Like all facets of daily life, the food that Russian farms grew and citizens ate—or, in some years, didn't eat—underwent radical shifts in the century between the Bolshevik Revolution and Putin's presidency. The modernization of agriculture during this time is usually understood in terms of advances in farming methods. Susanne A. Wengle's important interdisciplinary history of Russia's agriculture and food systems documents far-reaching changes on farms, along with their effects on ordinary people and for successive political regimes. Wengle argues that we need to focus on the...
Like all facets of daily life, the food that Russian farms grew and citizens ate—or, in some years, didn't eat—underwent radical shifts in the cen...