Post by Nancy Schute, The Salt at NPR Food (2/14/2014)
We've got more snow here in Washington, D.C., than they have in Sochi, and it's colder. But still it's hard not to dream about being at the Winter Olympics, especially since reports from athletes and spectators say that the food in Sochi is beyond delicious.
There's khatchapuri, a pizza-like Georgian cheese pie that would be perfect for nibbling while walking aside the Black Sea. And solyanka, a salty-spicy-sour Russian soup that would warm us up after a chilly morning watching triple toe loops. Some kabobs, of course, either the pork chunks known as shashlik or ground lamb like a Turkish kofta.
Just talking about Sochi food was enough to make Team Salt seriously hungry, so we trekked over to Mari Vanna, a Russian restaurant in downtown D.C., that's a hangout for NHL hockey star and Olympic player Alex Ovechkin.
Fortunately, the chef had been thinking Sochi, too. He made sure that khatchapuri and solyanka were on the menu. And that was just the start.