In the USSR, when you got your hands on a can of green peas, you’d treasure it. You’d hide it and keep it safe for months. You’d fall asleep calm in the knowledge that your can was secure. That for this year, you had fulfilled the goal of finding your can. Next year, the battle would resume but for now, you were in the clear.
Canned green peas are an ingredient in the Olivier salad, the main dish of the Soviet New Year celebrations. No canned green peas meant you were the kind of abject loser who couldn’t give your family one evening of eating well in a year. People went out of their way to make sure that New Year was celebrated as it should.
Those who somehow snagged several cans of green peas would use them as currency. People valued by the regime would get food packages as a form of recognition. We didn’t have such people in our family but from others I heard that a can of green peas was often part of these special foodstuffs. These people could sit in comfort, knowing that their peas were waiting for them.
Of course, you can’t celebrate New Year’s with canned green peas only. There are many, many other ingredients that you had to gather during the year to make the whole puzzle come together. Canned sprats, mayonnaise, alcohol, and many other things. You had to gather them, treasure them, make calculated decisions about what would be swapped for what else.
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