Time Flies!

Wow.  It's been a whole week since the last blog entry.  For the entire week (which feels like it was about 2 days) I've been "meaning to" put up an entry.  Obviously, I failed.  I will get the recipe for the knuckle soup, at least.

So, when last we saw our intrepid family... heh, in my head that's in the best 1930's movie serial announcer voice -- different from radio-announcer-voice -- that ever existed.  Anyway, our next country is Russia, and Angel has done yeoman duty in finding books, sites and recipes for this week.  We seem to be visiting more of the U.S.S.R. (remember them?) than current-day Russia, as we will have some recipes from independent states like Georgia that used to be in the Soviet Union.

My best (and only) anecdote about the past week's preparations concerns the search for ingredients.  Angel couldn't find Kassen cheese, Sweet Hungarian Paprika and Hot Hungarian Paprika in Traverse City or Cadillac, and since I go to Lansing every other week for classes, I assumed there would be a gourmet- or specialty-food store or two in town.  I pass by an Asian market when I get off the expressway.  So as my economics class would down on Saturday, I hit up Google for "specialty foods: Lansing, MI."  For our purposes, I found zilch.

I did find "Signature Herbs" in a (no pun intended) seedy part of Lansing, but they turned out to be in an upstairs flat, in the back of another business, open from 9am-12pm on Saturdays, and closed that day for a funeral.  I wondered if I'd walked up the stairs and asked for "Sweet Hungarian Paprika," if the proprietor would've pulled out a big Ziploc of pot.

My next thought was that the Kroger and Meijer grocery stores in Lansing might have a larger selection of international foods, since there is a larger international population brought in by the university.  Sadly, that proved to be inaccurate, though while trolling along Lake Lansing Road looking for Meijer's, I did pass by a 13-year-old-looking kid being frisked on the sidewalk by police officers, next to a Saturn that had been pulled over by a pair of police cruisers.

And on that image, I'll leave you until the next time...