The old town Sengiley in the Ulyanovsk Region is going to turn into the pancake capital of Russia in the nearest future. Local authorities and public organizations hope that such move will attract tourists to the region. The first thematic point of interest – a monument to pancake, traditional Russian food, - is expected to appear in the town this February.

It has been decided to set a pancake monument in February on the eve of Maslenitsa – a traditional Russian pancake feast, also known as Pancake Week. To confirm the seriousness of these intentions the monument’s groundwork has already been done.

Pancakes

The administration of the town thinks this project is non-ordinary and has no analogues elsewhere in Russia. Once a pancake café opened in the town, it became highly popular with visitors. This made the local administration come to the conclusion that the idea of creation of a pancake town cannot fail. The author of the unusual tourist project Sergey Petrov is extremely content with the forthcoming realization of the idea: “Sengiley has all chances to become the richest town in the whole country. I’m sure we can expect influxes of tourists to the town; just imagine – many pancake cafes and a pancake museum will appear here soon”.

A monument to pancake will be set in the town in February, on the eve of Maslenitsa – a traditional Russian pancake feast, also known as Pancake Week. To confirm the seriousness of these intentions the monument’s groundwork has already been done.

The project’s author also says that the governor of Ulyanovsk has approved the project and instructed the local officials to do their best to make the town deserve the status of the Russian pancake capital. “It would be great to introduce motor-ships and to build a spacious hotel, - Sergey Petrov says. – If the town called Myshkin (literally, Mouse’s Town) managed to promote the area and attract flows of tourists by taking advantage of the town’s name and building a monument to mouse, then we have all chances to succeed too”.

The administration of the town venturing the experiment, has already found a potential contributor to the project – a Sengiley citizen and teacher Lyudmila Blokhina, who has collected 125 recipes of pancakes and taught her college students to cook them. As the officials are planning to open a network of pancake cafes, there will consequently appear a need for trained staff; Lyudmila Blokhina claims her students are the first candidates for the enterprise.

If the administration of the town fully brings the project to life, this may become an important point in development of Russian gastronomical tourism which is now in germ state. Gastronomical tours are aimed at letting tourists get acquainted with peculiarities of the national cuisine of a country. Pure gastronomical tours` organization is not developed in Russia at the moment; however, one usually gets the idea of Russian cuisine while visiting the best national restaurants of the country.

Source:     www.newizv.ru

Lavrentyeva Natalya

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