Back Home On Island In my Kitchen

We enjoy Ukrainian borsch with deruny (potato pancakes). Notice the little Ukrainian flag.

Much of the Internet claims borsch (without a “t”) was invented in Ukraine and became popular in all the Slavic countries, including Russia. There appear to be at least 1000 recipes, with the only common element being beets, with sour cream on top. Hot/cold, beef/pork/vegetarian, and choose from garlic | onions | tomatoes | potatoes | cabbage | carrots | dill | etc. My recipe claimed to be truly Ukrainian, but who knows? 

The last time I had borsch was when my daughter Anna, who had just came back from a semester abroad in Russia about 15 years ago, cooked it for us. Yumm.

I am so glad to be back in my home kitchen, which I think is somewhat larger than the entire Boma trailer. Chicken Kyiv is on the menu in a few days.

We “celebrated” the sinking of the flagship Moscow. Ukraine claims the ship was hit by their missiles;  USA military confirms the ship was hit by two Ukrainian Neptune anti-ship missiles.  

Russia claims it was merely an “accident” that it caught fire. Yeah, righhhtt. I guess it really was an “accident” that it got hit by two missiles, but somebody is going to get a long vacation in Siberia. Even more remarkable, with two missile strikes, then a large fire with a thousand tons of high explosives on board (boom?), and nobody was killed? Truly a remarkable and believable safety record. 

This event is the largest warship sinking since WW II. Coincidentally, the USS The Sullivans (a destroyer) sank overnight. It is a WWII destroyer tied to the dock in Buffalo as a museum, darn those bilge pumps. Unlike the Moscow, nobody actually died.

Back when Trump and North Korea were beating their chubby chests about nuclear war, I put away some extra food in stock ‘just in case’. It came in very handy during covid. However, still in inventory were five cans of spam. Like cactus, one can’t let it go to waste.

How about Asian Spam Stir Fry? I fried two eggs in butter, and let them cool on the cutting board. Cooked brown rice in mushroom bouillon. Chopped up the spam and sautéed until well browned, put aside. Sautéed in sesame oil some onions, bell peppers, broccoli and cauliflower. Added finely minced Fresno peppers and garlic. Mixed all together with the rice, spam, added a dash or two soy sauce and Worcestershire, more sesame oil. Sliced the cooked eggs and added. Served topped with scallions.

Very consumable. Of course the vegetarian version would have been just as good, but at least one Spam can down, four to go. 

Speaking of nuclear war, some bright news that all five UN Security Council permanent members (China, Russia, USA, UK, and France) signed a very rare unanimous agreement on January 3 (shortly before the Ukraine attack) that "nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought." This seemed to slip under the radar of a lot of the media, but I read this as a positive. No snark intended. Quite a change from Trump and Russia.