[lives with her boyfriend, odd jobs as model, translator]
We go to Azbuka Vkusa not too far away from her house. She wants to show us how to make aubergines with salad and cheese and spices.
Despite the fact that there variety of the sorts of cheese is rich Dasha chooses the Russian one - Adygei cheese:
Dasha's granddad is Uzbeki - so she knows a lot about spices, but she chooses the one that is pre-mixed.
We end up with an assortment of vegetables and "cheese to make it feel finalized".
Dasha just woke up and hasn't ward up yet for a proper conversation. She opens up on the way home and at home. So we check out and head out home for cooking.
Shopping
One the way home I find out that Dasha and her boyfriend rarely go to this premium store. They regularly go to Metro Cash&Carry. This is where she digresses from what her boyfriend likes. He can buy a big pack of waffles and she hates this kind of junk food. Dasha then likes onion in any shape but her boyfriend objects to eating it a lot. So she has to refrain.
Dasha's meal routine usually consists of just vegetables and rice or buckwheat. Buckwheat is the only dish where she adds butter.
Her boyfriend usually buys something like Valio - something from the medium segment.
She specialized in Chinese at the University and regularly goes to China. She says that China has spoilt her. In China she could eat for less than 20 cents a day. And the food is cooked really fast there.
Open Markets
In Moscow in addition to Metro they go to local convenience stores and a nearby market. This is where Dasha picks up vegetables and spices. She mentions her Uzbeki roots and the vendors immediately show respect. She starts bargaining and they show even more respect.
Dasha knows about spices, how to make "the real pilaf", she feels comfortable at the market where most of the vendors of vegetables and rice come from the southern former-USSR countries.
Maslenitsa
Every year they host a big party dedicated to Maslenitsa and the ritual of burning the effigy of winter. They make bliny and burn the real effigy.
Opportunity: become the symbol of theme food parties.
First she washes the vegetables with a brush and then pours hot boiled water over them for cleanliness.
The cheese is cut
The tomatoes are sliced while the first portion of aubergines is getting toasted.
Next she adds the spices.
Now the aubergines are sizzling:
In the meantime we notice an assortment of separate spices on the fridge:
It was brought from China. While Dasha grinds the carrot she notices that it seems OK judging by the juice. But the aubergines seem to be too dry for their price. You never know where you find the good food.
"I did a research once and bought kiwi in every place I saw in the city. My conclusion was that it must be imported from the same place. All the kiwis in town tasted like crap."
"You have to spend some time trying before you find your 'grandma' on the market who will always have good products for you."
She confesses that restaurants are the same. You come to a place where they charge you over 700 rubles for a salad (almost 18 pounds) and it's just a bag of rocket salad from the supermarket and some sauce.
While she lays pepper and tomatoes on the in the pan she tells about the baking machine in the corner.
"We make the most delicious bread with this machine. My friends come to taste it all the time, with butter. I never tried it with butter because I am afraid to get addicted."
"It is also funny that I use flour from the store, nothing unusual. But the bread from the store grows moldy and my bread never does. It dries in 2 days, that's all. I think they put something bad in the bread since it grows moldy."
By now the first portion is ready. Final touches:
We sit down to table:
The dish tastes simple, elegant and tasty but something is missing. Dasha warns that she tries to avoid salt. "Because it adds 10 years of your life".
Why the Good Food?
Soon Dasha is moving to China for at least a year. She doesn't want to work as a translator there according to her diploma. She wants to start a business of her own, to continue taking photographs, and explore the world.
"I want to eat healthy to live longer. I want to be stronger to be able to see and taste more. I want to travel before I am 30. I don't want to read about things I want to see with my own eyes."
"I am not satisfied with the way things are going in Russia [she refers to the recent scandal involving the Mail of Russia not delivering parcels from abroad on time]. I want to change what I can. And I need to be healthy for that."
Conclusion: It seems that people who are interested in quality food are the ones who are in general more inquisitive and pro-active.
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