What to eat in Riga
Latvian cooking: grey peas with speck, dark rye bread and its dessert, smoked Baltic fish, cold beet soup, pīrādziņi and Black Balsam.

[ ] Eat grey peas with speck
    Large grey peas boiled and served with fried bacon and onion. The national dish, eaten with a spoon and washed down with kefir.
[ ] Try rye bread
    A dark sweet-sour sourdough with caraway, dense and almost moist. It keeps for weeks without staling and travels home well.
[ ] Buy smoked fish
    Baltic herring, mackerel, eel and salmon hot-smoked on the coast and sold warm straight from the smokehouse. Eaten with your hands and rye bread.
[ ] Try aukstā zupa
    A vivid pink cold soup on kefir with beetroot, cucumber, herbs and boiled egg, served with hot potatoes on the side. A summer staple from May to September.
[ ] Get pīrādziņi
    Small crescent-shaped yeast pastries filled with bacon and onion, baked until golden. Sold in bakeries and served at celebrations.
[ ] Eat karbonāde
    A breaded or battered pork chop with potatoes and sauerkraut. The main course of any café day menu and of home cooking.
[ ] Try braised cabbage and putra
    Sauerkraut braised with pearl barley and smoked meat, and putra, a thick grain porridge with meat or milk. The winter village base.
[ ] Try lamprey in autumn
    River lamprey grilled over a rack and served in jelly or hot with potatoes. A Kurzeme delicacy, in season from August to January.
[ ] Try herring and curd cheese
    Salted herring with curd cheese and boiled potatoes, a basic Latvian combination. The curd here is dry and grainy rather than smooth.
[ ] Try rasols
    A potato salad with boiled vegetables, salted cucumbers, egg and sour cream or mayonnaise. Festive and everyday at once.
[ ] Try sklandrausis
    An open tart of rye pastry with two layers of purée, potato below and carrot above, lightly sweetened and dusted with caraway.
[ ] Try rye bread dessert
    Rye bread soaked with dried fruit, cinnamon and sugar, served cold with whipped cream. A dessert made entirely of bread.
[ ] Try layered rye dessert and rhubarb cake
    A layered dessert of rye crumbs, cream and lingonberry jam, plus rhubarb cake in early summer. Both are lightly sweet with a sour edge.
[ ] Drink kefir and birch sap
    Kefir, drunk with the peas and with fatty meat, and birch sap in spring. Both are sold in any shop and at the market.
[ ] Try Riga Black Balsam
    A dark bitter liqueur built on two dozen herbs and roots at over forty per cent. Taken in small measures, added to coffee or mixed with blackcurrant.

Checklist from Unload: https://unloads.me/c/food-riga