Adventures in Ukraine

I must describe a typical meal at a restaurant. At least in my experience…in the States (I know, I know, we’re spoiled) all the people at the table get served their meals within minutes of each other (usually). The glasses are refilled for free, and you automatically get ice.

Now, for a change of pace, is the Ukrainian way. After ordering, and in my case it is much worse because you must first translate what I am trying to order, so the ordering takes a long time to begin with. The drinks are usually brought out pretty quick, the ice you may have to ask for more than once. It is not on the typical order, and they may not believe that you really want ice! But once they are aware that  the people ordering are American and love ice, you can usually get as much as you want…well…maybe not as much as I want, but more than the usual amount.

The orders may start coming as fast as 15 minutes, but each place is different. Sometimes the salads come before the meal sometime not. Once we ordered rice to go with the meat selection, it came when we were almost finished with the meat. But…it was very good, so it was worth the wait. We also ordered fried potatoes as a side dish and some meat dishes, the meat dishes all came and then almost 20 minutes later, the potatoes came to the table. No real rhyme or reason that I can see. They will tell you that a certain dish may take 45 minutes to prepare, so I always try to order something else when that happens. The food is almost always good, but it is not timely, and the service (just like in the States) is hit and miss.

We have had some very good servers this year, and they are always trying to smile and make the order to our liking. It is always a pleasure to go and see what is on the menu. And I think that lamb is one of my new favorite things to eat. If it is lamb, I really like the flavor of the meat dish that I have eaten, and would like to have it again!

till later…