A Footnote on the Popular Anecdote of Yury Gagarin, the Queen and the Slice of Lemon

It probably could indeed have happened, but the man drinking tea was not Gagarin at all. It was Captain-Lieutenant Vetoshkin, who fished out a piece of lemon with his fingers and ate the flesh, leaving the rind. And what, pray, is so remarkable about that? I eat my lemon too, whenever I feel like it, even with Elizabeth II seated beside me.

As a rule, however, the passage ends with the Queen, not in the least disconcerted, deciding to follow the Soviet officer's example and taking the lemon from her own cup to eat it as well. It is hard to vouch for the veracity of this tale, but according to the recollections of the Englishmen present at the luncheon, both Gagarin and Elizabeth drank coffee. And the story, first set down by Viktor Konetsky, is most likely simply a myth.