How and what did people eat at the beginning of the 18th century?
The majority of the population in Russia at the beginning of the 18th century had very diverse food. Peasants made up about 90% of the population. They did not drink tea, coffee, cocoa and wine, did not eat potatoes, turnip took its place.
Commoners ate like this:
Soups: stews, cabbage soup, borsch, kulesh.
Second courses: vegetables (turnips, onions, garlic, cucumbers, cabbage), fish (less meat, because of fast days and high prices, there was less sea fish than river fish), buckwheat and various other cereals (from oats, millet, barley ), game from the forest, mushrooms, berries, pies.
Bread was black, white – a rarity, on holidays and in cities for the wealthier.
Drinks: vodka, water, jelly, kvass, uzvar, sbiten. Tea appeared in the middle of the 17th century.
Dairy products: cheese, cottage cheese, kefir (probably appeared in the Caucasus).