Around the World in 20 Drinks: Russia

Russia has been in the news a bit recently, with its ‘Section 28 on steroids’ law that criminalises mentioning homosexuality anywhere near kids. But what are they drinking over there to turn them into such unpleasant, pig-headed homophobes? Let’s go on an educational journey to find out!

Let’s start with the soft drinks, which are alcoholic and made from fermented bread. Kvass takes your humble lump of rye bread and turns it into slightly boozy brown liquid, which is then flavoured with fruits, herbs and other things that you might want to put into your soft drink. Y’know, stuff that isn’t bread. It’s been around since the 1500s, and gets name-dropped in Tolstoy and Dostoyevsky, so it must be nicer than we’re making it sound.

If you just want to eat bread rather than brew it up, you’ll need something to go on it, like jam or honey. Well, honey is the magic ingredient in medovukha, a Russian alternative to mead. What with all the mead the kids are drinking these days, this development comes not a moment too soon. Medovukha dates back to the days of the proletariat being unable to afford mead because it took too long to ferment, only to find that honey and heat would speed that process right up. Clever proletariat, don’t know why they’ve never bothered trying to rise up, we’re sure it would go well for them.

The lack of successful workers' uprisings across Russia in recent times may be because they’re too busy making samogon, or Russian moonshine. It follows the standard formula – get some water, add some sugar, leave to sit, hope you don’t go blind – but its popularity is slightly terrifying. There seem to be two reasons for this, the first being that it is, incredibly, legal in Russia to make your own distilled spirits, and the second is that making your own booze is ten times cheaper than buying a bottle of vodka.

By 2014, samogon will be the most popular drink in Russia, an unsettling fact until you realise that getting this anti-gay stuff sorted may be easier if everyone is off their pans on homemade hooch. Those are the kind of negotiations we’ll be happy to mediate.