sakuska

plural sakuski · plural sakuskas

1. alternativeAlternative form of zakuska.

   The sakuski, or elaborate hors d’oeuvres, were but a prologue, and the succession of wines but an epilogue, to this dramatically staged and emotionally eaten course.

   1935 April 8, The American Housewife’s Bureau, “Fruit with Meat”, in Arthur I[gnatius] Judge, editor, The Canning Trade: The Journal of the Canning and Allied Industries, volume 57, number 35, Baltimore, Md., →OCLC, page 22, column 2

   5 more examples

   Before beginning dinner, come to the bar and try the sakuska. No Russian dines without taking his glass of vodka, and, prodding a fork into a multitude of snacks of all kinds, caviare, cold meats, bits of fried fish, raw fish, pickled fish, edible mushrooms, dubious toadstools, anchovies, mawns, cucumbers, onions, and radishes; for a copecks you may clear the lot and have your go of spirits. As long as the fork is clean and the tit-bits are dry, the sakuska is a good relish before starting; […]

   1883 August 17, Alfred Thompson in Boston Herald, “A Restaurant in Moscow”, in Wisconsin State Journal, volume XXXI, number 309, Madison, Wis.: David Atwood, →ISSN, →OCLC, page [2], column 3

   They seemed to know all about fishing and how to treat the fish. Most of it was cleaned, washed, and salted in barrels; but a small quantity was dried, and their house was full of fish hanging from the roof to dry; these would be tit-bits for the monks at home; with a drop of good spirits these fat dried fish are not bad and do very well for sakuska (hors-d’œuvre) in a convent.

   1914, Fridtjof Nansen, translated by Arthur G[rosvenor] Chater, “Nosonovski Pesok and the Samoyedes”, in Through Siberia, the Land of the Future, London: William Heinemann, →OCLC, page 106

   If a visitor should take away the bill of fare of a restaurant or a hotel as a souvenir, he would probably evoke some surprise at home. For it would list Wiener Schnitzel and Hungarian goulasch, the Swedish platter and Italian polenta, English roast beef and Turkish pilaff, works of French culinary art and Russian sakuska . . .

   1960 October 14, [Carlos Brogdon] Embry, quoting an item put out by the Hotel Kempinski, “Foreign Restaurants Offer Menu of Delightful Food Variety”, in Carlos B. Embry, editor, Grayson County News, volume 21, number 43, Leitchfield, Ky.: The Embry Newspapers, Inc., →OCLC, page 3, column 2

   A kindly British resident, Stuart, met me, and drove me in a troika to a restaurant where I had my first taste of vodka, sakuskas (glorified hors d’œuvre), borsch (cabbage soup) and peroshkies (meat pies), after which he took me to the railway station and settled me into the train for Baku.

   1961, Arthur Beeby-Thompson, “The Baku Oilfields of Russia”, in Black Gold: The Story of an Oil Pioneer […], Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday & Company, Inc., →LCCN, →OCLC, page 53

   Distilled from a grain mash (only in Eastern Europe is a potato mash sometimes used), vodka has no definite taste or aroma, but Russians, Poles, and other Slavic people toss their vodka down in thimble-size glasses, accompanied by sakuski or appetizers.

   1979, “Vodka”, in Woman’s Day Encyclopedia of Cookery, 1st revised edition, volume 22 (Veal–Zwieback), [New York, N.Y.]: CBS Publications, →OCLC, page 51