Borscht

I know how to cook Borscht.
I picked recipe and attitude from my mother - she described this process as "Building Borscht". She took it very seriously - simple, vegetables only Borscht was the only food my mother's family survived on during the Hunger in Ukraine (1932 -1933).
There is no "standard" Borscht recipe, every village in Ukraine has own borscht style, actually every hostess has own vision what Borscht is.

How to make Vegetables only Borscht.

First of all, what taste and flavor of Borscht mostly depends on:
How sweet beet is
How ripe and juicy tomato is
How sweet carrot is
Amount of water
As riper vegetables are - as better.
How to handle if Borscht is too sweet described below in the #7-b

Main Ingredients:
Green cabbage (~ 8” diameter, or a little bit larger)
Larger than average size red beet (or 2-3 small ones)
Average onion
1-2 not large carrots
Average red ripe tomato
2 reasonably large potatoes
Small bunch of dill + parsley (tie bunch with white thread)

Optional ingredients:
Lemon juice
Vegeta (or other seasoning)
Butter

Initial Preparation
Clean and peel beet, cut by half
Cut out 1/3 of cabbage as one piece
Cut carrots by half
Chop onion – as smaller as better

Execution
1. Boil water (make sure water initially takes ½ of the pot).
Amount of water depends on how thick you like borsch to be.
I usually start from a little bit more than 1.5 liters (48 - 50oz) – depending on actual size of cabbage, size of beet and size of potatoes.
Sometimes I add a little bit of hot water later.
2. Put beet, carrot, onion and large piece of cabbage (prepared before) in the boiling water.
3. More preparation (time spent for this is enough for borscht to be ready for the next step):
-- Chop remaining 2/3 of cabbage
-- Grate tomato on coarse grating blade
-- Peel and cut potato
4. Remove cabbage (large piece) from the water (everything else stays there).
Large piece of cabbage is not going into the borscht anymore (could be eaten separately).
5. Remove beet from the water (everything else stays there).
Warning: beet is hot!!! Put it in the cold water for a few moments.
Cut beet on small pieces (chop, grate – depending on your taste).
6. Put into the bowl: beet, chopped cabbage, potato and salt.
7. When potato is ready (“fork ready”):
a). Put grated tomato in the bowl
b). Taste borscht. If it is too sweet – add few drops of lemon juice.
Sweetness mostly depends on beet and carrot.
c). If you like: tea spoon of Vegeta (or other seasoning according to taste).
d). If you like: tea spoon size piece of butter.
8. Put bunch of greens (dill + parsley) and boil 2min.
9. Turn off the hit.
Greens could be removed or left. More or less flavor - as you like.
Cover the pot and put towel on the top.
Keep in this way hour or so, or until cold enough to put into refrigerator.

How to eat Borscht
Borscht is much more tasty and flavorful after few hours (overnight).
Borscht could be served cold or hot (cold Borscht in hot summer day - WOW!).
Add sour cream to the Borscht - almost mandatory :-)
Add cucumber to the Borscht - totally optional (I like it with hot and with cold Borscht).
Bread to eat with Borscht:
-- If you have Russian store around - ask for Ukrainian bread (round shape loaf).
-- If not - rye bread (like Polish rye).
Garlic - great addition to the Borscht.

Borscht and Meet
Borscht could be cooked with beef or with chicken.
Key point - Borscht should not have too much "meaty" taste.
So, cook (a little bit under-cook) meat separately and add to the Borscht between step 6 and 7. You'll get reasonable meet flavor and meet.
Could be added a little bit of meet broth.
There are recipes of Borscht based on meet broth instead of water, however I don't like such implementations.

Unleash you creativity and just make Borscht ! :-)

Blizzard, Chicago

It was bad.
Two buses and few cars just stopped in the middle of the street, probably from the evening before.


And more buses got trapped.


Lake Michigan didn't look like lake at all - more like snow desert.


However, things got much better after blizzard, at afternoon of 2/2/2011.
Many people came outside to enjoy sun, snow and to celebrate the end of the blizzard. It looked like everyone had camera to get photos of themselves in the snow, on the snow, around the snow, etc., etc., etc.


Even a little-blizzard-after-blizzard didn't affect elevated spirit



We are great! :-)


And latest news: Lake Shore Drive is running, both directions.
Life is back.


All photos are in this set