We Finally Visit the Starlite Diner

Last night we visited one of Moscow's Starlite Diners. These are 1950s American-themed diners, complete with the retro look, waitresses in cheerleader attire, walls stocked with American pop-culture memorabilia (circa 1950s), and, thank God, American-sized portions of very American food.

The location we visited was adjacent to the historical and beautiful Tchaikovsky concert hall, which gave the whole place an even greater surreal effect. Joey, Isaac and I had been meaning to visit one of the Diners for some time, not so much for the food, but for the experience, and we weren't let down.

We decided to start the meal with an hors d'oeuvres of buffalo chicken wings, complimented with blue cheese dressing and celery sticks. Delicious. Nearly all of us opted with burgers of some variety for the main course. The sizes were a gastronomic challenge, and both Michael and Guillaume ordered the largest burger on the menu: a 3-patty high meat skyscraper of cheese and grease-drippings. To my surprise, they both attacked their meals with gusto, although in the very french manner of impeccable table manners, using a fork and knife the entire way through. For dessert we all went with milkshakes, and to my astonishment, the Starlite offered a peanut butter milkshake. I of course ordered this and it was incredible.

Having Michael, Guillaume, and our Russian friend Kristina along for the experience allowed us Americans to offer guidance in navigating the menu and also provided us with some memorable questions: "Do you eat food like this every day?" "Is this real American food?" "Are burgers in America really this big?" "Is this a typical American dinner?"

US Embassy (again)

I know Isaac and Joey have already beat me to blogging on the US embassy, but here it goes anyway:P

On Monday we visited the US embassy, which is a pretty large compound near downtown Moscow. So large, in fact, that it's the butt of several Russian jokes. I remember our Russian teacher Vera even cracking a few jokes about its size.

Well it is imposing enough to warrant a few jokes, but to my delight, the "tour" of the embassy was a very informal and friendly lunch. Morgan Haas and Scott Reynolds of the USDA met us in the embassy's cafeteria, and for the next 2hrs, we ate and talked about what it is that they do in Moscow. You can check out Isaac's blog for that info, but I just wanted to say how oddly enjoyable it was to talk to other Americans and eat standard American cafeteria food. Maybe I'm a little homesick:P

Shashlik

This past weekend our classmate Maksim invited us to his hometown of Kaluga to celebrate his birthday. It was nice to get out of the city, and we all had a blast. We visited the space museum in Kaluga (check out Joey's blog) and were taken on a tour of the city, guided by Maksim's father.

On Saturday night we celebrated Maksim's birthday by grilling shashlik, a traditional type of Russian barbecue. The recipe is as follows: make a fire pit, marinate a cooked meat for several hours in a closed bucket, build a fire, collect the coals from the fire, place them in the fire pit, roast meat over the coals. It was simple, and incredibly delicious. My thanks to Maksim and his wonderful family for the hospitality they showed us, and thanks to Michael for the photos.

Picture: Grillmaster Michael watches over the shashlik.

Spring

Spring is finally here. Most of the snow has melted around the city and on the warmer days, in sunlight, you can actually feel comfortable wearing short-sleeves. So with the weather being good today, I decided to take a break from my homework and go for a walk.
Lo and behold I discovered a fairly large park about a mile and half from our hostel. It's basically a forest a few dozen acres large, and if you didn't know any better, and you didn't strain your eyes too hard to make-out the high rise apartment buildings cutting through the tree line, you could almost imagine you were in a forest and not in the middle of Europe's largest city.
Lots of people were in the park, grilling shashlik, walking, riding bikes. As I made my way further into the forest, I heard some festive music and saw a group of people huddled together. When I got closer I saw there was an old man playing an accordion. He was really belting out some good tunes, and I sat down on a park bench a few meters away to enjoy the scenery and music.
After switching a few songs, he stopped and then slowly played out a few notes. I guess the song must have been a well known one, because the group of people stopped talking and faced the man. The music picked up its pace, and then a couple got up and began to dance to it. Soon the group of people started clapping, and then they began to sing. It was all very beautiful, but soon it was time for me to get back to the hostel and finish my homework.

Champignon

On Tuesday we visited a mushroom factory. You can check out Dr. Layfield's blog for a more detailed look at the tour. I just wanted to say that thanks to that tour my love of the humble fungi has been reawakened. I've had mushrooms in some form for 3 of the last 4 meals I've eaten.They're incredibly simple to prepare. From the advice of our guide, I just saute them in some butter or oil with onions and serve with Smetana.

American Cuisine

A few weeks ago I mentioned how our Chinese friends Micahel and Stacy had us over for an incredible dinner. This last Saturday, Joey, Isaac, and I attempted to return the favor and cooked some "traditional" American dishes for them.

Pancakes, fried chicken, and shrimp and grits were on the menu. Cooking in the hostel was somewhat of a challenge, but to our delight, everything turned out quite well, including the pancakes which were made with kefir (due to the curious absence of baking powder in Russia).

Arbat Street

March 8th was Women's Day, and so we had the day off of classes. Later in the evening Denis, Galya, Isaac, Joey and I took the metro down to Arbat Street to take a walk.

Arbat Street is in the historic center of Moscow near Red Square, and is one of the oldest surviving streets of Moscow. The place reminded me of downtown Charleston, and like historic Charleston, the Street was bustling with tourists and pocketed with coffee shops and cafe's.

Pictures:

1. Isaac, Joey, and I in front of a stautue of beloved Russian poet Pushkin and his wife Natalya
2. Galya, me, Isaac, and Joey on Arbat Street
   
3. Arbat Street at Dusk (from Wikimedia Commons).