Eating Russian Food by Savvy Mom Ruth Paget

Eating Russian Food by Savvy Mom Ruth Paget

Before I moved to Monterey County twenty years ago, I read about the history of the area and learned that explorers had come to the area from nations as diverse as France, Spain, England, and Russia to establish whaling trading posts. 

There are still entire Russian settlements in California and Alaska in the United States.  We even have a darling Russian Orthodox Church in Seaside, California.  There is an old whaling station that you can visit outside Carmel, California in Point Lobos State Park, too.

With this historical background in mind, I immediately wanted to try the food at the Pagrovia Café in Pacific Grove, California that advertised Russian and Italian specialties when I was on my way to pick up Florence at her charter Waldorf School in PG.

I called up my editor at the Monterey County Weekly (Circulation: 200,000) and said, “There’s a Russian restaurant in PG.  We need to see what they eat.”

I got the assignment and off I went to write the following article:

A là Russe

As soon as I heard that the Pagrovia Café served Russian food, I took out an atlas to locate the Russian region of Pagrovia to see what influences it might have on the meals served in this new restaurant.

Luckily, before I started doing online searches to find this mysterious region, my Pagrovian friend told me that “Pagrovia” is PG-speak for Pacific Grove.

With that issue out of the way, I invited another friend to sample a Russian dinner.  When we walked into the restaurant, we liked seeing a samovar at the door.  Paintings of icons and St. Petersburg canals by the Italian-American chef lined the walls.  White linen tablecloths and fresh flowers awaited us at our table.

I suspect that co-owner Valentina Rapisarda, a native of St. Petersburg, had a hand in the decorating.  I could easily imagine the early 20^th century Russian poet Anna Akhmatova alchemizing her unrequited loves into poems in this former diner.

But it is not all about Russia at Pagrovia: the oversize menus offering a choice of Russian and Italian foods reflect both owners’ cooking styles – Russian and Italian.

While my dinner mate and I decided what to order, we dipped fresh, warm slices of Parmesan focaccia in balsamic vinegar and olive oil.  (This is a sneaky vegetarian protein combination from Italy).  Then, we ordered our Russian banquet: piroshky and beef Stroganoff for my dinner mate and borsch and barashka (lamb stew) for me.

I love the crimson color that borsch gets from beets, its main ingredient.  What I especially like about Pagrovia’s version of borsch is its savory flavor as opposed to the sweet and tangy flavor the soup usually gets from sugar and lemon juice in the versions I ate at Zukin’s Deli growing up in Detroit, Michigan.  (Zukin’s was by Friends School – my first high school in Detroit.)

My dinner mate laughed about all the vegetable additions to the borsch I ordered: carrots, cabbage, potatoes, celery, and mushrooms.  Moscovites traditionally make their borsch from beets and serve it cold as a clear broth; my dining mate told me that we were eating the Ukrainian version.

I liked the taste of the dill that decorated the top of the soup.  If I were cooking, I would chop it up and sprinkle it on top to combine the flavors.

The traditional accompaniment for borsch is beef.  The soup is based on a stock made from beef and ham bone.  I chose seafood as my accompaniment, because I can never pass up shrimp after suffering a seafood-deprived youth in the Midwest.  However, I can tell you that the borsch was so good that it made the seafood superfluous.

The piroshky my dining mate ordered was a surprise to me.  Where I grew up in Detroit (Michigan), we used to call Polish piroshki “Russian ravioli” to which our Polish friends would yell, “Polish ravioli.”  (2018 Note:  Did you catch the difference between the endings on Polish and Russian word?)

Piroshky are half-moon shaped pasta pockets filled with either cabbage or beef and onion fillings.  I was expecting my dining companion to get a pile of these with melted butter and parsley on top.

What my dining companion got was a piroshky with a college education.  Mounded up like a sculpture with a potato pancake as a base was a cannoli-like crêpe filled with chopped porcini mushrooms imported from Italy, sweet purple onions, and chopped, hard eggs held together with a cream sauce.

My dining companion said he had never eaten such delicious mushrooms in his life and told me not to worry about food pedigrees when things tasted this good.

Trying Russian Food in Pacific Grove (California)


When my dining companions’ order of Beef Stroganoff arrived, it looked worthy of the man it was named after.  Darra Goldstein relates in her cookbook A la Russe that while 19^th century Russian revered all things French, they secretly harbored a love for their own cuisine.

Count Pavel Stroganoff, whose family had made a fortune developing land in Siberia, had an inventive French chef who appealed to his benefactor’s dual tastes by adding sour cream to a basic French mustard sauce.

Stroganoff’s chef added this sauce to tender, sautéed tenderloin strips.

Pagrovia has improved on the basic recipe by adding chopped porcini mushrooms and serving it with perfectly al dente egg noodles.

I liked the Beef Stroganoff my dining companion ordered better than the barashka I ordered.  This dish comes with tender chunks of tender lamb, large slices of carrot, and celery in tomato sauce – all served over mashed potatoes.

I think adding a little salt to the sauce would have enhanced the flavor.  A few renegade lumps in the mashed potatoes let me know that the chef mashed the potatoes by hand, but I wish he had used a little more butter and milk in their preparation.

While I was talking with the chef about how he used to feed 6,000 people a day as a chef on a US Navy ship, my dining mate devoured the tiramisu he ordered for dessert.  He left a little bite for me on a saucer, because that is what I had requested him to do.  (2018 Note – I’m sure he was thinking, “If you ask for two tic tacs that is what you get for dessert.)

I have two book recommendations to make about Russian food:

-The Food and Cooking of Russia by Lesley Chamberlain

-Classic Russian Cooking: A Gift to Young Housewives by Elena Molokhovets

By Ruth Paget - Author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France

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Sampling the Foods of Alsace-Lorraine (France) with Juilliard Graduate Florence Paget and Savvy Mom Ruth Paget

Sampling the Foods of the Alsace-Lorraine (France) with Juilliard Graduate Florence Paget by Savvy Mom Ruth Paget

One of my favorite places to go out for a light lunch was Patisserie Bechler in Pacific Grove, California.

I called my editor at the Monterey County Weekly (Circulation: 200, 000) and told her how cute the decorations were at Bechler in addition to having nice food.

She gave me the go-ahead to write the article that follows:

Pastry Heaven

The stork on the roof of Patisserie Bechler signals your arrival at Pacific Grove’s own bit of Alsace off Highway 68.  The stork is a symbol of Alsace, France’s eastern region bordering Germany and the native region of pastry chef G. Bechler.

When you enter Bechler’s a wall mural depicting an Alsatian village with its steep, roofed homes held together with wooden beams greets you.  I am tempted to walk down the mural’s winding streets in search of shops selling the famous wines of the region like Riesling and Gewurztraminer and the region’s fragrant yet zesty cheese, Muenster.  Luckily, to find beautiful pastries all I have to do is look around Bechler’s.

Sometimes I have chosen to eat pastries with coffee in this room and just look at the adorable mural, because its lace curtains separating it from the main dining room remind me of being invited to a French friend’s house for a lunch.

While there, I like to leaf through wedding magazines and Bechler’s notebooks of cake creations he has made for film stars and opera stars.  I am reminded that the great chef Careme once likened pastry to the art of sculpture.

I usually eat in the restaurant’s main dining room when I go to Alliance Française lunches.

Alsatian charm permeates the room.  Most notably, Bechler has installed a two-tiered fountain with lion faces in the center of the room like the ones you find in Alsatian villages.

Arms from the town of Colmar close to Bechler’s village of Bergheim decorate the walls along with a picture of beehive signs like the ones that hang from buildings in Alsace.  Later, Bechler told me that the same beehives decorate shops in Germany.

“Alsace has been fought over many times,” Bechler told me.

“Now all we want to do is drink together,” he said.  I just smiled at him.

The menu reflects light French fare rather than hearty Alsatian dishes like choucroute (sauerkraut with assorted pork sausages).  Quiche, soups, and salad are the restaurant’s mainstays with daily specials adding variety.

Quiche is the specialty of Alsace’s neighboring region, the Lorraine, which also has a history of contact with Germany.

The name “quiche” actually is derived from the German word “kuchen,” meaning “cake” according to Jean Ferniot’s La France des Terroirs Gourmands.  It is worth noting that the “ch” in French is pronounced “sh,” making the French pronunciation of Bechler “Beshler” not “Bekler.”

The day we went, we ordered the salmon and spinach quiche and the spinach quiche.  Bechler’s creamy custard-like fillings always make the savory ingredients taste even better.

What I liked most about the salmon and spinach filling was that the chef had used enough salt in the preparation, so that the end result was not bland, but actually brought out the flavor of the salmon.

The same was true of Laurent’s spinach quiche.  The real test of a successful quiche lies in its crust.  Bechler’s crust is tender and perfectly absorbs the flavors of the ingredients.

My favorite dish at Bechler’s is the onion soup.  Julia Child once said, “It’s hard to imagine civilization without onions.”  Surely, she must have been thinking of onion soups like Bechler’s.  

This famous bistro dish gets its start by sautéeing onions in butter.  You add beef bouillon to these onions when they have become golden.  After this, you add toasted bread and place cheese on the bread.  Then, you grill everything for several minutes.

On other occasions, I have tried the restaurant’s pork pie.  This pork pie turned out to be a very sophisticated potpie.

The flaky crust melted in my mouth while the ground pork and onion interior made me eat more slowly, so it would last longer.

These foods are all good, but the real reason for going to Bechler’s is to sample the desserts.  One of my daughter’s favorites is the meringue cookies.  These cookies really do not have a lot of calories.  Laurent likes to indulge in chocolate eclairs.  Bechler’s version features a pastry cream rather than a chocolate filling.

I like the passion fruit mousse made of a thin, moist, layer-cake, which serves as the base for the mousse on top of which is a clear icing.   Bechler sets a raspberry in the center of this on white frosting.

Bechler looks as professional as his desserts when he comes out of the kitchen in his double-breasted, white chef’s uniform.

Bechler perfected his pastry making at the three-star Michelin restaurant, L’Auberge de L’Il before coming to the U.S. in 1984.

End of Article

By Ruth Paget, author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France

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Taking Nature Walks with Juilliard Graduate Florence Paget in Monterey County by Savvy Mom Ruth Paget

Taking Nature Walks with Juilliard Graduate Florence Paget in Monterey County by Savvy Mom Ruth Paget

One of my fondest memories of Pacific Grove, California is taking my daughter Florence for walks along the ocean amidst wildflowers after picking her up from school.

We usually bought chai and toasted, sesame bagels with cream cheese and ate them in the car before taking our walk.  On our walks, we could see brown pelicans flying in V-formation (they may still be on an endangered species list), seagulls diving for fish, and black cormorants trotting around on their guano-topped rocks beyond the reach of most walkers.

There is a boardwalk across the street that runs through the wildflowers as well.  Sometimes deer even come out on this trail.

Many tourists come to Monterey as a side trip from San Francisco to do things such as:

-Go on whale watching trips in Monterey

-Go on boat tours of Elkhorn Slough to see sea otters and 400 species of birds that migrate over the Slough or are resident in it

-Go to the Monterey Bay Aquarium to see jellyfish and swirling sardines – the star shows

-See brown pelicans, seagulls, and cormorants fly over the ocean in Pacific Grove

-Visit the Steinbeck House and Steinbeck Center in Salinas – Steinbeck’s camper that he took on the road trip with his dog Charlie is on display in the museum

-Photograph the domineering geese at Laguna Grande Park in Seaside by the Russian Orthodox Church

-Visit condor (Thunderbird) and bat country at Pinnacles National Park in Soledad

-Watch monarch butterflies flutter overhead in Pacific Grove

(The sanctuary is closed, but there may be a way to repair this.)

-Visit the Dali Museum on the Monterey Wharf

-View the Hispanic painting murals in Salinas

-Visit San Juan Bautista Mission and walk along the San Andreas Fault Trail, do pioneer dances at the Hotel-Saloon, visit the rock and gem shop, take pictures in the buggy and stagecoach museum, take pictures at Les Jardins and eat at Les Jardins or Dona Esther!!!  On Sundays, Dona Esther has mariachi music.

-Play in the Children’s Museum downtown or schedule a visit of the Wheelie-Mobily to your town

-Explore California's Native American past in the Pomo Basket gallery along with regional wildlife and flower collections at the Pacific Grove Museum of Natural History

-Visit the Holman Native American basket collection at Pacific House on the Monterey Wharf

-Go for family walks and bike riding on Marina's bike trails that go through Marina's downtown with shopping malls and restaurants.  There are motels and hotels in Marina and beach access as well. 

Those are some of the tourism possibilities in Monterey County.

By Ruth Paget, author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France

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Going on Nature Walks in Pacific Grove (California) with Juilliard Graduate Florence Paget and Savvy Mom Ruth Paget

Going on Nature Walks in Pacific Grove (California) with Juilliard Graduate Florence Paget and Savvy Mom Ruth Paget

A few blocks up from the Monterey Bay Aquarium, you can do three nice, nature outings in Pacific Grove, California – the Pacific Grove Museum of Natural History, the Monarch Butterfly Sanctuary, and the walking path at Asilomar Beach.  All three can be reached from Lighthouse Avenue, which has several restaurants along it.

Whenever I took my daughter Florence to the Pacific Grove Museum of Natural History, we would begin our visit of the permanent collection by watching a film about how a caterpillar becomes a butterfly.  The chrysalis developmental stage is crucial for a butterfly even though it resembles a sticky mess when a butterfly eventually emerges from it.

“Pacific Grove is called Butterfly Town, because orange and blacked colored butterflies called Monarchs fly through it from Canada on the way to Mexico,” I told Florence. 

After the film, we looked at all the stuffed birds on display including the brown pelicans and cormorants that we often saw flying along the beach.  We had fun putting our hands in the mystery drawers exhibit to see what we could come up with – feathers, shells, bones, and so on.  It was gross, great fun.

We admired the baskets woven by Native Americans that were on display.  Florence learned how to weave baskets at her Waldorf School.  We both liked the Pomo Indian baskets that are roundish with shells and feathers threaded into their weaving.  The baskets were functional and beautiful at the same time.  Many were used for cooking by dropping hot stones into baskets with hot water in them.

From the Museum, we then went to the Monarch Butterfly Sanctuary.  It is a quiet place that is perfect for a fleeting butterfly kiss.  Pine is the natural tree that Monarch butterflies go to, but there are many eucalyptus trees in the sanctuary as well.

A tour docent explained to Florence and me that eucalyptus trees were imported from Australia for wood, but Americans discovered that you cannot cut these trees when they are young.  The eucalyptus trees were used as wind breaks on farms as those in the Sanctuary once did.

The docent said the black line on the chrysalis makes it a male.  The docent also said that the black dots on the butterfly show that it is a male.

“What are the black dots?” I asked.

“Pheromone cells for attracting female butterflies,” he replied.

Florence played amongst the trees with the warning not to touch the butterflies, so they would not get hurt or killed.

Our last stop was the walking path at Asilomar Beach.  Native plants line the walking path.  A field guide is a good book to have here to identify the plants.  The coast here is rocky with waves crashing.  It is a great photo opportunity.

The sunsets are magnificent from Asilomar; they are worth the walk any time of the year.

By Ruth Paget - Author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France

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