Tutorials: Recipe of Beetroot Soup (Borsch)

250 g minced meat - beef or pork. You can use just chopped meat as well, I am sure
1 stock cube of your choice
1,5 l of water
1 biggish carrot
1 onion
2-3 potatoes
200 g beetroot
150 g cabbage
2 tbsp tomato puree
1 tbsp vinegar
a bit of oil
1 teasp of salt
1 tbsp of sugar
herbs and spices of your choice, definitely add pepper or paprika - something strong. dill and garlic won't hurt either. :)

A good dollop of soured cream/creme fraiche/greek style natural yoghurt

*Heat the oil in the bottom of a saucepan or pot big enough to fit all the soup in. Brown the meat until juices run clean, and if you like well done meat, even more, until it starts slightly burn and goes dark brown on one side.
*While the meat is cooking, cut the carrot into thin slices or small cubes. It's because carrots and swedes take muck longer to cook than potatoes and cabbage. When the meat is cooked to your liking, add the carrot and also chop or cut onion to add in. (I usually just kind of half-slice the onion in my hand above the pot. It's quick. :) Cover with lid and cook until onions are slightly transparent.
*While that is happening, peel and chop your potatoes and slice cabbage. also, you could start chopping your beetroots into smallish cubes. Add water, potatoes, cabbage and stock cube to your pot and steam the beetroot on a different pan (preferably on a wide frying pan, yes) with tomato puree and vinegar. Add few scoopfuls of soup from your pot.
*When everything is nice and done, add the beetroot to your soup. Cook for another 5-10 minutes, adding salt, sugar and all your herbs and spices.

Let it stand as long as you can. Serve with soured cream/creme fraiche/greek style natural yoghurt. Believe me, it makes all the difference.


So there you are. Quite a bit of chopping, but it's nice in the end, really. :) If you live somewhere where there is russian/polish shop, then you can go and look for some real borsch as well. It's usually in 1l glass jar, you have to add water yourself, and it looks and reads kind of like this:

Look for the text. It is pronounced BOR (then the fourth symbol reads) CHTCH (though you don't really say it like this, it's just a quicker "sssh" sound; and fifth is just making it sound more palatalized http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palatalization, so we add J)
BORCHTCHJ
:D

P.S. You can make it completely without meat, it still tastes nice. ;)

Kerli,
sincerely