Russian Food Vocabulary: 156 Flashcards From Borscht and Blini to Kvass and Kissel

Russian menus look intimidating until you notice that half the dishes are words you already know in English: borscht, blini, kefir, beef Stroganoff, goulash. The Russian Food & Drinks deck (code DM6050, 156 cards) builds on that head start and then fills in the everyday kitchen vocabulary you actually need at a market, a dacha table or a canteen.

What the deck covers

Each card is English → Russian in Cyrillic with a transliteration, and the order follows a Russian meal rather than the alphabet:

• Soups: щи, борщ, уха, рассольник, солянка, окрошка, ботвинья, холодник, тюря, бульон
• Dairy and grains: сметана, творог, кефир, каша, гречка, пшено, овёс, ячмень, рожь, манная крупа
• Bakery and mains: пирожки, пирог, ржаной хлеб, пельмени, шашлык, холодец, котлеты, котлета по-киевски
• Fish and salads: селёдка, щука, осётр, треска, селёдка под шубой, оливье, винегрет
• Berries and preserves: морошка, брусника, клюква, черника, варенье, пастила, зефир, тульский пряник
• Drinks: квас, морс, компот, кисель, сбитень, медовуха, чай from the самовар
• Cooking and taste: солёный, копчёный, маринованный, жареный, печёный, сладкий, кислый, горький

Sample cards

Two things to fix while you study

1. Merge the collisions. Cards 92 Jam and 93 Varenye have the same back, варенье, and so do Salted and Salty (солёный). Keep one of each and use the hint field instead: варенье is whole fruit in syrup, while thick spreadable jam is джем or повидло. Likewise, масло alone is butter, but card 90 shows it also means oil: подсолнечное масло. That double meaning is worth its own card.

2. Make the adjectives agree. The eight cooking and taste words are only given in the masculine form, so practise them with nouns of all three genders right away: вкусный суп, вкусная каша, вкусное мороженое, солёные огурцы. Also note that щи, дрожжи and пельмени are plural nouns, so they take plural adjectives (свежие дрожжи). If you add one phrase card per adjective, you can actually order and describe food instead of just naming it.

One cultural note: пасха is both the Easter cheese dessert on the card and Easter itself, and it is served next to кулич, so learn those two cards together. You should also keep the letter ё (мёд, свёкла, осётр). Signs usually print it as е, but the stress always falls on it.

Where it fits

Use this deck after Russian Travel Vocabulary, which covers menus and ordering. Then move on to Russian A1 Essentials for the case endings these nouns will need.

Find Russian Food & Drinks (DM6050) in the library at flip-it.app.