Bublik and to eat them with jam (varenye), sour cream (smetana), or other similar dips. While they often accompany tea, bubliks, again unlike modern bagels, are rarely considered a breakfast food. There are number of similar bread products in Russian cuisine, and the main one of this type is baranka (pl. "baranki"), a dough ring somewhat smaller than a bublik, but much thinner and drier. While bubliki originate from Pale of Settlement (Ukraine and Belarus), baranki are an original Russian dish, their very name, baranka or baranok, being a contraction of a word obvaranok, "scalded". They are usually harder than bubliks,
Boule de Suif even worse by the fact that it was Boule de Suif's personal sacrifice that allowed them to leave. Her self-sacrifice in sleeping with the German officer underlines her personal courage and the blind hypocrisy of the other travellers; the travellers go to great lengths to persuade Boule de Suif to sleep with the officer in order that he will let the coach continue its journey, and the travellers fill Boule de Suif's head with arguments, arguing that it is for the good of the country, that it is not morally wrong to sleep with the officer in order to let