Mäetagused (May 2015)
Oma toit: muutustest Siberi eestlaste toidukultuuris
Abstract
The article discusses Siberian Estonians’ opinions about the dishes unique to them and the changes that their food culture has undergone throughout time. The majority of Estonians living in Siberia today are descendants of the people who migrated there in the last decade of the 19th and in the early 20th centuries. Many Siberian Estonians continue to live in small Estonian village communities, but also in larger cities and district centres, and their families and social circles are increasingly multicultural. Settling in another country requires adaptation to a new natural environment, which inevitably brings about changes in the customary choice of food. Estonians have mainly settled in the region suitable for farming and animal husbandry. Today, Estonians in Siberia often refer to themselves as siberlased (Siberians), which gives evidence of their adaptation and integration in Siberia. Throughout time, the food culture of Siberian Estonians has undergone changes due to various factors: the transformation of forms of ownership, multicultural environment and mixed marriages, urbanisation, growth in health awareness, media influences, etc. The younger generation is more susceptible to changes: they exchange recipes, and acquire new ideas and cooking tips also from the media and literature. The closer the communication with the neighbours, the more the Estonians took over from their neighbours’ food culture, often also borrowing and Estonianising the names of the dishes. For Estonians in Siberia, including those who live in cities, own food often means that meals are prepared from self-grown produce. Self-grown food is perceived as healthy and opposed to imported goods and the produce grown in Chinese and Korean greenhouses that have been built in Siberia in the last few decades. The term own food also covers traditional Estonian dishes, thus helping to draw a line between ‘us’ and the ‘others’.
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