the degree of development of the culinary taste of the menu compiler, and not just on his personal taste inclinations.

Sometimes dishes from different national cuisines are simply incompatible, and you need to be able to feel this.

For example, Russian sour cabbage soup and Uzbek pilaf as a second course are incompatible in one dinner. It is inharmonious to serve Georgian satsivi or Moldavian kiftelutse after Estonian milk soup; Armenian bozbash cannot be combined with Lithuanian roast goose, etc. and so on.

In short, it is necessary to take into account not only the rules for alternating light and heavy dishes and the rule of non-repetition of food composition, but also take into account some national traditions in the field of cooking, the incompatibility of seasonings, spices, etc.

So, for example, if the menu contains one or two dishes from Transcaucasian cuisines, then it cannot include Lithuanian or Belarusian goose dishes or Estonian and Latvian herring dishes, since such products are not consumed in Transcaucasia and their taste and aromatic range contradicts range of Georgian or Armenian sauces and seasonings.

All this taken together makes it difficult to compile a menu of dishes from different national cuisines; this requires special culinary knowledge and experience.

We will give as an example one such correct menu, leaving readers the opportunity to then practice creating “international dinners” themselves using this book.

Holiday dinner

Snacks:
Resol (Mold)
Muzhuzhi (Georgian)
Heftya-bejar (Azerbian)
Mkhali (Georgian)
Chogi (Georgian)

Soups:
Botvinya (Russian)
Rakhman cabbage soup (Russian)
Ukha white (or sweet) (Russian)

Second:
Manti (Uzb)
or
Kololac (Armenian)
or
Chanakhi (cargo)
or
Shima (Taj)

Entremet:
Tolma Etchmiadzin (Azerb)
Kaisaba

Dessert I:
Cheeses:
Pishlok (Uzb)
Janu-sierins (Latin)
Ezhegey (Kazakh)
Irimshik (Kazakh)

Dessert II:
Rhubarb grounds (est)
Apple grounds (est)
Chryanteli (cargo)
Berry jellied meat (Ukr)

Explanation:

Snacks: Selected boiled meat and vegetable snacks with soft, lightly marinated or neutral colors, without oily and spicy sauces. Therefore, lobio was not included here, but mkhali and chogi. All types of snacks are used at the same time.

Soups: Selected Russian soups with fish and cabbage soup made from fresh cabbage with a neutral or slightly acidic broth, with soft, tender vegetable grounds and tender fish meat, especially pleasant after mildly spicy meat jellies.

Second: Moderately dense meat main courses have been selected, some of which contain a dough component, which is new in this dinner. The meat is also different everywhere than in the appetizers - lamb.

Entremet: After meat and dough main courses, it is appropriate to use fruit and meat or fruit and butter fried dishes as a transitional dish.

Dessert: For dessert, it is possible, but not necessary, to use combinations of several national cheeses in combination with fresh fruit or with light, cool and sour fruit dishes and drinks.

This selection of dishes ensures that the slightly sour, soft, delicate flavor with neutral flavor additions is maintained throughout the entire meal.

In general, lunch is very diverse in composition, it contains two types of meat, fish, poultry, a lot of vegetables and fruits, there are protein-rich lactic acid products, and in general, despite a large number of dishes and significant nutritional value, such a lunch is not heavy.

Russian kitchen

Russian cuisine has long been widely known throughout the world. This is manifested in the direct penetration of native Russians into international restaurant cuisine food products(caviar, red fish, sour cream, buckwheat, rye flour etc.) or some of the most famous dishes of the Russian national menu (jelly, cabbage soup, fish soup, pancakes, pies, etc.), and in the indirect influence of Russian culinary art on the cuisines of other nations. Assortment of Russian cuisine at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries. became so diverse, and its influence and popularity in Europe were so great that by this time they started talking about it with the same respect as the famous French cuisine.

Russian national cuisine has gone through an extremely long development path, marked by several major stages, each of which left an indelible mark.

Old Russian cuisine, which developed from the 9th-10th centuries. and which reached its greatest flourishing in the 15th-16th centuries, although its formation covers a huge historical period, it is characterized general features, largely preserved to this day.

At the beginning of this period, Russian bread from sour (yeast) rye dough appeared - this uncrowned king on our table, without it even now the Russian menu is unthinkable - and also all the other most important types of Russian bread and flour products arose: the familiar saiki, bagels, sochni, pyshki, pancakes, pancakes, pies, etc. These products were prepared exclusively on the basis of sour dough - so characteristic of Russian cuisine throughout its entire history. historical development. The predilection for sour and kvass was also reflected in the creation of Russian real jelly - oatmeal, wheat and rye, which appeared long before modern ones. Mostly berry jelly.

Various gruels and porridges, which were originally considered ritual, ceremonial food, also occupied a large place on the menu.

All this bread and flour food was varied most often with fish, mushrooms, wild berries, vegetables, milk and very rarely meat.

The appearance of classic Russian drinks - all kinds of honey, kvass, sbitney - dates back to the same time.
Already in the early period of the development of Russian cuisine, a sharp division of the Russian table into lean (vegetable-fish-mushroom) and fast (milk-egg-meat) was evident, which had a huge impact on its further development until the end of the 19th century. The artificial creation of a line between the fast and fast table, the isolation of some products from others, and the prevention of their mixing ultimately led to the creation of only some original dishes, and the entire menu as a whole suffered - it became more monotonous and simplified.
We can say that the Lenten table was luckier: since most days of the year - from 192 to 216 in different years - were considered fast (and these fasts were observed very strictly), there was a natural desire to expand the range of the Lenten table. Hence the abundance of mushroom and fish dishes in Russian cuisine, the tendency to use various plant materials - grain (porridge), vegetables, wild berries and herbs (nettle, snot, quinoa, etc.). Moreover, they have been so famous since the 10th century. vegetables such as cabbage, turnips, radishes, peas, cucumbers were prepared and eaten - whether raw, salted, steamed, boiled or baked - separately from one another. Therefore, for example, salads and especially vinaigrettes have never been characteristic of Russian cuisine and appeared in Russia already in the 19th century. as a borrowing from the West. But they were also originally made mainly with one vegetable, giving the corresponding name to the salad - cucumber salad, beet salad, potato salad, etc. Each type of mushroom - milk mushrooms, mushrooms, honey mushrooms, white mushrooms, morels, pecheritsa (champignons), etc. d. - salted or cooked completely separately, which, by the way, is still practiced today. The same can be said about fish, which was consumed boiled, dried, salted, baked and, less often, fried. In the literature we come across juicy, “tasty” names for fish dishes: sigovina, taimenina, pike, halibut, catfish, salmon, sturgeon, stellate sturgeon, beluga and others. And the fish soup could be perch, ruff, burbot, sterlet, etc.

Thus, the number of dishes by name was huge, but all of them differed little from each other in content. Flavor diversity was achieved, firstly, by the difference in heat and cold processing, as well as by the use various oils, mainly vegetable (hemp, nut, poppy, olive and much later - sunflower), secondly, the use of spices. Of the latter, onions, garlic, horseradish, dill were most often used, and in very large quantities, as well as parsley, anise, coriander, Bay leaf, black pepper and cloves, which appeared in Rus' already in the 10th-11th centuries. Later, in the 15th - early 16th centuries, they were supplemented with ginger, cardamom, cinnamon, calamus (fir root) and saffron.

In the initial period of the development of Russian cuisine, there also developed a tendency to consume liquid hot dishes, which then received the general name “khlebova”. The most widespread types of bread are such as cabbage soup, stews based on vegetable raw materials, as well as various mash, brews, chatterboxes, salomat and other types of flour soups.

As for meat and milk, these products were consumed relatively rarely, and their processing was not difficult. Meat, as a rule, was boiled in cabbage soup or gruel, and milk was drunk raw, stewed or sour. Cottage cheese and sour cream were made from dairy products, and the production of cream and butter remained almost unknown for a long time, at least until the 15th-16th centuries. These products appeared rarely and irregularly.

The next stage in the development of Russian cuisine is the period from the middle of the 16th century. and until the end of the 17th century. At this time, not only further development of variants of the Lenten and Fast table continues, but also the differences between the cuisines of different classes and estates are especially sharply outlined. From this time on, the cuisine of the common people began to become more and more simplified, the cuisine of the boyars, nobility and especially the nobility became more and more refined. She collects, unites and generalizes the experience of previous centuries in the field of Russian cooking, creates new, more complex options old dishes, and also for the first time borrows and openly introduces into Russian cuisine a number of foreign dishes and culinary techniques, mainly of Eastern origin.

Particular attention is paid to the fast festive table of that time. Along with the already familiar corned beef and boiled meat, spun (i.e., cooked on spits) and fried meat, poultry and game occupy a place of honor on the table of the nobility. Types of meat processing are becoming increasingly differentiated. Thus, beef is used mainly for preparing corned beef and for boiling (boiled slaughter); pork is used to make ham for long-term storage or they consume it as fresh or suckling pig, fried and stewed, and in Russia only meat, lean pork is valued; finally, lamb, poultry and game are used mainly for roasting and only partly (lamb) for stewing.

In the 17th century All the main types of Russian soups finally took shape, while kalia, pokhmelki, solyanka, and rassolniki, unknown in medieval Rus', appeared.

The Lenten table of the nobility is also enriched. A prominent place on it begins to be occupied by balyk, black caviar, which was eaten not only salted, but also boiled in vinegar or milk of poppy seeds.

On the cookery of the 17th century. Oriental and primarily Tatar cuisine has a strong influence, which is associated with the accession in the second half of the 16th century. to the Russian state of the Astrakhan and Kazan khanates, Bashkiria and Siberia. It was during this period that dishes made from unleavened dough (noodles, dumplings), products such as raisins, apricots, figs (figs), as well as lemons and tea, the use of which has since become traditional in Russia, came into Russian cuisine. Thus, it significantly replenishes and sweet table. Next to gingerbread, known in Rus' even before the adoption of Christianity, one could see a variety of gingerbreads, sweet pies, candies, candied fruits, numerous jams, not only from berries, but also from some vegetables (carrots with honey and ginger, radish in molasses) . In the second half of the 17th century. Cane sugar (1) began to be brought to Russia, from which, together with spices, they made candies and snacks, sweets, delicacies, fruits, etc. But all these sweet dishes were mainly the privilege of the nobility (2).

The boyar table is characterized by an extreme abundance of dishes - up to 50, and at the royal table their number grows to 150-200. The size of these dishes is also enormous, for which the largest swans, geese, turkeys, the largest sturgeons or belugas are usually chosen - sometimes they are so large that three or four people lift them. At the same time, there is a desire to decorate dishes. Palaces and fantastic animals of gigantic proportions are built from food products. Court dinners turn into a pompous, magnificent ritual, lasting 6-8 hours in a row - from two o'clock in the afternoon to ten in the evening - and include almost a dozen courses, each of which consists of a whole series (sometimes two dozen) of dishes of the same name, for example from a dozen varieties of fried game or salted fish, from a dozen types of pancakes or pies (3).

Thus, in the 17th century. Russian cuisine was already extremely diverse in the range of dishes (we are, of course, talking about the cuisine of the ruling classes). At the same time, the art of cooking in the sense of the ability to combine products and bring out their taste was still at a very high level. low level. Suffice it to say that mixing of products, chopping, grinding, crushing them was still not allowed. Most of all this applied to the meat table. Therefore, Russian cuisine, in contrast to French and German, for a long time did not know and did not want to accept various minced meats, rolls, pates and cutlets. All kinds of casseroles and puddings turned out to be alien to ancient Russian cuisine. The desire to prepare a dish from a whole large piece, and ideally from a whole animal or plant, persisted until the 18th century. The exception, it seemed, was the fillings in pies, in whole animals and poultry, and in their parts - rennet, caul. However, in most cases these were, so to speak, ready-made fillings, crushed by nature itself - grain (porridge), berries, mushrooms (they were not cut either). The fish for the filling was only flattened, but not crushed. And only much later - at the end of the 18th century. and especially in the 19th century. - already under the influence of Western European cuisine, some fillings began to be specially crushed.

The next stage in the development of Russian cuisine begins at the turn of the 17th and 18th centuries. and lasts a little more than a century - until the first decade of the 19th century. At this time, there was a radical demarcation between the cuisine of the ruling classes and the cuisine of the common people. If in the 17th century. The cuisine of the ruling classes still retained a national character and its difference from folk cuisine was expressed only in the fact that in terms of quality, abundance and range of products and dishes it was sharply superior to folk cuisine, then in the 18th century. The cuisine of the ruling classes gradually began to lose its Russian national character. Since the times of Peter the Great, the Russian nobility and the rest of the nobility have borrowed and introduced Western European culinary traditions. Rich nobles visiting Western Europe brought foreign chefs with them. At first these were mostly Dutch and German, especially Saxon and Austrian, then Swedish and mainly French. From the middle of the 18th century. foreign cooks were hired so regularly that they soon almost completely replaced the cooks and serf cooks of the upper nobility.

One of the new customs that appeared at this time is the use of snacks as an independent dish. German sandwiches, French and Dutch cheeses, which came from the West and were hitherto unknown on the Russian table, were combined with ancient Russian dishes - cold corned beef, jelly, ham, boiled pork, as well as caviar, balyk and other salted red fish in a single serving or even in special welcome food - breakfast. New alcoholic drinks also appeared - ratafia and erofeichi. Since the 70s of the 18th century, when tea began to become increasingly important, in the highest circles of society, sweet pies, pies and sweets were separated from lunch, which were combined with tea in a separate serving and dedicated to 5 o’clock in the evening.
Only in the first half of the 19th century, after Patriotic War 1812, in connection with the general rise of patriotism in the country and the struggle of Slavophile circles with foreign influence, advanced representatives of the nobility began to revive interest in national Russian cuisine. However, when in 1816 the Tula landowner V.A. Levshin tried to compile the first Russian cookbook, he was forced to admit that “information about Russian dishes has almost completely disappeared” and therefore “it is now impossible to imagine full description Russian cookery and should be content only with what can still be collected from what remains in memory, for the history of the Russian cookery has never been given over to description” (4). As a result, the descriptions of Russian cuisine dishes collected by V. A. Levshin from memory were not only not accurate in their recipes, but also in their assortment they did not reflect all the actual richness of the dishes of the Russian national table.

The cuisine of the ruling classes and throughout the first half of the 19th century. continued to develop in isolation from folk cuisine, under the noticeable influence of French cuisine. But the very nature of this influence has changed significantly. In contrast to the 18th century, when there was a direct borrowing of foreign dishes, such as cutlets, sausages, omelettes, mousses, compotes, etc., and the displacement of native Russian ones, in the first half of the 19th century. a different process emerged - the processing of the Russian culinary heritage, and in the second half of the 19th century. The restoration of the Russian national menu is even beginning, albeit again with French adjustments.

During this period, a number of French chefs worked in Russia, radically reforming the Russian cuisine of the ruling classes. The first French chef to leave a mark on the reform of Russian cuisine was Marie-Antoine Carême - one of the first and few research chefs and chef-scientists. Before arriving in Russia at the invitation of Prince P.I. Bagration, Karem was the cook of the English Prince Regent (future King George IV), Duke of Württemberg, Rothschild, Talleyrand. He was keenly interested in the cuisines of various nations. During his short stay in Russia, Karem became familiar with Russian cuisine in detail, appreciated its merits and outlined ways to free it from superficiality. Karem's successors in Russia continued the reform he began. This reform affected, firstly, the order of serving dishes to the table. Adopted in the 18th century. The “French” serving system, when all dishes were put on the table at the same time, was replaced by the old Russian method of serving, when one dish replaced another. At the same time, the number of changes was reduced to 4-5 and a sequence was introduced in serving lunch, in which heavy dishes alternated with light ones that stimulated the appetite. In addition, meat or poultry cooked whole was no longer served on the table; they began to be cut into portions before serving. With such a system, decorating dishes as an end in itself has lost all meaning. The reformers also advocated replacing dishes made from crushed and pureed products, which had taken over great place in the cuisine of the ruling classes in the 18th - early 19th centuries, with dishes made from natural products more typical of Russian cuisine. This is how all kinds of chops (lamb and pork) from a whole piece of meat with a bone, natural steaks, clops, splints, entrecotes, escalopes appeared. At the same time, the efforts of culinary specialists were aimed at eliminating the heaviness and indigestibility of some dishes. So, in their cabbage soup recipes they discarded the flour flavor that made them tasteless, which was preserved only by virtue of tradition, and not common sense, potatoes, which appeared in Russia in the 70s of the 18th century, began to be widely used as side dishes. For Russian pies, they suggested using soft puff pastry made from wheat flour instead of sour rye. They also introduced a straight method of preparing dough using pressed yeast, which we use today, thanks to which sour dough, which previously required 10-12 hours to prepare, began to ripen in 2 hours. French chefs also paid attention to snacks, which became one of the specific features Russian table. If in the 18th century. The German form of serving snacks predominated - sandwiches, then in the 19th century. snacks began to be served on a special table, each view special dish, beautifully decorating them, and thus expanded their range so much, choosing among the appetizers a whole range of ancient Russian not only meat and fish, but also mushroom and vegetable pickled dishes, that their abundance and variety from now on never ceased to be a constant subject of surprise to foreigners.

Finally, the French school introduced the combination of products (vinaigrettes, salads, side dishes) and precise dosages in dish recipes, which had not previously been accepted in Russian cuisine, and introduced Russian cuisine to unknown types of Western European kitchen equipment.

At the end of the 19th century. The Russian stove and pots and cast iron specially adapted to its thermal conditions were replaced by a stove with its oven, saucepans, stewpans, etc. Instead of a sieve and sieve, colanders, skimmers, meat grinders, etc. began to be used.

An important contribution of French culinary specialists to the development of Russian cuisine was that they trained a whole galaxy of brilliant Russian chefs. Their students were Mikhail and Gerasim Stepanov, G. Dobrovolsky, V. Bestuzhev, I. Radetsky, P. Grigoriev, I. Antonov, Z. Eremeev, N. Khodeev, P. Vikentiev and others, who supported and spread the best traditions of Russian cuisine to throughout the entire 19th century. Of these, G. Stepanov and I. Radetsky were not only outstanding practitioners, but also left behind extensive manuals on Russian cooking.
In parallel with this process of updating the cuisine of the ruling classes, carried out, so to speak, “from above” and concentrated in the noble clubs and restaurants of St. Petersburg and Moscow, there was another process - the collection, restoration and development of forgotten ancient Russian recipes, which spontaneously took place in the provinces, in the landowners estates until the 70s of the XIX century. The source for this collection was folk cuisine, in the development of which a huge number of nameless and unknown, but talented serf cooks took part.
By the last third of the 19th century. Russian cuisine of the ruling classes, thanks to its unique assortment of dishes and their exquisite and delicate taste, began to occupy, along with French cuisine, one of the leading places in Europe.
At the same time, it is necessary to emphasize that, despite all the changes, introductions and foreign influences, its main characteristic features have been preserved and remain inherent to it to this day, since they have been firmly retained in folk cuisine. These main features of Russian cuisine and the Russian national table can be defined as follows: the abundance of dishes, the variety of the snack table, the love of eating bread, pancakes, pies, cereals, the originality of the first liquid cold and hot dishes, the variety of fish and mushroom table, the widespread use of pickles from vegetables and mushrooms, an abundance of festive and sweet table with its jams, cookies, gingerbreads, Easter cakes, etc.

Current page: 1 (book has 36 pages in total)

Pokhlebkin William Vasilievich
National cuisines of our peoples

Introductory article.

Unfortunately, it was forgotten that cookbooks and recipes are notes of culinary art that cannot be changed, just as parts of any instruments cannot be deleted from the score of a symphony just because the industry did not fulfill the plan for their production. As a result of the simplification of classical culinary recipes, the exclusion and replacement of some products with others, culinary skills gradually degraded both in public catering, in restaurant cuisine, and in home cooking, because all types of cookery literature, both educational and popular or scientific, were leveled.

It is not surprising, therefore, that culinary subtleties sometimes become simply irreplaceable for new generations. Let me give you one small example.

But since in the history of the development of cooking there were many different directions, the question naturally arises, what are the criteria for right and wrong in cooking, what should be preferred? After all, it would seem that in this area one cannot argue about tastes at all? Of course, we are not talking about choosing the best two hundred from a thousand dishes, and not about which of the rational cooking methods known to different nations to prefer and which to discard. The point is that in the evolution of the culinary art of all nations there were both main directions of its development and branches and sleeves. Some of them led to a dead end and became obsolete. Others stayed for a long time. Moreover, even incorrect, but fashionable trends sometimes flourished magnificently. It is impossible to determine at the moment of development which direction is the main one and which is ephemeral - a retrospective look at the history of cooking is necessary. Only in this way is the core, main direction that best meets the needs of the majority of humanity revealed, and the temporary, artificially supported sometimes by fashion, sometimes by economic circumstances, becomes obvious.

Culinary art has always developed under the influence of a certain environment, classes, estates, and often depended on fashion imposed by a certain social stratum, prestige or habits (and sometimes tyranny) of individuals. But until the end of the 17th century. it was invariably based on local, national cuisines, closely related to the natural conditions of a particular country, with the historical achievements and religious precepts of a particular people.

Only in the 18th century. throughout Europe, including Russia (and in France as early as the mid-17th century), differences between the cuisine of the ruling classes and folk cuisine were sharply marked. From now on, they differ not only in the amount of food, the range of dishes, the variety of their presentation and the quality of food raw materials, but most importantly - in the composition of the dishes, varying their components, and different cooking technology. New methods and techniques of the “master’s kitchen”, new tools and kitchen equipment for a century remain inaccessible to the people’s kitchen, which is thus divorced from the more “advanced”, “progressive” for its time technology of the kitchen of the ruling classes and is thereby placed in the position of “ backward", "underdeveloped".

At the same time, throughout the 18th century. the cuisine of the ruling classes of all European countries falls under the complete influence of the recipes of French court cuisine and, in connection with this, becomes more and more artificial, increasingly includes leveled dishes devoid of their national flavor, is standardized, obeys conventions, and even begins to work not only and not so much for the stomach, as much as for the eye, and finally goes into fashionable delights, losing its national piquancy and definition.

In turn, the national cuisine, excommunicated from the table of the ruling classes, also loses. It is gradually deprived of food diversity, its rich assortment is becoming scarcer. And while it turns into a “kitchen for the lower classes,” for the urban philistinism and peasantry, its more complex, expensive and rarely prepared dishes are either forgotten or, in an “ennobled” form, forever move into the cuisine of the ruling classes.

This process continues in Europe until the middle of the 19th century: the gap between the artificial, Frenchized and Germanized cosmopolitan “universally identical” cuisine of the ruling classes and the numerous, but forgotten and impoverished national cuisines is increasingly widening. However, from the middle of the 19th century. In many European countries, especially small ones, national cuisine is receiving a new impetus for development. It is mainly the petty and middle bourgeoisie who are called upon to be the custodians of national culinary traditions. At the same time, it cannot do without crude “urban” distortions of the old national cuisine.

In Russia, these trends also take place, but due to the delay in Russia’s transition to capitalism, the development of national cuisine here reaches its climax only in the 70-80s of the 19th century. This is most noticeable among the merchants, who emerged from the peasantry, but noble cuisine also includes, along with cosmopolitan “French” cuisine, the best of the old Moscow national cuisine.

Thus, by the end of the 19th century. in the countries of Southern, Eastern and Northern Europe, as well as in small Western European countries(Belgium, Holland, Luxembourg) the position of national cuisine is being restored, which occupies, if not dominant, then a predominant position.

The twentieth century again puts a limit to this development of cooking. After the First World War, the importance of national cuisine in European life changed.

The fact is that in the 20th century, when unprecedented events took place fast growth urban population at the expense of the rural population, when the ratio between the urban and rural population everywhere began to change sharply in favor of the former, in all developed industrial countries the task arose of quickly and uninterruptedly supplying large masses of the population with food, and at the same time - during lunch breaks at three – or two-shift work. These conditions left their mark on the further development of world cuisine.

As the rural population declined and the urban population lost their homestead farming, national cuisine in all industrial countries lost its position, because home cooking requires both many products and a lot of time. The old restaurant cuisine, adapted to serving the ruling classes, could not provide for large masses of the population ready table, because in this case she had to sacrifice high culinary and technical standards. All that remained was to turn to simplified, but fast, cheap, strictly standardized, mass production of food. This direction in the development of cuisine was called rationalistic. It originated at the end of the 19th century. in the USA and from there spread to the industrial countries of Europe. Its essence was that food in terms of raw materials and preparation methods should be simple and, therefore, consist of semi-finished or finished products, combined with bread and consumed cold or lightly boiled or heated. This gave the main benefit - quickly providing food to large masses of people at the same time with the relative cheapness of such food.

In rationalistic American cuisine, the main products became canned food, condoms, sausages, sandwiches and ready-made drinks, most often cold: whiskey, beer, cocktails, juices. Only a few hot instant dishes, convenient for standardizing portions and prices, were allowed in this kitchen: cutlets, sausages, scrambled eggs, coffee. Tea, requiring special brewing conditions, was already becoming impossible in this “stream”, because it inevitably lost quality, turning into a mud, and it was easier to refuse it. All sorts of pickles and deviations from the standard were also ruthlessly expelled from the rationalist kitchen. Therefore, it was difficult to withstand it for a long time.

These strict rules were softened, however, by the fact that in the United States, in parallel, those national cuisines were preserved and cultivated, which in their repertoire had dishes that could become standard and compete in cheapness with dishes of rationalistic cuisine. These cuisines were: Italian

- with its famous pizza, polenta, pasta dishes (spaghetti, pasta, noodles, ravioli, etc.), as well as Chinese and Japanese - firstly, with rice, which is indispensable for them, the taste of which can be changed many times with the help of various seasonings and spices ; secondly, with the traditional way of preparing a number of hot dishes, especially soups in Chinese cuisine(quick combination of pre-cooked meat, poultry, fish, vegetables with hot meat, chicken, fish or vegetable broth); thirdly, with dishes similar in nature to canned ones (duck pickled eggs, sea cucumbers, squid, soy paste, seaweed, etc.); fourthly, with the Japanese hot fish dish, tempura, which lends itself well to standardization.

This coexistence of faceless American cuisine with a limited range of some national cuisines became characteristic of the development of European cuisines in the 30s and 40s. Here, sausages (sausages, wieners, bacon, hundreds of types of local sausages) took, along with sandwiches and cheese, which numbered up to 400 varieties and varieties in Europe, a central place in mass public nutrition on the eve of the Second World War. At the same time, national types of cuisine, of course, coexisted, especially in the countries of Southern and Eastern Europe, but in Western Europe they, being more expensive, constantly “receded” to the dishes of simplified Americanized cuisine.

After the Second World War, the position of rationalist cuisine in Europe became even stronger, and until the mid-50s, this cuisine became even more Americanized through the direct import of American ready-made dry, freeze-dried, and canned foods. National cuisine in European countries in the first two decades after the Second World War was preserved only for wealthy people; it quietly took the position of a cuisine for a narrow circle, because it required mastery of skill and raw material costs. Only in Asian countries has mass nutrition of the population followed the path of preserving quickly prepared standard national cuisine products that have long been cultivated in the East (flatbread, pies, kebabs), produced in small batches (on small braziers) by numerous retail market chefs. Here, the positions of the national cuisine were only narrowed (the range was reduced), but not violated; in principle, they remained unshakable. But in Europe, in the industrial countries of America (USA, Canada, partly in Brazil, Argentina, Mexico), the first round of the struggle between two culinary trends - rationalistic and national - was decided, taking into account the mass coverage and popularity, by the middle of the century it was still in favor rationalistic cuisine. It met the simplest needs of the majority of the urban poor population of industrial countries: although not very tasty, it was convenient, fast and cheap. Over the next decade, the 1960s, rationalist fast food continued to gain ground, especially in Europe. This was also facilitated by some new factors: the expanded import of foreign food products and semi-finished products from all over the world, the development of the production of semi-finished food products and concentrates in all countries, as well as the adaptation of some national dishes, for example in Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Romania, Finland, Poland, to the needs of the kitchen -minutes with a review of technological regimes and processes.

However, by the mid-70s, rationalist cuisine was noticeably losing its adherents. Fundamental changes in international supply, the virtual elimination of seasonality of products, the opportunity in any European country to have (for a decent fee, of course) any products, at any time of the year, from any part globe, a revolution in home kitchen equipment and equipping the kitchen with appliances and tools that dramatically save time - all this opened the way for the urban population to prepare more tasty and valuable dishes of national cuisines without much loss of time and labor.

Already in the early 70s, among the urban population of industrial countries in Europe and America, there was an increased interest of “white collar” workers in exotic national cuisines, and primarily in Japanese, Chinese, Indian, Indonesian, and Thai. This was partly due to increased interest in tourism to Asian countries, reaching tens of thousands of people in Western, Central and Northern Europe, Canada and the United States. Then the same interest was shown in Arab and Middle Eastern cuisines, which was associated with the well-known “political” fashion for these countries. However, in addition to a purely fashionable hobby, a very serious reason emerged. When directly comparing the rationalistic “pan-European” cuisine with the national one (and the national ones remained intact mainly in Asia), it turned out that the “habitual” European standard cuisine is greatly inferior. Quite a broad mass of people have realized in practice the fact that any national, colorful food has a beneficial effect on increasing productivity and well-being.

That the relative increase in the welfare of the population in all European countries allowed such comparisons to be made on an ever larger scale was additional factor, which tipped the scales towards the interest of the urban average population of Europe in national cuisines - both their own and those of “foreign countries”. What was new in this phenomenon was a truly international interest in the life and customs of other peoples, not bound by racial and national prejudices. Here, not only the “interest of the stomach” was manifested, but also the interest of the mind and intellect, so the passion for national cuisines in Europe can be considered a special cultural phenomenon of our time. This process definitely increases in the 80s. Another thing is that not everyone can practically take advantage of the national cuisine, as a rule, a smaller part of the urban population, but this is not so much a question of time as of social and material opportunities. Nowadays, everyone in Europe is in favor of the revival, renewal and development of national cuisines as the main culinary direction in the future.

The change in culinary preferences of wide circles of the population was immediately reflected in publishing activities in the West. The publication of books about national cuisines has increased sharply both in circulation and in title. Even in countries where “common continental” cuisine has dominated during the current century, and national dishes have long been leveled out or lost (England, Belgium, Ireland, Norway, Scotland), or were extremely modest in range (Iceland, Finland), in last years The search for forgotten national recipes began, books were published popularizing national cuisine.

In the countries of Southern Europe, in Spain, Portugal, Italy, Yugoslavia, Greece, Bulgaria and Romania, where national cuisine has always held a strong position, the promotion of national culinary traditions has intensified even more, and rich literature about the national cuisine of these countries is published. In China, the publication of a 20-volume encyclopedia continues, dedicated exclusively to the traditional cuisine of the Han Chinese and other peoples inhabiting China. In some European countries (England, Germany, France, Italy, Switzerland), as well as in the USA and Canada, the publication of extensive culinary manuals with recipes for national cuisines of peoples around the world has been undertaken, and in some places completed. The revival of interest in national cuisines, as a general modern international process, has also affected our country. Not everything, however, is positive in this new hobby. There is also a purely formal, eclectic combination (and accompanying dubbing) of culinary recipes, especially in joint American-Italian publications. different countries and peoples into some common “national” conglomerates. And this is understandable, because it is much easier to mechanically combine than to compare, check and select with ethnographic, historical and culinary accuracy what constitutes the truly national fund of culinary skills of each people individually, while weeding out the random and erroneous. Restaurant cooking around the world is especially prone to mixing different national cuisines.

Take, for example, our practice. The fact that foreigners call borscht or dumplings Russian national dishes can still be understood and excused, but when it turns out that they gleaned this information from Soviet cookbooks or from restaurant menus, one becomes ashamed of our authors and catering experts who so ignorantly promote national cuisine our peoples.

People often talk about “Caucasian” or “Oriental” cuisine, which do not exist at all, without suspecting that under these fictitious names hide different culinary trends that exist in the North Caucasus, Transcaucasia and Central Asia. Very few people can clearly explain how Ukrainian cuisine differs from Belarusian, and Estonian from Lithuanian, although they differ greatly from each other in practice. Not only “eaters”, the passive side in the culinary process, so to speak, are incompetent in this, but also the vast majority of catering and restaurant chefs. For many of them, “oriental” cuisine is united only because it is all “spicy”, it supposedly has a lot of “pepper”. Such an unprofessional judgment indicates that many chefs do not deal with real national cuisine and do not know the peculiarities of this or that national table.

The lack of culinary culture is not only a gap in the general cultural development of a person. For citizens of our multinational country, inability to navigate culinary skills Russian peoples– an indicator of a weak political culture, indifference, indifference to national phenomena and processes that characterize the social life of our country.

Nothing makes it possible to come into closer contact with the material culture of a people than the national table. Understanding its features is perhaps the best and shortest path to mutual understanding among nations.

The article offered to the reader was conceived for educational purposes as a collection of the most typical national recipes for dishes of different peoples of our country, as a determinant of the place and significance of each national cuisine in the history of its people, in the history of the country as a whole and in the system of general development of culinary in the world.

The introductory essays preceding the recipes of each national cuisine should make it easier for readers to compare and contrast different culinary repertoires and thereby contribute to a better understanding of the characteristics of the composition of products and the range of dishes of each nation. This article does not include all the recipes for the national dishes of the peoples of our country. And at the same time, it gives a complete picture of the culinary skills of nations and ethnic groups that have their own distinct national cuisine.

The fact is that the author did not include duplicate dishes, which often appear in the cuisines of different nations and in different cookbooks under different names. The main criteria for determining the nationality of a particular dish were its nutritional composition, composition and method of preparation. All borrowings, analogies, alterations and variations of dishes from “foreign” cuisines, no matter how long ago they took root and took root among one or another people, were fundamentally eliminated by the author. As a result, the book includes only those dishes that can be called primordially national in origin, long-term use, prevalence and inclination of a particular people to them. An essential criterion for determining the origin of dishes is also the lexical analysis of their names.

Some regional dishes that are occasionally found in one or another region of the country or in a separate area were not included in the main composition of national dishes. At the same time, regional features are taken into account and noted when it comes to some national dish (for example, cabbage soup, pies, borscht, pancakes, dumplings, mamalyga), which has numerous local variations. In these cases, the national dish is presented in the book with a nest of variations as evidence of the rich culinary imagination of each people.

The ethnographic approach taken by the author to the culinary heritage of nations helps to restore and restore the overall picture of folk culinary creativity, freeing it from unnecessary layers, and individual dishes from restaurant distortions made due to ignorance or lack of knowledge.

Everyone knows that integration processes in national development of our peoples, which have emerged over the past 30-50 years as a result of free interethnic communication, the creation of mixed families, etc., have caused the leveling of part of the national material culture - primarily housing, home furnishings, clothing. They also touched upon the national cuisine, which began to lose its position, become clouded, and distorted by “gag.”

All this gradually led to a decrease in the quality level of culinary skills in the country.

Meanwhile, national cuisines and the repertoire they created are tasty, healthy, taking into account certain climatic and natural features dishes should not be lost. They must be preserved for the sake of present and future generations as a precious heritage that stimulates the life and development of every nation, and indeed all the peoples of our country. Before it’s too late, we must collect and leave for descendants as true and accurate results of national culinary creativity as possible.

We must not forget that original national cuisines are the basis modern kitchen of any nation, a source of creativity in the art of cooking.

Pokhlebkin William Vasilievich

National cuisines our peoples

Introductory article.

Unfortunately, it was forgotten that cookbooks and recipes are notes of culinary art that cannot be changed, just as parts of any instruments cannot be deleted from the score of a symphony just because the industry did not fulfill the plan for their production. As a result of the simplification of classical culinary recipes, the exclusion and replacement of some products with others, culinary skills gradually degraded both in public catering, in restaurant cuisine, and in home cooking, because all types of cookery literature, both educational and popular or scientific, were leveled.

It is not surprising, therefore, that culinary subtleties sometimes become simply irreplaceable for new generations. Let me give you one small example.

But since in the history of the development of cooking there were many different directions, the question naturally arises, what are the criteria for right and wrong in cooking, what should be preferred? After all, it would seem that in this area one cannot argue about tastes at all? Of course, we are not talking about choosing the best two hundred from a thousand dishes, and not about which of the rational cooking methods known to different nations to prefer and which to discard. The point is that in the evolution of the culinary art of all nations there were both main directions of its development and branches and sleeves. Some of them led to a dead end and became obsolete. Others stayed for a long time. Moreover, even incorrect, but fashionable trends sometimes flourished magnificently. It is impossible to determine at the moment of development which direction is the main one and which is ephemeral - a retrospective look at the history of cooking is necessary. Only in this way is the core, main direction that best meets the needs of the majority of humanity revealed, and the temporary, artificially supported sometimes by fashion, sometimes by economic circumstances, becomes obvious.

How to use recipes

A collection of individual recipes for national dishes, no matter how many there are, does not give, however, a complete picture of a particular cuisine until it is generalized technological features. After all, the main differences between national cuisines are not in what or what they cook from, but in how they cook, using what techniques, at what time, at what temperature, in what environment, in what container. It is these details, these technological “little things” that are fundamental to shaping the taste, consistency and aroma of a dish. That is why it is extremely important, when reading recipes for national dishes, to pay primary attention to the description of the preparation of products and the technology of their preparation, to special national methods and techniques of culinary processing, which are often more important conditions for success than the composition of the products.

Each chapter of the book consists of an introductory part that briefly outlines the history and general features of one or another national cuisine, and from recipes, which in most cases are preceded by an introductory word about the specifics of preparing any group of dishes as a whole. In the case where we are talking about a cuisine that is little known to the broad masses or insufficiently studied, it is usually given more attention in the introductory part, where its historical, ethnographic and technological features are examined in detail. Where a well-known, researched cuisine is described, the focus is on summarizing its features and comprehensive characteristics. Finally, where the main characteristics of dishes are set out in introductory words, as, for example, in the chapter “Russian Cuisine”, the introductory part is devoted to national cuisine as a whole, describing the process of historical development of this cuisine.

The dishes in the recipe section are grouped according to the principle of serving: first, second, dessert. But within each group they are divided by type of product: meat, fish, flour, etc. This arrangement helps to better navigate the material in the book. In addition, to make the book easier to use, it is equipped with an alphabetical index.

Before using recipes, it is, of course, advisable to familiarize yourself with the introductory part of the corresponding chapter, as well as with the introductory word to a particular group of dishes. It should be noted that the introductory word outlines the basic principles, rules and techniques (methods) for preparing this type of dish, for example cabbage soup, pancakes, pilaf, dumplings, etc., and then a whole nest is given specific recipes(usually there are several of them) indicating the norms of products and the order of preparation. Then only the minimum necessary information was left in the recipes; the main attention was paid to the order in which the ingredients were added. At the same time, they indicate the type of cookware used in each case (if this is significant for shaping the taste of the dish), the nature of the fire (weak, moderate, strong), and also the duration of cooking the dish, both overall and individual operations.

In a number of cases, especially when it comes to little-known dishes, the most detailed recipe is given, if possible, with a clear division of all operations. Sometimes housewives, having seen and not even read such a long recipe, consider it too complicated and look for shorter recipes. However, one should be wary of just too much short recipes.

All recipes are usually designed for 4 servings. The quantity of products is given in two dimensions - in weight and volume - depending on what is more convenient for the housewife in each specific case (with the exception of recipes for some confectionery and flour products, where the exact weight ratio of all components is necessary).

Vegetables, as a rule, are given in pieces or shares of tubers, roots, bulbs or heads of cabbage, usually of medium size.

Spices in most cases are indicated in unground form - in grains, buds, stamens, leaves. However, before using in soups or main courses, it is recommended to crush pepper grains and other whole spices without turning them into powder at the same time. Most often, the minimum spice rate is indicated, which is indispensable for preserving the national flavor of the dish, which can be increased to taste.

As for salt, the amount required to give the dish a general taste is, as a rule, not indicated in recipes, since it depends solely on the individual taste of each person. Exact instructions for the amount of salt are given only in those recipes where salt is necessary during the cooking process and is associated with the specifics of individual dishes. Therefore, when encountering such specific instructions on the dosage of salt, you should remember that they have nothing to do with creating the taste of the dish and that such a dish still needs to be added to taste. However, you should remember the general rule that it is best to salt meat after it has been cooked or fried at least halfway. All legume dishes (peas, lentils, beans, mung beans) are salted only after final readiness, preferably immediately before consumption.

Even those dishes in which the composition of the products does not dictate a strictly defined time for adding salt, it is still better to add salt at the end of cooking. This especially applies to soups and stews. An exception to this rule is fish - when boiling it is added to an already salted medium, and when frying it is salted before placing it in a frying pan.

A number of recipes contain special instructions for one or another type of utensil for preparing the dish. However, there are some general principles to keep in mind. Firstly, dishes that contain acidic media (lemon juice, sauerkraut, tomatoes, sour milk, etc.) must be prepared in non-oxidizing containers, i.e. enamel, porcelain, earthenware, earthenware, glass . It is also better to cook soups in non-oxidizing containers, regardless of the composition of the products. Food should be fried in fats and oils in a cauldron metal utensils with thick walls and bottom or in frying pans. It is best to bake, especially fish, mushroom and vegetable dishes, in non-oxidizing (enamel) frying pans.

The type of outbreak is also of great importance for proper preparation national dishes. The Russian oven, the Transcaucasian and Central Asian tandoor (tanur), the Moldavian grater, the Azerbaijani barbecue make it possible to obtain dishes of different consistency and taste from the same products (say, meat), since the different temperature conditions and pressure created by these types of fireplaces cause far from the same physical, chemical and biochemical processes and products.

However, the use of these types of fireplaces is practically possible only in certain conditions, or in specialized catering establishments (national restaurants). In most cases, especially in urban environments, they use a European stove (wood, gas or electric) with two types of heat mode - a stovetop fire and an oven (oven). In this case, a stove fire is most often used. Taking this into account, the book presents mainly national dishes that can be cooked on the stove. The same dishes that are usually prepared in other types of fireplaces are recommended to be cooked in the oven, and in some cases it can be used as an open fire such as a barbecue or tandoor, in others as a thermal atmosphere such as a Russian oven. To this end, in the first case, unprotected meat should be placed directly on the oven grate as high as possible above the fire and create an initially high temperature for a short time; in the second case, the products should be placed in a tightly closed clay or cast iron cookware with thick walls and place it on the lower step of the oven closer to the fire, at the same time making it moderate and keeping the dish at this temperature for a long time. Finally, in urban conditions, you can even imitate baking in ash by using food foil as a food shell for this purpose and placing the products tightly wrapped in it (potatoes, vegetables, meat, fish) in the oven. At the right combination suitable type fire and utensils in modern urban conditions on gas stove You can cook over 90% of the national dishes of the peoples of the USSR.

National cuisines of our peoples. Pokhlebkin

Russian kitchen

Pokhlebkin William Vasilievich National cuisines of our peoples

Introductory article.

Pokhlebkin William Vasilievich
National cuisines of our peoples