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Meet Ukraine’s “cook from the hell of war” mending spirts with a social media blend of cuisine and conflict
Ukraine — Standing amid ruins in east Ukraine, Ruslan Mokrytskyi held a combat knife and concentrated on cutting onions without crying. As trivial as it seems on the front line, it’s still not easy.
The mustachioed 32-year-old in military fatigues instructed his comrade to get the right shot of him with his phone. The angle matters. Mokrytskyi is one of Ukraine’s soldier-influencers helping to keep up spirits amid the war sparked by Russia’s full-scale invasion early in 2022. His TikTok account has 131,600 followers.
“Take a close-up of my fingers,” he told his friend, a cameraman for the day. “Lower the frame.”
The shot showed his shrapnel-scarred hands as he peeled the onions carefully.
Mokrytskyi’s social media profile describes his life as a part-time celebrity chef and soldier in a nutshell: “A cook from the hell of war.”
ANATOLII STEPANOV/AFP/Getty
The day AFP met him, he revisited an Italian classic, pasta all’arrabbiata.
Just 24 hours earlier, he was a drone pilot in what he called the “hell of Toretsk” — defending the eastern city that Russia has been trying to capture for months.
“I needed to recuperate mentally”
At the front since the start of the war in 2022, Mokrytskyi needed a form of escape while being under constant fire.
“After missions, there were, let’s say… many horrible and stressful images,” he said. “I needed to recuperate mentally.”
He tried to forget the horrors by plunging into films, music, reading and going on walks despite the bombs. But nothing worked.
“I got to the point where I told myself that it would be cool to film myself making fries,” the soldier said.
The success of that idea exceeded his expectations: his fries video got three million views.
Encouraged, Mokrytskyi involved friends from his battalion, who would call their wives to get ideas for recipes.
He then realised he was not only helping his own mental health but that of his comrades too.
“Everyone was joking around,” he said. “It’s not just me rebuilding myself mentally, but also everyone around me.”
ANATOLII STEPANOV/AFP/Getty
His video sessions offer “an hour or two” of light-heartedness — an unusual feeling on the front in Donbas, where fighting has been incessant for two and half years since Moscow invaded.
A vital link to family and friends
His fellow battalion member Ivan played with the camera and looked delighted with the uplifting break from war.
Normally, Ivan’s nights are restless.
“When I film Ruslan, I don’t think about the war,” the 25-year-old said, adding that he also gets the extra bonus of a good meal while helping make the videos.
On his TikTok page, Mokrytskyi’s content alternates between cooking recipes and raw images showing the realities of war.
On top of having “vital” psychological benefits, running the social media page means the soldier retains a link with civilian life.
It also allows civilians — as well as his family — to keep informed on what a soldier’s life is like in the east.
Mokrytskyi said that “if you do not have contact with your family, you can go mad.”
He strives to make the content entertaining but war-related, like converting a rifle cartridge into a pepper shaker and using products found in destroyed cities he travels through.
Some fame, and countering Russia’s narrative
Now a recognizable face, some businesses are getting interested in Mokrytskyi.
“An energy drinks company approached me,” he said, to make him a brand ambassador.
“They sent packs of drinks and helped me when I was wounded,” he added, his hands still bearing the scars.
Last year Mokrytskyi even did a video with one of Ukraine’s best-known chefs, award-winning Kyiv restauranteur Ievgen Klopotenko, who CBS News met not long after he was forced to temporarily close down his establishment after Russia launched its full-scale invasion.
Mokrytskyi initially got generous donations from civilians but, after two and a half years of war, those have dried up.
Yet he knows his videos help keep up Ukrainian spirits — and even may be helping undermine the enemy’s stereotypes.
“The Russians also watch my videos,” he said with a smile.
“They see that we are ordinary people defending their country, and not fascists or I don’t know what else,” he said, referring to Moscow’s portrayal of Ukraine and its stated aim of “de-Nazifying” the country.
That, in part, motivates him to keep running his cooking war channel, despite his very demanding obligations as a soldier.
When a friend was killed, he said it took him “four days to get back my spirits,” but then he went back to making the videos.
Back on his cooking spree, the aroma of hot parmesan was rising above the ruins as Mokrytskyi emptied the pasta onto the plastic plates of his comrades.
Smiles lit up their faces.
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Yellowstone hiker burned when she falls into scalding water near Old Faithful, park officials say
Yellowstone National Park, Wyo. — A New Hampshire woman suffered severe burns on her leg after hiking off-trail in Yellowstone National Park and falling into scalding water in a thermal area near the Old Faithful geyser, park officials said.
The 60-year-old woman from Windsor, New Hampshire, along with her husband and their leashed dog were walking off a designated trail near the Mallard Lake Trailhead on Monday afternoon when she broke through a thin crust over the water and suffered second- and third-degree burns to her lower leg, park officials said. Her husband and the dog weren’t injured.
The woman was flown to Eastern Idaho Regional Medical Center in Idaho Falls, Idaho for treatment.
National Park Service / Jacob W. Frank
Park visitors are reminded to stay on boardwalks and trails in hydrothermal areas and exercise extreme caution. The ground in those areas is fragile and thin and there’s scalding water just below the surface, park officials said.
Pets are allowed in limited, developed areas of Yellowstone park but are prohibited on boardwalks, hiking trails, in the backcountry and in thermal areas.
The incident is under investigation. The woman’s name wasn’t made public.
This is the first known thermal injury in Yellowstone in 2024, park officials said in a statement. The park had recorded 3.5 million visitors through August this year.
Hot springs have injured and killed more people in Yellowstone National Park than any other natural feature, the National Park Service said. At least 22 people have died from hot spring-related injuries in and around the 3,471-square-mile national park since 1890, park officials have said.
TRENTON, N.J. — Democratic Newark City Council President LaMonica McIver has defeated Republican small businessman Carmen Bucco in a contest in New Jersey’s 10th Congressional District that opened up because of the death of Rep. Donald Payne Jr. in April.
McIver will serve out the remainder of Payne’s term, which ends in January. She and Bucco will face a rematch on the November ballot for the full term.
McIver said in a statement Wednesday that she stands on the “shoulders of giants,” naming Payne as chief among them.
She cast ahead to the November election, saying the right to make reproductive health choices was on the ballot as well as whether the economy should benefit the wealthy or “hard working Americans.”
“I will fight because the purpose of politics and the purpose of our vote is to give the people of our communities and our nation a bold voice,” she said.
Bucco congratulated McIver on the victory in a statement but said he’s looking forward to the rematch in November.
“I am not going anywhere,” he said in an email. “We still have a second chance to make district 10 great again!”
Who are LaMonica McIver and Carmen Bucco?
McIver emerged as the Democratic candidate in a crowded field in the July special election. A member of the city council of New Jersey’s biggest city since 2018, she also worked for Montclair Public Schools as a personnel director and plans to focus on affordability, infrastructure, abortion rights and “protecting our democracy,” she told The Associated Press earlier this summer.
Bucco describes himself on his campaign website as a small-business owner influenced by his upbringing in the foster system. He lists support for law enforcement and ending corruption as top issues.
The 10th District lies in a heavily Democratic and majority-Black region of northern New Jersey. Republicans are outnumbered by more than 6 to 1.
It’s been a volatile year for Democrats in New Jersey, where the party dominates state government and the congressional delegation.
Among the developments were the conviction on federal bribery charges of U.S. Sen. Bob Menendez, who has denied the charges, and the demise of the so-called county party line — a system in which local political leaders give their preferred candidates favorable position on the primary ballot.
Democratic Rep. Andy Kim, who’s running for Menendez’s seat, and other Democrats brought a federal lawsuit challenging the practice as part of his campaign to oust Menendez, who has resigned since his conviction.