From Heinz Cream of Tomato to Homemade Tom Yum
Written by Katya Anderson
As I sit on the couch of the living room, making notes on my phone of ideas to include in this article, I am hopelessly distracted by the smell coming from the stove area. There stands Babulia, my Russian grandmother, cooking up something irresistible. From the side I probably look like a meerkat – neck outstretched, eyes scanning, trying to gauge how many more minutes wait it is until I can sink my teeth into freshly fried chicken kotlety. These mini burger-esque patties are one of the most traditional dishes from back home, often served with a side of mashed potatoes, and I swear they are magical – having a bad day? All worries have melted away. Having a good day? A few extra rays of sunshine have been added. But let me rewind a bit.
I’m very fortunate to be a product of two different, yet not dissimilar, cultures. Mum was born in Moscow and Dad in Glasgow, two cities thousands of kilometres apart, sitting on the 55 latitude. When they married, Mum couldn’t boil an egg. When she first came to the UK in the mid-90s with a baby version of me, one of her biggest joys was going to the supermarkets to experience the myriad of dishes tucked away on the shelves. Heinz soup. Ready-made cottage pie. Jars of pesto. Coming from a country that had just recently emerged from the iron curtain, the diversity of flavours and availability of options was mind- blowing – has everyone seen the photos of kilometre-long queues from Moscow when the first McDonalds opened in the 90s? People didn’t even know what the food was going to be, but it didn’t matter. It was new, and it was freedom.
“Growing up in the USSR, ingredients were limited and flavours were sparse. I love the food that Babulia makes, yet objectively it is quite simple. “
Fast forward to the present, if you were to ask anyone who has been in Mum’s company a phrase to describe her, I guarantee you one of the top ones would be ‘She is a fantastic cook’. And they are absolutely right. Her culinary repertoire is as broad as it is deep – you could quite literally travel the world with her dishes: Uzbek plov, Sicilian meatballs, Moroccan tagines, French coq au vin, Thai tom yum, Georgian khinkali. The list goes on.
All served with flair, and oh so much love. So how did she go from zero to hero in the kitchen? Growing up in the USSR, ingredients were limited and flavours were sparse. I love the food that Babulia makes, yet objectively it is quite simple – she always follows the same few recipes, her favourite spice is dill (some stereotypes can be true), and there are rarely more than 5-7 ingredients to a dish.
It’s not varied, but everything made is done well and again, with the most important ingredient, forgive the cheese – love. My grandfather was a marine physicist who had the rare opportunity in those times to travel outside of the country for work, and in these expeditions he would pick up unusual herbs and spices, without even knowing what they were, then quite literally experimented with them in the kitchen back home.
He had a remarkable instinct for flavour, and his intuition seldom led him astray in what food would pair well with which of his new found delicacies. Regrettably, I only learned of this after he passed away a few years back, but it is clear as day that this flair did not leave with him, but instead continued and grew in time within Mum.
This talent, however, does come with a caveat – whenever you ask Mum ‘What did you put in this?’ you will not get more of an answer than some of the most obvious ingredients. And she doesn’t do it for secretive reasons, but because she processes food on such a sensory level, that yes, she may gain inspiration from a dish, but will always in the heat of the moment add a dash of this and sprinkle of that to make it uniquely hers. Think Monet displaying his ‘Impression: Sunrise’ painting from which the art movement took its name.
This is how I think of Mum’s cooking- her own unique impressions. And although she was not able to teach me how she cooks, this love did find its way into my soul in another format. Anyone who has met me knows my main passion in life is travelling, and the most valuable experience I come away with, except for human connections, are food memories. I am that person who loves to try weird things, both eating and drinking.
Food is a way of not only learning about other cultures, it’s a way of forming connections, even when you don’t share the same language. It’s a way of preserving history and carrying on traditions. It can serve as a lifeboat during your lowest moments. It can help to elevate even further an already happy moment. Food is universal. It is at our core. I am so very grateful to my family for my cultural heritage, my upbringing, and instilling a love that motivates me to explore every corner of our planet.
In particular, thank you to Mum, for being a woman in my life.
This article was first published at ISSUE 2 Oysters & Martini Magazine: Our Day Ones
