Soup and Siberia, not necessarily in that order.

I made soup yesterday.  I don't usually make soup - fussy eaters - but Lloyd's out of town and I didn't have to feed anyone but myself so I decided to use leftovers from the fridge and see what I could come up with.

I started out with a bowl of leftover seasoned ground beef which we had used in burritos a couple days ago.  Into the pot it went...followed by some chopped onions, salt and pepper.  I added several cups of water seasoned with beef broth, threw in some chopped tomatoes (leftover from the burrito meal of a couple days ago), some frozen corn and peas, more random seasonings, and finally a handful of uncooked elbow macaroni.  Then I let it cook for awhile.  The result was a very tastey pot of soup which I ate for both lunch and dinner with a piece of buttered bread.  And that's all I needed for the day.  Of course, now I have leftover soup!  Guess what I'll be eating today...

"Leftover Soup"

Lloyd and I had dinner with our oldest son and his family on Saturday.  He had been on a business trip to Siberia two weeks before Christmas and was telling stories of his experiences in a part of the world that was cut off from 'outsiders' for many years and is vastly different from our home country.  For one thing, they don't seem to know how to host visiting colleagues.  (Rob is a metallurgical engineer and his group was visiting a steel plant over there).  Noone over there spoke english. They had an interpreter but after the meetings he left the group on their own to get around, find restaurants, etc.  Rob was not impressed with the food.  He said the restaurants were like large diningrooms in someone's house.  Most of the food offered was in the form of casseroles, which Rob dislikes on principle.  One night they went out for steak.  And that's what they got.  A plate with a large slab of meat - no marinades, no spices, no sauces, no vegetables - just a big slab of meat.  While they were in the restaurant, three men with ski masks over their faces, carrying assault rifles, burst in and went directly to the table Rob was at, shouting and waving a piece of paper.  They had a picture of a man - a foreigner to them - and they assumed that someone at Rob's table either was that man or knew him.  They managed to make it known that they did not know the person in the picture and luckily the men and their assault rifles left.  A scary place to go.  I hope Rob's company doesn't send him there again.  And that's just one of his stories.  Here are a few of his pictures:

Statue of Lenin outside steel mill

Cathedral built over the spot where the last Czar (Nicholas II)
and his family were shot by the Bolsheviks.

Memorial to fallen soldiers of the Russian Afghan war (1980s)

Rob in Siberia

Have a nice day - I'm going down to eat some soup now.

Pat