The Kingdom of Rye: A Brief History of Russian Food by Darra Goldstein

Abstract

Goldstein has written an introductory text for the general reader who has an interest in Russia’s history and culture, but who does not have expertise in its food history. This book does not present new material and the intent is not to break new ground theoretically or empirically. The reader who is expecting a rigorous analysis of Russian food policy will be disappointed; there is no central argument and no endnotes or citations to references. Instead, the book is a well-written, broad history that is accessible to a wide readership. The author presents a well-informed portrait of Russian food that is part memoir, part cookbook, and part historiography.The analytical approaches for the book’s three lengthy chapters are sociological, ethnographic, and cultural anthropological. A fourth chapter, which for some reason is unnumbered, covers the whole of the post-Soviet period in twenty-five pages. The central theme in the first chapter—the longest, and in this reader’s opinion, the strongest—concerns the role of food in Russian culture through the ages. The interplay between food and culture is the focus here—the food that was available, where it came from, how it was prepared, and how it was eaten. The author provides detailed descriptions of foods, drink, ingredients, taste, and diet throughout Russian history, all loosely tied to class. The first chapter clearly draws upon the author’s previous writings and expertise, and she is successful in bringing food to life.My criticisms of the book are fourfold. First, the book covers a lot of material, as is expected in an introductory text, but the treatment of its various subjects varies in depth and sophistication. For example, though chapter 1 is engaging, using food as both a dependent and independent variable, I would have liked to have seen a deeper analysis of how food impacted and changed culture, and how culture in turn shaped the demand for different foods. Another example, perhaps the least satisfying aspect of the book, is the discussion of government food policy, which is overly general, lacking detail and nuance.Second, the author conflates dacha plots and household gardens in chapter 2, which muddles the discussion. An uninitiated reader to Russia is likely not to understand the differences between these two types of land usage from the discussion (89–92). It is true that there is some overlap between the two, but household gardens are distinct in several ways—in terms of their legal status, registration, size, use, and users—from dacha plots and these nuances are not clear from the author’s discussion.A third criticism concerns the selection of material. Russia’s 1891 and 1921/2 famines are discussed, but the 1932/3 famine in Ukraine receives only one-half of a sentence. The 1946/7 famine is completely ignored. Likewise, there is no discussion of the 1962 uprising over food prices in Novocherkassk, which represented the most overt anti-Soviet collective action in the ussr’s history. There is an important section on ancient trade routes that brought different foods and spices to pre-Tsarist Russia, but little discussion of food trade in the Soviet period (aside from passing mention of the importation of American grain).A fourth criticism, and perhaps the most important, is that the author misses an opportunity to explore in depth important questions regarding food in Russian society. The author’s research design is to discuss the “what” rather than the “why,” which leaves holes in the discussion. The author, for example, includes only a brief discussion of collectivization (71–74). Collectivization was the single most important event in Soviet Russia’s agrarian history, but based on the author’s abbreviated discussion, the reader would be mystified about what collectivization was and why it was undertaken. Further, why is the role of the state at times active and other times passive in introducing or allowing foreign foods to influence the Russian diet? Why was the impact of foreign food so transformative to the Russian diet in the post-Soviet period, a diet that in chapter 1 the author depicted as inherently tied to Russian culture and identity? The book is intended as an introduction, but brevity is not always a virtue.In sum, the author has achieved a Herculean task in tackling the history of Russian food. The introductory reader will benefit from the wealth of material and scope of her coverage. At the same time, she raises as many questions as she answers.