Vegetarian Kharkiv

Many of our readers will recall our discovery of the First Vegetarian Cafeteria.

As we know, it was located at Kontorska Street, 9. It was open from 1:00 PM to 5:00 PM and promised its customers “guaranteed food.”

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The owner of the courtyard property in 1909 was Mikhail Alexandrovich Belotserkovsky.

Photo: Ivan Ponomarenko, 2015

The most interesting thing here is that there was a Muslim mosque very close to the cafeteria. So perhaps, in addition to vegetarians, those who preferred halalfood also stopped by Kontorska Street, 9.

In a 1913 publication, we find an advertisement that is just as interesting. It turns out that a similar establishment was also located at Sumska Street, 6.

Visitors were offered vegetarian and dairy-based meals. The most interesting thing was that breakfast, lunch, and dinner were served in this cafeteria before and after theater performances. So it turned out to be a sort of vegetarian-theater establishment. The advertisement also mentioned the availability of a free elevator. And you could reserve a table by calling 30-65.

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It is unclear how many more such seemingly insignificant yet fascinating details the history of Kharkiv holds.