Igor Klekh

Let’s remember the background – to promote female cooks to the status of Deputies of the Supreme Soviet! Let’s remember the policy of the elimination of women homemakers as a class, a huge expansion of the Soviet system of public cafeterias, the enlargement of food production factories – huge industrial complexes and plants, and the phantasmagorical impoverishment of product variety when not just some products but even their classes and kinds disappeared without a trace, and only generic types remained: “kielbasa” (ringed sausages) in general, “meat” as such, or simply “fish.” One of the possible definitions of Socialism is precisely this “impoverishment of product variety,” which, in the world of food, means “nothing extra,” only the necessary stuff, preferable in that it is commonly accessible. (p.27)