A character or a dish?

Though the tale is simple, it has profound significance. Like so many folktales, it obliquely teaches proper social conduct by warning of the dangers resulting from foolish and self-centered behavior. But perhaps its greatest contribution is that it connects children to their roots, to their national heritage.

From the first moment that a child hears the story, he begins to imagine one of Russia’s traditional wooden houses, the old woman and her husband, and the wife shaking out the tin to salvage the last scraps of floor. In his imagination, the child touches the lifestyle and world of his ancestors: He receives his first lesson in Russian national history. In today’s ever-changing and uncertain Russia, this folk connection to a distant past may be more important than ever before.

Reading the tale, the child learns another lesson, this time in cookery. He now knows that, to cook a bun, it is necessary to knead flour with sour cream, make a dough, and then to bake the mixture in butter.

When I was a child, I learned and accepted this basic recipe. It was only as an adult, when I had become a mother and was reading the tale to my daughters, that I was struck by a question: What specifically was the kolobok?

What was this dish in the old Russian cuisine? I have never tasted it. I don’t believe that I have ever seen it. I just “knew” that it was a round bun, “scraped in the bin, shaken in the tin, baked on the grill, and cooled on the sill.”

I knew of the bun only from Kolobok’s song and nothing more. The kolobok was a part of my sense of national heritage, yet I knew nothing of it in reality. What was the actual recipe? How was it cooked? How did the kolobok taste?

I decided to find the recipe and cook the kolobok for my daughters. In my work as a journalist, I have learned to open any door. The search proved more difficult than I had ever anticipated. Archaeological excavations allow us to restore the dwellings of ancient Russians, to know of their pots, pans, and plates; chronicles tell us of past events. But, it turns out, recipes for many dishes known centuries ago to our ancestors have been lost.