Blade recounts how one of his sushi cravings unfurled during a brief moment of calm while stationed in the south of Ukraine during the first year of the country’s war with Russia. “The enemy was very close,” he said. The drone pilot and his team were just beyond the front lines, regrouping in the war-ravaged village of Bashtanka.
At the time, only a few thousand civilians remained, but during a lull, Blade walked into a café in search of sustenance and matter-of-factly asked, “What is on the sushi menu?” Moments later he was snacking on unagi.
Blade is the call sign of the Ukrainian drone pilot. At his request, we’re using it instead of his real name for security purposes as the war is now in its third year. The cultural moment he shared during an interview that happened to take place in another sushi restaurant—this time in Kramatorsk, itself a frontline city that is a major logistics hub for fighting in east Ukraine—captures what I often tell people who ask what’s most surprising thing I’ve learned about Ukraine over the past three years as an independent Kyiv-based war correspondent: their love affair with sushi.
Across the country, at nearly every military position, from large cities to small and obscure villages, Japanese sushi rolls—classic and with a Ukrainian twist—are part of the diet of hungry troops. In fact, if you walk into a restaurant in Ukraine at random, there’s a very good chance it will serve sushi. Google Maps backs this up. Zero in on Kyiv or almost any part of Ukraine and search for “sushi,” and you’ll likely be able to find a café or restaurant to satiate your fix.
Over the past 20 years, as the fight for an independent and democratic Ukraine has progressed, first through deadly protests and now the ongoing war against Russian oppression, sushi has become a staple food.
“Sushi was probably one of the first properly foreign dishes that came to Ukraine [after the restoration of independence],” said Yaroslav Druziuk, the former editor in chief of The Village Ukraine, a Ukrainian culture and politics publication. “[At that time] sushi is the easiest way to feel like you’re eating something exotic and fascinating…. Want to impress your girlfriend? Set up a date in a sushi restaurant.”
The rise in sushi’s popularity is intertwined with a Ukrainian trend toward eating what America and the rest of the West eats—a cosmopolitan way of looking at the world absent of Russian influence. According to Google search trends, the most sought after takeaway food in Ukraine is sushi. In Russia, it is kebab.
Olha Nasonova, a restaurant consultant and cofounder of the National Restaurant Association of Ukraine, says that cold appetizers are “very popular” in Ukraine—sliced vegetables, sliced sausage, mushrooms—“and in some way, sushi replaced these cold appetizers because many people, even now, put sushi on the table instead. They can eat sushi first, then have a hot dish, and then dessert. And basically, this has become…a common practice for many families.”
I’ve asked countless Ukrainians why sushi is so popular here. It’s so entrenched at this point that most don’t give it any thought. “It’s just delicious!” is the most common reply. But there are also subtle ways in which Ukrainian sushi history is intertwined with its politics.
Sushiya, now a common Ukrainian sushi chain, established its first store in 2006. Several years later, it opened a branch overlooking Kyiv’s Independence Square. The square is integral to the Ukrainian story. In 2014, this is where protesters demanded the resignation of pro-Russian President Viktor Yanukovych and closer integration with the European Union. No doubt during frigid winter days, some pro-democracy protesters huddled in the Sushiya to stay warm and in the process ordered a few rolls. Today, Sushiya has 21 restaurants in five cities across Ukraine.
Following the successful Maidan Revolution, one way Ukrainian chefs and customers expressed themselves was freeing their palates of rigid culinary bonds. “Ukrainian [sushi restaurants], especially the places that opened up after 2014, they had more freedom to make experiments,” Druziuk said.
In taste and texture, most sushi is about as far from traditional Ukrainian food as you can get. Ukrainian cuisine typically emphasizes foods like varenyky and borscht and buckwheat—and there’s often a hefty serving of smetana, a sort of sour cream, but as happens in nearly every cultural food mash-up in societies around the world, Ukrainians added a personal twist on their sushi-eating habits.
“In post–Soviet Union countries, it was quite typical to have a mixture of milk and fish products, fish with mayonnaise in a salad, stuff like that,” says Ukrainian chef Serhii Khehai, who manages a high-end Kyiv sushi counter called Shima.
And these combinations have found their way into Ukrainian sushi menus. “I’ve personally tried various adaptations of sushi, like sushi with mashed potatoes and herring, or rolls with beetroot and salmon, for example,” Nasonova says. The experimentation led itself naturally to sushi paired with cream cheese, or mayonnaise, or other types of cream sauces—a departure from the subtle flavors of traditional Japanese cuisine. The country’s favorite type of sushi, by far, is the Philadelphia roll—the sushi characterized by cream cheese paired with raw or cooked fish.
Sushiya has no less than 34 versions of the Philadelphia roll on its menu, such as the “Philadelphia Grilled Greens with Salmon Well-Done,” which features salmon stewed in soy sauce, cream cheese, and cheddar cheese and topped with some onion crumble; or a version with mussels, tomato, crab mix, avocado, shaved tuna, and cream cheese.
“A Japanese person who eats sushi as an everyday food would be surprised by the variety of our menu…we’re not afraid to surprise, adding something of our own,” said Artem Mykhailenko, a Sushiya employee at the Independence Square location.
Getting fresh raw fish into the country has been a challenge in a period of wartime, when all flights are grounded. Ukraine’s only nearby major body of water is the Black Sea, where ongoing military operations are underway.
But restaurateurs have found a way to meet demand despite the regular power outages, drone attacks, and missile strikes across the country. Over time, Khehai has been able to source salmon from Scotland and other fish from countries like Spain, using road transport to get it across the border from Poland into Ukraine. He orders his fish to arrive by Tuesday evening—chilled, never frozen. The sushi counter’s freshest fish is served on Wednesday.
“It is quite interesting because it is the only available exotic food at the moment. One could say that people in Ukraine are getting poorer, and they really want something unusual, something exotic, something that differs from their usual diet,” Nasonova says. “And sushi has taken on this role. Sushi is not just food, it is a celebration.”
