September and October herald a very Russian tradition that can even be called a national sport � mushroom picking. Every weekend buses and trains are packed with people in muddy boots and large backpacks heading out of the city and into the forests.

In fact, Russians love mushrooms so much that even those who emigrate continue to pick them in the forests of Europe and America. Hikers in Washington are stunned when they see people crouching in the undergrowth with baskets, but in Russia this is a typical autumnal sight.

Dozens of different types of mushrooms are then piled along with colorful berries and herbs at city markets. Besides the splendor of the fall harvest there is much at a Russian market that may surprise the untrained eye. The traditional fruits, vegetables, and grains are accompanied by various meat substances of sketchy origins and rows of strange dried fish that are as hard as rock and look unchewable.

Like in many other cultures, some foods in Russia are unique due to the country�s history and geography, and often not very inspiring to foreigners. Long winters and short summers encourage a lot of baking and preserving, and this gastronomical tradition continues even in our age of globalization.

Russians are brought up with a taste for butter, bread and potatoes, so for many people who come here from other countries the food seems too rich and at the same time too bland. As one Russian saying goes, you cannot spoil your porridge with too much butter. Those Russians who travel or study abroad come home and complain that the culinary habits acquired in the Mediterranean, for example, are simply too expensive to maintain in a country where the term �salad� has more to do with mayonnaise than with green leafy vegetables. 22-year-old Anna, a lover of Italy and the Balkans, misses cheap parmesan and freshly-squeezed quince juice: �There are some foods that I was used to when I was a student there that are not affordable in Moscow.�

Unlike in many European countries, serving coffee at home is only practiced by a minority of Russians. Instead, there are countless tea-drinking routines. The ways of drinking tea are numerous and depend on the region, but tea is never appreciated for what it is in essence, like in Britain, for example. The tea itself may be the cheapest variety bought in bulk for five rubles; the important thing is what goes with it: pastries, candies, and jams. The same tea can be brewed several times until it is reduced to a yellowy liquid commonly referred to as �donkey piss�. Not to worry though, the weak taste is not that important as long as the tea is hot and the dessert is sweet enough.

Traditionally, tea is served after every meal, including dinner � which has to have a serving of meat to be considered dinner. Vegetarians may not be too happy in Russia, where the absence of meat at the table is still considered a sign of poverty or poor cooking skills. Red meat is real food; everything else is somehow secondary and frivolous. If you announce that you are a vegetarian, you may be served chicken, after all, when something has wings and lays eggs, it certainly isn�t meat!

The fixation on meat may be a holdover from the Brezhnev era when people associated fish with �fish days�. On one day of the week, usually Thursdays, the authorities enforced a fish day, and meat was not served in restaurants or cafeterias. What was served, however, could hardly be considered fish; usually they were bizarre cutlets made of fish bones and rice. The experience resulted in the humorous Russian saying: �The best fish is sausage!�

Today, for those who can afford it, the fish days are over. The majority of people are happy with their choice of food: according to a recent poll, 63 percent of Russians said that they eat well. This number is higher among young people (81 percent of those aged between 18 and 35) and much lower among pensioners (45 percent) and low-income families (48 percent).

There is a soviet joke that goes something like: a customer in a western supermarket asks an employee, �When do you get your first strawberries?� and the response is �At 5 AM.� Since the end of the Soviet Union, the irony has worn off in Moscow, where supermarkets have anything from truffles to tofu. But most Russians still rely on nature and the seasons to get their fruit and vegetables. Predictably, they are the items that Russians desire most: only a third of poll respondents said that they buy fruit as often as they want. Most still have to wait until June to buy their first strawberries, and then go on mushroom sorties into nearby forests.