You are what you eat: Russian food and identity with Alissa Timoshkina

Join Pushkin house for an evening with food writer and curator of dining experiences, Alissa Timoshkina. She will speak about her debut cookbook Salt&Time: recipes from the Russian kitchen, in which she transforms perceptions of the food of the former Soviet Union and in particular her home Siberia – the crossroads of Eastern European and Central Asian cuisine – with a collection of 100 inviting recipes adapted for modern tastes and Western kitchens. In conversation with Zuka Zak – author of the best selling Polish cookbook ‘Polska’.

Alissa writes evocatively about her memories of growing up in Siberia and travels across this vast country to share experiences of summers spent cooking and eating alfresco as well as the whole new set of food rituals that would be introduced with the onset of the paralysing cold of the bitter winters. Alissa celebrates Russian food outside of its conventional visual codes with dishes from Ashkenazi to Russian and Central Asian cuisines, as well as those that are authentic to Siberia alone, together with family classics and her own new interpretations of traditional flavour combinations.

Zuza Zak is a writer and homecook, author of the popular Polska cookbook, which seeks to revitalise traditional Polish food and bring it to a wider audience. Zuza studied English, followed by History of Oriental and African Art: this background gives her a unique approach – she is interested in the history of food and it’s meaning in peoples’ lives. The food she cooks is both modern and nostalgic, always rooted in the vast lands of Eastern Europe.