Wherever the conversation turns to Ukrainian cuisineUkrainian borscht will definitely be mentioned with a kind word - a widely known, universally loved dish. How did it end up on our table and how to cook it properly? Let's figure it out.

Historical Reflections and Searches

When did people first decide to cook borscht?nobody knows. It is clear that the Slavs could have cooked it. Maybe a little differently than it is done now, but almost everything for this was there. The ancient Greeks wrote about cabbage and beets, and for the inhabitants of Kievan Rus, the existence of these vegetables was no secret. Our ancestors did not know in those distant times about the existence of such overseas curiosities as potatoes, carrots and tomatoes. But our ancestors could well cook borscht with turnip roots and venison. It is also known that in the 9th century in Rus' there was an edible plant hogweed, and who knows, maybe it all started with it. But the names Ukrainian, Russian and Belarusian appeared much later, when the Rus ceased to be a single people. In the 13th-14th centuries, carrots arrived from Europe to Ukraine - a native of Afghanistan and supplemented the recipe for what is now Ukrainian borscht. In the first half of the 19th century, the vegetable harvest ended with the arrival of tomatoes and potatoes. They arrived from America and were not received kindly, but over time they took root and settled in forever. It can be safely said that in the second half of the 19th century, all the prerequisites for the establishment of real Ukrainian borscht in all its diversity on our table were in place.

And how many borsch

And indeed, there are many varieties of this dish.a great many, but it is not difficult to name the exact number - there are exactly as many of them as there are housewives and cooks - each with their own individual recipe. However, in different places people developed their own taste preferences, and borscht began to be called Chernigov, Odessa, Kyiv, Volyn, Poltava and others, according to the name of the place of registration. Their main difference is the recipe for making broth, so, for example, for Odessa borscht it should be goose, and for Poltava - chicken. Despite the great variety of cooking methods and taste inclinations, there are quite strict rules, following which you can cook a real Ukrainian delicious borscht.

How to cook broth

The most common broth forUkrainian borscht - bone and meat and bone. To make bone broth, crush the marrow bones with a hammer, put them in water and put on high heat. When the water boils, change the water, bring it to a boil again, add a little salt and continue to cook on low heat for 4-5 hours. If this is meat and bone broth, then add portioned pieces of meat an hour and a half before the end of cooking and pieces of lard half an hour before. The classic Ukrainian recipe requires the presence of lard. This is a feature of real borscht. Therefore, when the cooking is over, strain the broth and grind the cooked lard with garlic. For meat broth, wash the meat, clean it from the film and sinews, cut it into portioned pieces, fill it with water, bring it to a boil, add salt and cook for an hour and a half over low heat. It is quite clear that the classic recipe suggests pork for the broth, but combining it with other types of meat did not spoil the dish at all, but on the contrary, it was good for it. In some cases, it is suggested to cook only with beef or lamb, and at the end of cooking add sausages or salami, which brings borscht closer to the solyanka in taste and recipe properties.

A few words about mushroom broth

It is impossible not to mention the mushroom broth.It is one of the oldest in age, but is still popular. With the advent of Christianity in Rus', mushrooms became the main ingredient for soups, gravies, borscht and pies on fast days. Dried porcini mushrooms have a special aroma. The recipe for making broth from them is not complicated, but it takes a lot of time. Dried mushrooms should be placed in a glass, ceramic or enamel bowl, pour boiling water over them, cover with a lid and leave to soak for 5-7 hours. This is usually done in the evening so that you can start cooking in the morning. The water in which the mushrooms were soaking is drained, and the mushrooms themselves are cut into several pieces or chopped into strips. After such preparation, they are poured with water, brought to a boil and cooked for 2-3 hours over low heat. Half an hour before the end of cooking, you can add a little dry onion peel. Of course, it will need to be removed as soon as the broth is cooked and infused. It is clear that in this case the borscht must be cooked in vegetable oil. This is a Lenten recipe and meat would be clearly superfluous here. While the broth is cooking, you can work on the vegetables. They are prepared differently and are put in for cooking at different times. This is a strict rule, otherwise not only the recipe will be broken, but you will not be able to cook real borscht.

How to prepare vegetables

The onion and bell pepper are chopped, and the carrots andParsley root is grated on a coarse grater and sautéed together in melted pork fat or vegetable oil. When the onion and carrot are browned and golden, add finely chopped tomatoes or tomato juice and fry for another 2-3 minutes. Until recently, tomato juice was prepared for future use everywhere in Ukraine. Nowadays, tomato paste is used more often, but homemade juice is still better. It was common practice to prepare juice. In the second half of summer, when tomatoes ripened, housewives carried them from vegetable gardens or markets to courtyards in carts and bags. There, under awnings, they cut ripe tomatoes all day long and cooked them in large pots on summer stoves. When the juice was ready, it was poured into bottles, corked with corks and filled with wax. In this form they were lowered into cellars or basements for storage. Beets are the most important component. Without them, not only the recipe for Ukrainian borscht is impossible, but also for any other borscht. It is what creates the appearance and the main taste of this widespread and beloved dish. Red, rich, sweet, golden-amber, sour - this is all borscht, and beets make it so. For bright red, sweet, it is better to bake it in the oven, and then cook it in broth. For amber - beets are cut into strips, stewed a little in melted lard or vegetable oil, and then boiled in broth. Today it is extremely rare to find Ukrainian borscht cooked with the addition of kvass. But until the middle of the last century, this was a common practice. Kvass was prepared with beets. The recipe is not complicated: grated beets are put into raw warm water and left in a warm place for 3-4 days. The resulting sour drink is added to the almost ready dish 15 minutes before the end of cooking. Nowadays, it is absolutely impossible to imagine Ukrainian borscht without potatoes and cabbage. These products are put into the pan without preliminary heat treatment, however, they still need to be cooked. Potatoes are cut into cubes, then put on a sieve, washed again and dried on a towel. Excess starch will be washed off by water, and the broth from the potatoes will not foam. Cabbage should be cut into strips. This is how it is, otherwise it will not be borscht, but cabbage soup. It cooks quickly and therefore it should be put in 15-20 minutes before the end of cooking.

What when and how much to cook

Thus, the cooking recipe will havethe following time schedule: cook the bone broth for 4 hours, then add portioned meat, beets cut into strips and cook for another hour, strain, put on the fire again and put in the diced potatoes, cook for 15-20 minutes, and add the cabbage, after another 15-20 minutes add the fried carrots, onions, bell peppers and parsley, cook for 5 minutes, then put in the bay leaf, finely chopped herbs and garlic, mashed with lard and cook for another 3-5 minutes, remove the pan from the heat, cover with a lid and let it brew for at least half an hour. It should be noted that this is a recipe for golden-amber borscht. To make it red, baked or stewed beets in lard or butter are added half an hour before adding the potatoes and then boiled with all the vegetables together. To prepare, you will need:

• 300 g of porcine brain bones,
• 500 g of pork,
• 20 g of pure fat,
• 250 g of beet,
• 400 g of potatoes,
• 400 g of cabbage,
• 1 large onion,
• 1 Bulgarian pepper,
• 1 medium carrot,
• 1 small root of parsley,
• 1 fresh tomato (200 g of mors or 3 tablespoons of tomato paste),
• 2 cloves garlic,
• 2-3 bay leaves,
• Dill and parsley greens,
• Salt to taste.

It would seem that's all:the recipe is followed, the dish is ready, but in order for the borscht to be truly Ukrainian, real, classic, it must be served with pampushkas or potaptsy. If everything is clear with pampushkas - they occupy a worthy place on the dinner table, then potaptsy have been undeservedly forgotten, and in vain. It is very easy to prepare them, here is the recipe: cut the lard into thin slices and fry in a frying pan until transparent. Fry pieces of rye or wheat bread in melted lard and put the fried slices of lard on it. On top of such a sandwich you can sprinkle with herbs or put fried onion rings, or crushed garlic. In any version, the potaptsy will be delicious, and with borscht it is simply irresistible. And in conclusion, two more words. In Ukraine, traditionally, at any time of the year, they cooked on stoves - in the warm season on summer, under a canopy, and in winter in huts and also on the stove. So, borscht cooked on the stove is much tastier than the one cooked on a gas stove. It has such a special aroma.

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