Kompot recipe

One fine autumn day when I was in -- Riga? Vilnius? -- I walked through my Soviet-era apartment building discreetly peering into other people's apartments. Ordinarily people kept the doors to their apartments closed and I never, ever saw them. On this hot day, however, several doors were open -- because inside, people were making kompot.

I haven't seen anything like that kompot in America. It isn't a dessert. It's juice. It's a thick, syrupy juice made in the fall from fresh fruits. Throughout the winter and spring people pour a small amount of kompot into a cup, mix it with water, and drink it.

I liked it very much, so Witty Russian Guy sent me the recipe. He said I could share it with y'all.

Kompot

1. You need 2 three-litre glass jars, (attention!!!!) 2 special lids and special Sealing Machine for "sealing the lid of a glass jar." Sure, you can try another method of conservation but I give no guarantee in this case... :-(

2. You need 1 kg of sugar.

3. You need some FRESH apples, better straight from apple-tree. Don't peel them! Just thoroughly wash them with warm water and cut into 4 or 8 pieces. Do not remove the seeds, ever!

4. Clean up the jars with household soda or work them up inside with steam (sterilize to kill bacteria and spend the time either).

5. Start boiling 2 lids and keep doin' it until everything else is ready.

6. Boil up 5 litres of water, then add sugar stirring slowly from time to time.

7. When the syrup starts to gurgle, start smiling to yourself.

8. Put the apples into two jars and pour the syrup there, full to the brim.

9. Wait for a while. The air bubbles will go out and free some space in the jars. Fill them again with the rest syrup.

10. Don't wait! Snatch the hot lids from boiling water and seal them one by one using sealing machine carefully.

11. Turn the jars upside down and put them in a warm place covered with any rag (to keep warm).

12. Forget it for twenty-four hours.

13. Turn the jars back normal side up and hide them in a cold secret place your children will never know.

Zdrast-vwy Dee-ma

Witty Russian Guy with Two Young Daughters owned a car. It must have been a Lada. It ran inconsistently. Usually I travelled around Kaliningrad by trolley or bus, but sometimes Witty Russian would give me a ride.

Once we stopped for gas. Now, gas stations in Kaliningrad at that time did not look like gas stations back home. They hadn't any infrastructure. No mini-marts, of course, and no shelter from rain. No windshield-washing stations. No garbage cans. No pavement, sometimes. The hoses had no automatic shut-off, so you either splashed gasoline on yourself when the tank overflowed (this happened to me, which amused everyone around), or you didn't fill your tank completely.

Anyway, Witty Russian Guy with Two Young Daughters and I stopped for gas at a station which had two pumps, one for regular and one for premium gasoline. Witty Russian asked me what I thought of that. "What is in the premium pump?"

I tried to remember the technical difference between the two, gave up, and said in my rudimentary Russian, "Good gas."

Which made him laugh. "No," said he. "In Russia, premium gas is watered down."