As promised, I’m going to give a little run down of the meals during my time in Kiev. I usually sample two or three native dishes during my trips, and while that is definitely true this time, there was also the added wrinkle of some “home cooking” which has gotta count for something too.

The trip started with a some Italian food, Ukrainian style. (It almost started with Georgian — the country, not the state — but we got there too late and the kitchen wasn’t making their signature dish anymore.) The Da Vinci Fish House was kind of an odd choice, as neither I nor my companion are big on fish, but it was getting late and the options were running low. Pizza is pretty much the same there as here, although I’ve yet to see anyone do deep dish, or even a thicker chewy crust. Not that I really mind; just observing. I’ve had pizza, in one form or another, on all my trips. That night’s pizza was sausage, prosciutto, mushrooms and onion, and it was pretty nice.

Two interesting things for that night. First, this was the first restaurant I’ve been to in Ukraine that took credit cards. This kind of makes sense; on my first trip (to Odessa) I wasn’t hitting the restaurants all that much (and when I did I was paying cash, because that’s what the guidebook said I should do), and Mariupol, the subject of last year’s trip, is not nearly as cosmopolitan as Kiev. Credit cards are still gaining ground in Ukraine, but it only makes sense that a major tourist draw like Kiev would be leading the way. The other thing was hot chocolate. Have you ever wanted sit down a drink a warm cup of Hershey’s chocolate syrup? Yeah, me neither, but that is apparently about what passes for hot chocolate. I didn’t partake, but my companion had a nice cup of melted candy bar after the pizza. I asked if that was normal (for hot chocolate) and was told that it was. For anyone who complains that Swiss Miss is just too thin, be aware that the other end of the spectrum exists too. (Let me reiterate that I didn’t try the hot chocolate myself, but it was definitely thicker, and could very well have been more than just a melted candy bar.)

Day two featured an Old World delicacy known as a “Big Mac.” Yes indeedy, it was lunch at McDonald’s. I know the person I was with is not a fan of Mickey D’s (and I’m constantly teasing her about that), so I’m not sure if we were there as a way to ease me into Ukrainian food, or she just didn’t “get” all the teasing. I’m not a huge fan of McDonald’s either; I’m just amazed that the food tastes the same no matter which country you are in. Also, McDonald’s remains the only place I’ve been to in Ukraine where they put ice in the drinks.

In a previous post I mentioned the cafeteria we visited; that was actually one of two such places.  The other one was a smaller place; given its proximity to one of Kiev’s universities, I gathered that the clientele was mostly students.  It was at this smaller cafeteria where I tried a couple new things for this trip.  The first was a “cutlet,” which is more the description of what it looked like than what it really was.  It was kind of like a stuff potato pancake, with the potato being mashed potatoes and the stuffing being cooked cabbage.  It wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t my favorite either.  Also on the menu was a blini, which translates as a “pancake,” but what we would actually call a crepe.  The filling was apples and caramel sauce, but there were several other fillings one could order as well.

At the other cafeteria (the one I mentioned in my other post), I finally had green borscht.  (In Ukrainian the word is “борщ,” which means I should be spelling it “borshch” but the spell-check doesn’t like that.)  In my previous trips, I’ve had red borscht, which the one made with beets (hence the red color).  Since I have enjoyed the red variety each time I had it, I was looking forward to trying the green.  Unfortunately, I didn’t like it nearly as well.  It’s an OK soup — it’s green because it is made with sorrel and/or spinach — but I didn’t think it was as flavorful as the red.  Also, this soup isn’t served hot, like the red, which I think diminishes its appeal.  Still, it was OK, and it went fine with the rest of the meal, which was rice pilaf and some kind of sausage.

Curiously, despite the fact that Ukrainians cover everything in sour cream, I don’t recall having sour cream with anything I ate.  Honestly, I think that’s a first for these trips.  I don’t think sour cream would have helped the borscht, but a little dab might have been nice with the potato/cabbage cutlet.

Restaurant-wise, that was it for this trip; all the other meals were made at the apartment.  I’ll put that into a separate post, which will also include the trips to the grocery store.