The Ethnocultural Specificity of Traditional Cuisine in the Jewish Autonomous Oblast

The aim of the research is to determine the features of the ethnocultural specificity of traditional cuisine in the Jewish Autonomous Oblast. The sources for the study arereligious texts that reveal the peculiarities of Jewish cuisine, publications in the periodicals of Birobidzhan that throw light on the ongoing ethnocultural events in the region including the food culture of the region's ethnic groups, the authors' ethnographic field material-the questionnaire data from a survey conducted among migrants and the local population of the Jewish Autonomous Oblast. Food traditions are strongly associated with the culture of an ethnic community. The consideration of the ethnocultural meanings underlying the concept "food" is one of the conditions for the successful implementation of intercultural dialogue. An ethnocultural marker of Jewish cuisine is kashrut-a set of laws regulating the characteristics of banned and allowed food. However, the issue of kosher food in local restaurants with Jewish cuisine remains the most controversial. It turns out that the Jewish Autonomous Oblast has no venues with authentic Jewish cuisine, and, to this day, this is primarily due to the fact that enterprises involved in the restaurant business do not have the opportunity to purchase products required for preparing kosher dishes. By the 1990s, along with the revival of Jewish culture, other distinctive features emerged in the region that manifested themselves in the peculiarities of the cuisine. Despite the national status, since its official formation, the region appears as a territory with a multi-ethnic palette. A characteristic feature of the Jewish Autonomous Oblast is the development and support of cultures of different nationalities. The culinary situation in the Jewish Autonomous Oblast, represented in food venues, attests to the great influence of the nearest border neighbor (China) and reflects the migration processes, namely, the inflow of migrants from the regions of the Caucasus and Central Asia. In the 1990s, there was a revival of Jewish culture, which was reflected in the peculiarities of the development of the national aspect in the cuisine. Every cafe and restaurant in Birobidzhan has a local specialty: Birobidzhan-style schnitzel authored by the chef Yakov Blekhman. Today, there is a mixture of different ethnic dishes in the menu of the inhabitants of the region: Chinese and Korean salads, borscht, etc., but normally the Jewish national dishes such as gefilte fish (stuffed fish) , broth with mandel, latkes (draniki), varnechkess (ravioli with cottage cheese), forshmak (pate from salted herring with butter) are an obligatory component, although all these dishes are not kosher. In this case, we do not see the actual manifestation o f the Jewish national culture expressed in traditional cuisine, but rather the development of an original and distinctive cuisine itself. Although the Jewish names and the basic composition of the dishes are preserved, there is no religious component due to the fact of their "non-kosher" nature.

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