Convert Me: A Cooking in Russia Update

Found "corn meal" or something that we can pretend is cornmeal. And another girl found corn meal. So, now, I have a ton of cornmeal. Well, in reality, only about a kilogram of corn meal.

And therein lies the next hurdle. Converting recipes with US measurements into metric. Either that or eyeballing measurements since I suspect there are no measuring devices of any type in my apartment. Hey, that tea cup looks like 8 ounces! Tablespoons could be difficult as their are teaspoons and these huge soup spoons, and nothing else.

Oh, I needs to go find some baking powder now.

The Great Russian Shopping Extravaganza

I'm hunting cornmeal in St. Petersburg.

Don't ask me why I do silly things like this.

This morning I went to the "gipermarket" Lenta. Which is basically the Russian version of Wal-mart. Picture a more frustrating version of Wal-mart without cornmeal and something like three or four aisles of vodka, and ta-da, you will have Lenta in your head. Now, add tacky American Christmas carols. Wonder why they are playing such things, as it is not Christmas, nor does Russian really have American-style Christmas.

Then add in gates so that you can't leave without going through a check-out line, and I didn't want to try to explain that I hadn't found what I wanted, so I bought a chocolate bar, and confused the cashier because going into this store and only buying a chocolate bar is kinda silly. Just now I remembered that I should have bought ink pens and a gluestick, but those can be had else well.

On to try other options. I have a feeling that if I find cornmeal at all it will be the most expensive cornmeal ever. Good thing I don't need that much.

In the TMI category -- I have one wisdom coming in all happy and straight, and being pampered and carefully brushed. Can I get a second? Come on little tooth. I welcome you to my mouth, and would prefer that you take up residence there.

Moscow Part 5: The Arbat and Random Stuff

So, here’s my report on the Arbat. It’s a lot like Beale St. But longer and with more original buildings intact. Lots of restaurants. Lots of tourist kitsch. Yeah, Beale, but longer.

I might have a better appreciation of the Arbat, if I had tried harder to understand the tour guide or just know the history, or if I had spun by a night. But . . .

Hard Rock Café Moscow

Here I spent too much money on a very warm hoodie.

Statue of Aleksandr Pushkin and Natalya Goncharovna.

Tiles listing names and wedding dates of Russian couples in front of the above statue. For those of you familiar with Aleksandr and Natalya relationship – please, don’t ask me why you would want their “blessing” for your marriage.

This is another thing Russian couples do in Moscow – they attach padlocks to these wire trees on a bridge crossing the river. They also attach them to the bridge by the rebuild-to-attract-tourists Christ the Savior Cathedral.

And here’s an interesting statue, Anton pointed out to me. It’s supposed to represent the ways in which the world corrupts children.