Food Fights: Culinary Conflicts & Diplomacy

go-vilnius-pinksoupflag-domantas_kancleris_6-s.jpg, default, Vilnius Pink Soup Fest, photo: press materials

In September 2024, the New York Times culinary website NYT Cooking published a recipe for Lithuanian cold soup, which was described in a short Facebook post as ‘probably the most famous of Polish cold soups'. Things quickly turned sour.

Although the article went on to say that it is also a Lithuanian dish, known there as Šaltibarščiai, and referred to the shared history of the two countries, we know very well that ‘nobody reads the whole text anyway’, and protests began immediately. ‘This is not a Polish soup!’, thundered the Lithuanians. ‘It's Lithuanian, even in name!’, they said, not without reason: while chłodnik is a general Polish word for cold soup (we might refer to gazpacho as a ‘tomato chłodnik’), the deliciously pink version made with dairy and beetroot, is indeed called chłodnik litewski, Lithuanian cold soup.

Polish readers tried to defend the appropriation by referring to the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, Polish bard Adam Mickiewicz, and his famous piece of writing, The Invocation in Pan Tadeusz, which begins with ‘Oh, Lithuania, my Homeland…’. Some Lithuanian debaters approached their soup heritage humorously (‘Lithuanians only have cold soup and basketball, and we've been doing poorly in basketball lately – don’t take the soup as well!’), others threw in bon mots (‘Let the cold war begin!’), and in an interesting twist, Latvians also laid claim to the recipe (‘What are you talking about, it's aukstā zupa!’). However, as is often the case on the internet, once the discussion got going, the innocent pink concoction became a pretext for mutual malice and the digging up of Polish-Lithuanian animosities. ‘Someone is going to demand the return of Vilnius next,’ commented a friend of mine.

Hummus, borscht & gastronationalism

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Hummus at a Warsaw café, photo: Jaap Ariens / Getty Images

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This is not the first nor the only ‘culinary war’ between neighbouring countries: for years, New Zealand and Australia have been arguing about the origin of the famous meringue cake pavlova, Austria and Slovenia have argued about sausage, and the Austrians would gladly reach all the way to France and take away its croissant along with all its glory.

But laughs aside, it can become more serious: part of Israel's identity policy was to take over traditional Arab dishes, primarily Palestinian ones such as ‘Arab salad’, which was renamed as Israeli salad. Then there is falafel and hummus. The dispute over the chickpea paste between Israel, Palestine, and Lebanon was referred to as the ‘hummus wars’ – if only they were the only ones. The ‘jollof wars,’ on the other hand, are the rivalry over who makes the best jollof rice, a one-pot, aromatic rice dish, between several African countries, primarily Nigeria and Ghana. All these disputes can be classified as part of gastronationalism, which involves the use of food and culinary culture – especially dishes with special symbolic meaning – as an element of constructing identity and national brand by emphasising one's distinctiveness from other countries. It is rarely just about food.

In recent years, a particularly clear example of a gastronomic conflict that was a symbolic emanation of much more serious issues in our region has been the dispute over borscht. When, in 2019, a post appeared on the official account of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation praising borscht as ‘one of our most beloved dishes, a symbol of traditional Russian cuisine,’ Ukrainians responded with anger and dark humour (‘As if Crimea wasn't enough for you, now you want to take borscht from us too?’). Borscht, they claimed, is a quintessentially Ukrainian dish, originating in the lands of Kievan Rus and only popularised in Russia during the Stalinist era by the then People's Commissar for Food Industry, Anastas Mikoyan, who was tasked with creating a Soviet culinary identity. In 1939, on his orders, The Book of Tasty and Healthy Food (Книга о вкусной и здоровой пище) was published, which contained recipes of various origins – Uzbek pilaf, Georgian kharcho, and Ukrainian borscht – but standardised to create a single, ‘total cuisine’ for the entire USSR.

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Ukrainian borscht, photo: Aleksei Isachenko / Forum

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Following the Russian tweet in 2019, Ukrainian diplomats submitted borscht to UNESCO's list of intangible cultural heritage – after the Russian invasion, the adoption procedure was accelerated, and on 1st July 2022, the tradition of preparing Ukrainian borscht was granted international protection.

The rich version of the soup, full of vegetables such as carrots, beans, and potatoes, and often meat, is commonly known in Poland as ‘Ukrainian borscht,’ which distinguishes it from the beetroot essence that we serve here with uszka on Christmas Eve or drink from a cup with a krokiet on the side. Since 2022, pierogi with cheese and potatoes have also been often referred to as ‘Ukrainian’ – which, incidentally, also caused a culinary controversy sparked by NYT Cooking.

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Pierogi ruskie (Ruthenian pierogi), photo: Forum

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The recipe for pierogi ruskie from Warsaw's Bar Prasowy appeared on the website in 2020 as a supplement to Amelia Nierenberg's article on the renaissance of Polish milk bars and did not cause any particular outrage, but when it was reposted after February 2022, an online debate erupted. By publishing a recipe for a beloved Polish staple taken from a Warsaw milk bar, the magazine somehow unwittingly managed to offend some Ukrainian commentators. ‘How can you publish a recipe for our varenyky and call them Russian?’, they protested. As we know, the name pierogi ruskie is misleading: before Russia's invasion of Ukraine, Poles themselves were not necessarily aware that although the word ruski is used as a slightly offensive word for ‘Russian’, when combined with pierogi, it doesn’t have anything to do with Russia at all.

The name actually came from the historical land of Red Ruthenia (Ruś Czerwona), which comprised the northwestern part of Ukraine and southeastern Poland and should, therefore, be translated into English not as ‘Russian’, but ‘Ruthenian’ pierogi. In 2022, many restaurants and manufacturers decided to rename them pierogi ukraińskie – Ukrainian pierogi – to avoid the Russian connotation in solidarity with our war-torn neighbour, even if the connotation itself was historically false; and so, technically speaking, the name was changed unnecessarily, but perhaps rightly so, due to its undesirable ambiguity.

Pink national pride

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Chłodnik, photo: Vilnius Pink Soup Fest press materials

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Going back to chłodnik, in Polish it is also ‘Lithuanian’ in name, although the NYT's description of it as a Polish soup can hardly be considered a factual error. In the television series Historia kuchni polskiej (The History of Polish Cuisine, TVP Historia), Professor Jarosław Dumanowski talks about chłodnik – as well as dishes such as kołduny and sękacz – with Professor Rimvydas Laužikas from the University of Vilnius, who reminds viewers that all these dishes are part of the heritage of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and that these recipes travelled freely throughout its territories.

Chłodziec appears in the 18th-century recipes of King Stanisław August's court chef, the Frenchman Paul Tremo: ‘Take 3 quarts of sour cream, half a quart of cucumber juice (...) squeeze two lemons into it, then take some cooked crab necks, peel them nicely and cut them into cubes...’ Tremo begins, and then, importantly, adds beetroot leaves and głąbiki – beet stalks (which can be replaced with sorrel). Rimvydas Laužikas explains that in the 19th century, there were cold soups made with rye sourdough (typical for Lithuania) and sour cream (mainly in Poland); in Lithuanian cold soup, only beet stalks and leaves were used, so the final mixture was often white, while in Poland, the roots were also used.

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Beets, photo: Grażyna Makara

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In the famous book Kucharka litewska (The Lithuanian Cook) from 1854, there is a whole section dedicated to chłodniki. Wincenta Zawadzka proposes a cold almond soup, a cold cherry or raspberry soup, and, most interestingly for us, ‘a cold soup made from beetroot leaves, beetroots or sorrel,’ which is prepared from selected vegetables with the addition of dill, cucumbers, sour cream, as well as broth and crayfish. Poland’s most famous 19^th century culinary author Lucyna Ćwierciakiewiczowa provides a recipe for cold soup made from chicken broth and white and rye borscht with the addition of beetroot leaves, dill, and cream, as well as a ‘cheap pink cold soup’ made from cucumber kvass with dill and beets.

So, if cold soup has been present in Polish cuisine for centuries, why did calling it a Polish soup outrage Lithuanians to such an extent that the official social media profile of Vilnius, Go Vilnius, posted a graphic on social media with the caption ‘If ‘Lithuanian cold soup’ is Polish, then Campbell's soup is Lithuanian,’ accompanied by a petition emphasising the Lithuanian origin of the soup? More than 2,500 people signed it.

Dominik Wilczewski, author of the book Litwa po litewsku (Lithuania in Lithuanian), published in August 2024 by the Czarne publishing house, explains:

I would like to point out that for several years now, Lithuania has been taking the promotion of its image abroad very seriously. State agencies, the media, and influencers are all involved in this. The emphasis is on showing that Lithuania is a modern, innovative, “small but brave” country. They are trying to attract tourists to Vilnius who are tired of the crowds and noise of European metropolises. It’s obvious that cuisine is also an element of image building. This is where Lithuania has a problem, because its cuisine is not particularly sophisticated, and traditional dishes are the food of simple people, which above all should be filling: dishes are often based on large amounts of potatoes and cream. So they are not overly healthy, which does not really fit in with contemporary trends. (...) Cold soup stands out in this context because it is cheap, easy to make, healthy and filling at the same time, and perfect for hot weather. Its pleasant, light beetroot colour makes it easily recognisable. And since Lithuanians have put so much effort into promoting chłodnik abroad as their own, it is not surprising that they react with irritation when someone tries to take it away from them.

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Vilnius Pink Soup Fest, photo: press materials

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Indeed, cold soup, the pride of Lithuanians, has been heavily promoted in recent years: Vilnius invented a cold soup festival, which has been organised for the past two years under the name Pink Soup Festival; in 2020, it appeared on charming pink postage stamps, and the National Tourism Agency also created a map of places where you can try it. The map is undoubtedly useful, since, according to TVP Vilnius, as many as 90% of tourists choose it as the first dish to try in Lithuania, while 84% of Lithuanians consider it their national dish.

All these efforts are part of culinary diplomacy, which aims to build a positive image of the country by promoting its food culture – and is still, unfortunately, often neglected in Poland. The masters in this field are, of course, the Italians and the French, and in the last decade also the Koreans, the Thai, and the Japanese, as well as representatives of the Nordic countries, whose strategies could serve as a model for Poland. So far, the story of Polish cuisine has been reconstructed and presented to the wider audience thanks to the efforts of historians such as Prof. Dumanowski and culinary diplomacy specialist Magdalena Tomaszewska-Bolałek (author of, among others, The Polish Table and Polish Culinary Paths), chefs such as Aleksander Baron, Marcin Przybysz and Maciej Nowicki, tour guides who specialise in food, and some online creators. Some institutional efforts are being made, but there is still no coherent strategy that would allow Polish cuisine to be presented in an attractive, modern way, while also consistent with historical knowledge.

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The Polish pork cutlet, photo: Monika Zbojeńska / IAM

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National dishes and customs connected to their consumption which form the basis of a country’s culinary identity are an important tool of diplomacy and tourism, a source of pride and fascinating subject to study. And yet they are also a construct, which Americans, who have long been struggling to pinpoint what American food truly is probably know best: apple pie? Hamburgers and fries? Clam chowder? Pepperoni pizza? California rolls? Poland, housed right in the middle of Europe, is a great example of how different cultural influences shape a country’s culinary landscape and, just like the US, we sometimes struggle to find dishes that would be distinctly and undeniably ours.

Wouldn't it be wonderful to tell a story about our culinary culture in which Ukrainian borscht, Lithuanian chłodnik, Ruthenian pierogi, and even completely made-up Polish dishes that have no connection to their name, such as ryba po grecku (Greek-style fish) and śledzik po japońsku (Japanese-style herring) coexist in harmony? With peas and mayonnaise, just like in Tokyo!

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