Some of the pasta remarks remind me - I remember in a Belgian supermarket, seeing pasta in an aisle labeled "American foods."



They were remodeling, though, so maybe that was not really true.

I went to Baikal twice, both business trips, gorgeous area, but I never ate there, back in 1986 there was one buffet at the station and I did not dare to try, LOL.
Russia is huge and food varies from one region to another, Siberia is heavy on pelmeni, frozen and thinly sliced fish, stong tea with butter and stake bread ( yikes). The good fish ( Omul) is almost non-existent in Baikal now, sad, but the lake is gorgeous, I bet your DH enjoyed the view.

Don't they eat more potaotes in Belgian, I still think pasta is more italian, since wheat grows better in warmer climate, reason russians eat more rye bread traditionally, hard to grow wheat in cold climate, so they had to boost gluten content so the crops would survive.
Actually, back home we barely ate pasta, mostly buckwheat and potaotes, and bread of course. Neither I made often pelmeni, or piroshki, too time consuming, and I worked ful time and had 2 kids too.
But on ocation, I would make egg noodles, all manually, no pasta machine, LOL, 6-7 eggs and as much flour as it takes to put it together, very high protein and high fat pasta. Take lots of biceps strength to roll it our paper thin too, LOL. Good exercise. You can use this to make pelmeni too, but overall this is much better than eggless pasta IMO.

We had the same joke back in Russia: no bread with my kasha.

Belgians eat their potatoes as fries! It was the Flemish who invented the "French Fry." In fact a lot of the frites stands in the Netherlands are "Vlaamse Fritjes" - Flemish Fries.

They eat them with mayonnaise.

Jurjen spent a month in Siberia as a volunteer for the Great Biakal Trail Project - a follow-on to studying Russian history and culture (and language) in college. First he did some stuff like mowing grass (with a scythe) in the village of Bolshoe Goloustnoe, then he helped build a nature trail by the lake. That involved camping in the mountains near Baikalsk. That part was less fun, actually, but overall it was a great experience.

I think buckwheat is a very overlooked food item. Oddly enough, it's used in a type of festive Dutch pancake, called poffertjes. But the bran is removed to make it less healthy.

I didn't pull the stats out of thin air, as I said, it's data published from MONICA (a surveillance database of disease, health and diet across the EU, that includes former Soviet states and the Russian Federation).

It's confirmed in the Food and Agriculture Organization tracking of food supply, imports, exports, waste and consumption - available here in the online Food Balance Sheets, which show in 2003 the Russian Federation had 3,117.93 calories available to eat per person every day.....of that 85.7g was from fat (771.3-calories, 24.73% of calories)....of that fat, 49.12g are from animal sources and 36.59g are from plant-based source....so the MONICA statistic of 8.3% saturated fat is not too low.

So far as alcohol....well, 164.77-calories per day are available, or 5.2% of calories....Japan (one more country with impressive, low CHD rates consumes 140.05-calories a day - 5% of calories; France consumes 169.44-calories from alcohol - more than the Russian Federation, but less as a percentage of calories at4.7%)

Do these stats apply to every person? No...they're "average" - just like in the US we have averages based on data we know...but we all know someone is consuming our HFCS don't we? So, some eat more than average, some eat less....the average just provides us with some insight.

No, I didn't confuse Byetta with Januvia.

http://health.dailynewscentral.com/...iew/0002300/38/

Baikal is poisoned with cellulose waste, it is horrible, it is really greta lake and beautifull place to visit. I was there is summer, many tourists from Europe.
As for buckwheat, the bran (outer shell) is not edible, it will give you intestinal blockage or appendicitis. But this is the very healthy and tasty grain (not actually grain but seed), one cup can provide about 20% of daily magnesium, some copper and zinc and fiber, not too heavy on carbs, yummy too. I toast it with raw egg, and then when the egg is absorbed completely, add boiling water, and simmer. It makes it fluffy and yummy.
I have read the buckwehat came from Asia, mostly northern parts of China, Manguria, popular in Japan too.

Great then, mosty because it restores Phase I insulin response, hence does not allow Bgs to spike higher than 120 within an hour after a meal. This basically prevents Phase II from occuring, so lower Bgs don't turn into fat, and basal insulin is also lowered allowing for weight loss.
Thanks for the link, I prolly overlooked this additional bonus.
Still, I did not lose a pound until vacation, and I've been taking januvia since end of March, almost 3 weeks before the vacation. I think it is a combination of eating no dairy and very little sat. fat, and only 2 eggs in a week. I suspect some ppl are allergic to AA in meat, cheese, and eggs, and I may be one of them. I will continue to stay off dairy, cheese, and red meat and will see how it goes.
ETA:

sorry does not look like a real weight loss to me, and certainly does not explain 7 pounds loss in one week.

The point of building the nature trail is to attract nature-loving tourists and bring some money in - and hopefully prevent more paper mills dumping effluent into the lake (for you folks reading along, Lake Baikal is over a mile deep, and holds 1/5th of the world's fresh water).


There are products made with ground-up buckwheat including the outer shell, in fact it's hard to find ground-up buckwheat without it. We had to buy the groats and grind our own to make the flour for making poffertjes here in the States, which we very occasionally do (I bought a little cast iron pan just for making them, kind of like a Nordic aebleskiver pan).
I have some buckwheat honey, too. Super dark and very strong-tasting.

it is just shows how inaccurate statistics are and how any statistical data can be intrepreted to one's benefits.
As for alcohol, you still don't undertsnad that getting a glas of wine with dinner is different that a bottle of bad vodka without food on a daily basis.
With alcohol consumption it is a J-curve, a little bit is good, but too much will kill you at young age.
http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/484552_19

Oh, I thought you are talking about the outer shell, I buy buckwheat groats only, not toasted in health food store, it is very light color, and I toast and cook it myself. I like kasha better than buckwheat flour, it does not work by itself, you need to mix it with wheat flour but it certainly adds nutty and yummy flavor to pancakes and bliniez. Cast iron pan is a must for those paper thin bliniez, but it is hard to get very think if you use buckwheat, I have 3 cast iron pans, nothing better than this for cooking.
My dad used to buy buckwheat honey from Bashkiria, long time ago. It was amazing: dark, rich and fragrant. Great with buckwheat blintsez and pancakes, although I don't remember when was lats time I made it. I have buckwheat flour from our local health food store, may be I will make a batch of bliniez on weekend for my family, you brought up good memories, Ysabella.

Heh, glad to hear it. I know I've been fracturing this thread with these side topics, but this cultural/food stuff interests me.

I think we'll see more buckwheat coming on the American market. There seem to be more people finding they have problems with gluten, and buckwheat is a really useful alternative product.

ReginaW - thanks for the data on food consumption in Italy. That was what I wanted to see. Rob

ps Nice entry today in your blog

Yeah that's what we need more people eating grains such as buckwheat..