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Relic of the soviet era, this canteen serves a delicious meal in a minimalist setting.
After spending hours visiting the Arboretum and walking back to Sochi town, I was pretty exhausted and I went to this restaurant – Stolovaya No. 17 – for a late lunch. Stolovaya (meaning ‘canteen’) is a chain (run by government?) and there is another one (No. 57) is in Moscow. During the days of Soviet era, people formed long queues, waiting for their turn to get a cheap meal. The restaurant houses a kitchen (which you can see from the outside) that is full of babushkas talking to each other loudly, busy doing something while you hear constant cling-clang sounds of steel pots and pans in the background.
People stand in a queue while babushkas serve you what you ask for.
Nobody will greet you at the door, you are supposed to grab a plate and stand in that queue next to a big table filled with trays of food. You pick what you want from the options you have. Grab some meat, vegetables, salads, bread and even some desserts before you finish picking up your glass of tea. “Лимон?” (लीमोन?) you will be asked if you want a fresh slice of lemon in your tea. Finally, and here’s the most fascinating part, the babushka at the cash counter will look at your tray and announce loudly the food you have. Another babushka sitting next to her, with her head bent over a wooden Russian abacus, will rapidly move the beads with both hands. As soon as the sound, which I like, of banging wooden beads on wooden frame is over, your total will be announced, “сто сорок шесть рублей пожалуйста.” (one hundred and forty six Roubles please). I kept asking her “Сколько? Сколько?” (how much? how much?) since I am not so quick with numbers, until she waved the receipt on my face.
Russian Abacus, used to calculate the bill. The last time I used an abacus must have been over 20 years ago!
You will then be handed Aluminum cutlery, ONE napkin, and then you must immediately proceed to the dining area without lingering at the counter to take pictures of the abacus, or else you will be yelled at (guess how I found that out). The dining area, that smells like floor cleaner, has plastic chairs, rickety iron frame wooden tables with covered with plastic cloth on top (that almost smells like old plastic, you know, with an oily smell – very common in government restaurants in India) and plastic flowers to make the dining experience lively.
So I really don’t know what class of people eats at this (or such) restaurants, but everyone, visitors and employees, were very curious to watch every move I made, every breath I took. Oh god, and we are trying to be subtle.. 
The grand dining room.
I was delighted to experience this post-communist restaurant, and henceforth I am going to claim that I had an authentic experience of dining in a Soviet-era restaurant. 
Finally, that’s what I got. I was starving and I enjoyed every bit of my food.
Delicious food. Bread, chicken breast, vegetables, salad and soup. Don’t go by the colour of the borscht – you WILL NOT get even remotely spicy food anywhere. But all the food I had was extremely tasty, including the hard bread. I queued up once again to get some dessert and burped to my stomach’s content. 
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there was an episode on russia and other CIS countries on lonely planet/globetrotter..there were showing these restaurants , the host said the same thing about these restaurants that they have very good food but not so good ambience!!
SS: It was very nice experience indeed, I loved the place, even with its lack of service orientation!
Wow. I admire your courage in going to one of those places. I have to admit, that gets you bragging rights! I think I would be afraid of getting into the place, primarily for the reason you mentioned, which is the fact that I don’t have the script for what are the right and wrong things to do in such a place. I think the most local place I have eaten in was this canteen in Quito, Ecuador. Lonely Planet lists it, and yes, there were plenty of locals in there, sharing a table with you, but they serve superb guatita (beef tripe stew in potato peanut sauce). It was located in this little alley and looked rather dangerous in the dark.
Hi Jeruen,
It wasn’t a big deal at all (but I still want to keep my bragging rights) because I didn’t know what to expect of this place before going there. I also love to explore uncharted waters especially in situations where the script is new. Next time you go, do dive in – I prefer the local eateries because freshness of the food is guaranteed there and if so many people are eating, it can’t go wrong.
Interesting insights into Russia.
And that food looks really healthy food!
Thanks Nita! Yep, the food was really enjoyable.
Priyank,
Stolovaya indeed….Interesting….some things just don’t change.
That is good…at least the poor get food at low cost…(like our zhunka-bhakar scheme…which flopped after the initial wave).
I never had the guts to try anything in Tibet….just could not trust those guys to come out with edible stuff (yak meat for starters)
Hi Mavin,
In Bhutan they dry it, salt it and then eat it like we eat potato chips. Quite delicious I must say, and doesn’t feel like you are eating meat.
Yak meat..
It’s a great way to eat because you don’t need to read menus and you can taste a lot of food!
We did the same in Brazil, using a lot of “comida por kilo” restaurants — basically buffet style restaurants where your plate is weighted at the end.
The atmosphere in the restaurant looks very Soviet style! I don’t even know if such places exist in China nowadays. People use to eat at their danwei (单位）, which was their work department/ unit.
Hi Zhu, Yeah I love eating at such places. Food is cheap, fresh and real (without decorations or modifications for foreigners). Man, I want to go to China…
I’m so glad the food was tasty. I was expecting you to say it tasted like bad school cafeteria food.
Oh god me too!
great looking food, but except for the bread, I would have mistaken it for Chinese food – as in pictures you can’t taste or smell
lovely feeling coming back to your post, Pri. did you like my peacock sighting video? my first time ever watching pecaocks dancing.
Hi Trisha, Nice to see you here too. Yea I visited your post few days back, it is so rare to witness that!!
Wow, that is a really amazing experience. A chain of restaurants run by the govt. ala ‘India Coffee House’. Very nicely narrated and I enjoyed the photos.
Were the discs on the abacus actually circular breads like Bagels or something?
Hi Sid,
I visited a couple of ICH’s and enjoyed them immensely. Its a very different feeling of drinking coffee in a place that is not lit by shiny lights, sparkling clean and baristas sporting a fake smile at you all the time while trying to speak English to appear cool.
The beads were large, indeed like bagles. Easy to slide them.
Actually the one in Moscow is not government-run. I doubt if there are any such left in Russia. Here’s my experience there:
http://niftynoshing.blogspot.com/2009/09/moscow-canteen-stolovaya-57-review.html
Thanks for posting the link. I loved your review. I have also been to that place in Moscow’s GUM.
Very interesting! This does count as a uniquely Russian experience. The part about the abacus surprised me. You actually used one? I don’t remember using one ever; only read about them!
Hi Shantanu… Yes I used the abacus – purely because I was curious, my grandfather taught me.
“guess how I found that out”..I guessed..haha!
I also guess the plastic flowers made your dining experience lively..haha!
hahaha! Plastic flowers or scratched aluminium cutlery or the grumpy babushkas: hard to say which made it the liveliest!
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