Why kutia with rice, not wheat, was popular in the USSR: interesting facts

Kutia is a traditional dish for Christmas Eve. It is made from wheat, nuts, raisins, poppy seeds, and honey. Each of these ingredients has its own special meaning.

However, in Soviet times, kutia was often made with rice instead of wheat. The Local History website explains why this was the case.

In the 1930s, attempts to grow rice began in the then USSR. This process took place in the South of Ukraine, and later scientists managed to acclimatize rice to our weather conditions. Thanks to this, rice cereal became available to all residents of the union, and the Institute of Rice was even established in the Kherson region.

Since then, the popularity of rice has grown significantly and a large number of different dishes have been prepared from it. Sometimes rice even replaced wheat in traditional kutia. This happened because rice was much more affordable than wheat. It was easy to buy in the store, while it sometimes took days to find wheat.

However, this explanation may be too simplistic, because in some regions of the country kutia started to be massively cooked with rice, while in others it continued to be cooked with wheat. This can be explained by a large number of urban as well as economic factors, which, as we know, can vary significantly from region to region.