March 2012

Here’s an easy first recipe to mark the arrival of spring: buy every possible variety of spring onions, shallots, and garlic (including garlic scapes) at your local farmers’ market and turn them into…

Restaurants in Baku; caravanserais; dolma, kutab, chikhirtma, plov, kebabs and other pakhlavas; the infamous watermelon hookah.

Wishing you all a happy Novruz! I am including some pictures of President Ilham Aliyev and First Lady Mehriban Aliyeva taking part in the festivities in Baku, eating plov (above) or drinking tea…

With this recipe, I’m killing two old Eastern European birds with one stone. The combination isn’t just a gimmick, though; the two dishes actually work really well together! The venison goulash uses…

Here’s a recipe that perfectly illustrates Food Perestroika’s mission. Its Eastern European character is visible in the ingredients and the preparation: with the Mangalica lardo, the chanterelles, the corn, and the faux…

As you may have read in the media, Vladimir Putin invited foreign journalists for a dinner-interview at his dacha near Moscow last week. We got the usual report of his highly predictable…

A note about my restaurant reviews: New York City counts many Eastern European restaurants scattered across the five boroughs, most of them ignored by restaurant critics and diners alike. I intend to visit…