Sipping Tea and Enjoying Piroshki at Alaska’s Quirkiest Tourist Spot

Inside Samovar Cafe in Nikolaevsk, Alaska, every inch is adorned with Soviet artifacts and trinkets, leaving the U-shaped bar top and its six seats as the only bare surfaces. The cafe resembles a Slavic-themed I Spy puzzle, brimming with decorative plates, posters, photographs, nesting dolls, scarves, and handicrafts. It’s an overwhelming yet enchanting dining atmosphere.

“One piroshki? No, you must have three! And no tea? Of course, you’ll have tea—real Russian tea! And dessert too,” Nina Fefelov, the owner of Samovar, insisted during my last visit in 2018, just before the pandemic. “After the meal, we create a genuine Russian experience; we take photos, yes?”

Dining at the cozy Dinogoy is a sensory overload: a burst of colors, an array of pelmeni and cream puffs, and Fefelov attending to every guest. Inevitably, during or after your meal, you'll find yourself donning traditional attire (I wore a patterned skirt, oversized shawl, and a tiara-like headdress while my partner got a blue belted tunic and fur hat) and posing in the shop, whether you planned it or not. Either way, it costs $20 for this unique experience.

Despite being near a popular road trip route, Samovar remains an unexpected destination. From Memorial Day to Labor Day, a steady stream of RVs and local cars navigate the Sterling Highway on Alaska’s Kenai Peninsula, connecting Anchorage to Homer, known as “the end of the road.” Although the turnoff to Nikolaevsk is just 20 miles from Homer, the small community of 188 residents, many of whom belong to the devout Russian Old Believer faith, often prefers to keep their distance from tourists, wishing to avoid outside influence.

At the Samovar, an elderly babushka offers a rare insight into the Old Believers community by serving her guests traditional Russian dishes and dressing them up like life-sized Matryoshka dolls. While the Dinogoy may be a bit of a tourist trap, it offers a unique glimpse into a place that usually keeps its doors closed to outsiders — and as Fefelov suggests, it might soon shut off access altogether after the pandemic.

Visiting Alaska

The majority of residents in Nikolaevsk belong to the Russian Old Believer faith, a strict offshoot of the Russian Orthodox Church, making it the largest of four such communities in Alaska.

In 1666, reforms introduced by Russia’s Orthodox Church — including changes in the spelling of Jesus's name and the method of making the sign of the cross — prompted a backlash from a small faction of believers. Viewing these alterations as unauthorized, they separated from the Church to form the Russian Old Believers. To escape persecution, those who refused to hide their practices fled to a remote area in Siberia, where they lived for over 200 years. The communist revolution of 1917 forced the Old Believers to China, where they survived by hunting tigers and elk in Harbin until WWII, when they were deported, scattering across the globe.

Around a quarter of the way through the Old Believers’ time in Siberia, in 1732, Russian colonizers arrived on Alaska’s shores, drawn by the hunt for valuable furs, including mink, fox, and especially sea otter. In 1867, Russia ceded its claims to Alaska to the United States for $7.2 million (roughly two cents per acre), leading to Alaska becoming the U.S.'s 49th state in 1959. Amid ongoing conflicts with Ukraine, Russian officials have suggested a desire to reclaim Alaska if U.S. involvement in the war continues.

A decade after Alaska became a state, in 1969, the Fefelov family established themselves in Nikolaevsk, a town located on traditional Dena’ina land, as one of the five founding Old Believer families. Reverend Kondraty Sozontovich Fefelov, originally from Russia, along with his wife Irina and their seven children (later ten), initially attempted to settle in Brazil and then Oregon. The first location proved unsuitable due to weather, and the second was too close to urban areas, which drew the youth away. They chose Alaska — once part of the Russian Far East — for its remoteness and less modern atmosphere. Kondraty would eventually become a boatbuilder and the church leader. Nina, who emigrated from Russia to Alaska in 1991, joined the family by marrying Denis, Kondraty and Irina’s son, who was born in Brazil.

As with many remote communities around the globe, modernization is gradually making its way into Nikolaevsk. In 2013, the Atlantic reported that most schoolchildren were speaking English, and modern American sports like football and basketball had found their way into local culture. Many men and boys in Alaska’s Old Believer communities work in commercial fishing, and a New York Times article from 2017 mentioned that as “technology became increasingly essential to the fishing industry, many in the village began to embrace the internet, smartphones, and television.”

Despite the encroachment of modernity, Nikolaevsk’s residents strive to maintain their pre-separation way of life from the Orthodox Church. They wear vibrant, embroidered clothing with hand-woven belts, and married women cover their hair; most homes converse in Russian, with religious services often held in ancient Church Slavonic. At sporting events, signs in Cyrillic are nearly as prevalent as those in the Latin alphabet. According to Nina Fefelov, founding Nikolaevsk represented an opportunity for her in-laws and their peers to “seek the true religion.” Today, the tension between tradition and contemporary life is more pronounced than ever.

Experiencing Dining in Old Russia

Reviews of the Samovar Cafe are polarizing — patrons either rave about it or criticize it, with little room for indifference. Beyond her roles as chef and host, Fefelov is known for her vibrant personality and savvy sales tactics (she even billed the writer and photographer of this article for their time). While the laminated menu displays prices, they haven't been updated in quite a while, and many hidden costs may surprise you. You might question the purpose of receiving a menu at all since choices are limited. However, for those willing to pay, dining at Samovar Cafe has historically been the sole opportunity to explore the traditions, history, and crafts of the Old Believers, a chance that may soon vanish.

Since the pandemic began, Fefelov’s cafe has mostly remained closed to the public. Her husband is disabled and spent much of 2022 hospitalized, and the number of tourists has dramatically decreased compared to previous years. “I’m turning 71 this year. I think this is enough,” Fefelov stated recently. “My son tells me, ‘Mom, it’s time to stop.’ I replied, ‘If they’re hungry, why not?’”

Fefelov announced that starting this summer, she will adopt a new business model. Guests will no longer dine inside the restaurant, and the traditional “Russian experience” will be discontinued. Instead, she’ll offer to-go options like borscht, bread, main dishes, desserts, and tea from a window on her balcony, functioning more like a food truck than a restaurant. While the menu — featuring simple Russian dishes such as borscht and pelmeni, mostly sourced from Costco — is likely to remain the same, that’s not the primary draw for visitors. They come not just for the food, but for the experience of witnessing life in a community that has fought to preserve its traditions for centuries amid a rapidly changing world.

Nevertheless, if you’re traveling down the Sterling Highway, it’s definitely worth stopping by to meet Fefelov and taste her offerings. Will you have one piroshki or two?

Let’s be honest: you’ll probably go for two.

Bailey Berg is a travel writer who spent seven years living in Alaska.Nathaniel Wilder is a photographer from Anchorage who has a passion for all things Alaska.Fact checked by Victoria PetersenCopy edited by Nadia Ahmad