Chłodnik or Chłodnik litewski, a Cold Borscht Recipe

Cold borscht (borshch) or Cold beet soup (Lithuanian: Šaltibarščiai, Polish: Chłodnik or Chłodnik litewski, Russian: Kholodnik) is a soup traditional to the Belarusian, Lithuanian, Polish, Ukrainian and Russian cuisines, a variety of borscht. Its name is derived from the fact that the soup is served cold.

Its preparation starts with young beets being chopped and boiled together with their leaves. After cooling them down, the soup is usually mixed with soured milk, kefir or yoghurt (depending on regional preferences). Typically, raw chopped vegetables such as radishes or cucumbers are added and the soup is garnished and flavored with dill or parsley. Chopped, hard-boiled eggs are often added. The soup has a rich pink color which varies in intensity depending on the ratio of beets to dairy ingredients.

8 cups cold buttermilk
1 medium cucumber, sliced into thick matchsticks
3 medium beets, boiled, peeled, and cut into thick matchsticks
2 eggs, hardboiled, sliced into matchstick shapes
1/4 cup scallions, chopped
1 tablespoon fresh dill, chopped
Salt and pepper to taste

In a large bowl, whisk the buttermilk and then add the rest of the ingredients.

Borscht Recipe

Four large onions
Cooking oil for frying
2 medium peeled potatoes
4 peeled carrots
2 large tomatoes
3 tbsp ketchup (optional, not necessarily authentic)
1 tbsp vinegar or lemon juice
1/4 head of cabbage
3 medium-beets
4 large cloves of garlic
Parsley and/or dill, to taste.
1 tbsp salt (to taste).
1 tbsp sugar (to taste).

Steps

1. Chop the onions, potatoes, cabbage, and tomatoes into small pieces, and grate the beets and carrots into approximately 1-inch long pieces.
2. Fry the onions until golden-brown (with about 4-5 tbsp. oil) in a deep frying pan at medium heat. Mix regularly.
3. Add the carrots to the onions and cook for two or three minutes more.
4. Add the tomatoes and beets to the frying pan. Immediately pour vinegar or lemon juice over the beets to preserve their color and taste. If you are going to add ketchup, do it right now.
5. Mix everything, then cover the pan with a lid and cook for 5-10 minutes more at low heat.
6. Pour cool water into a large pot so that the water takes up between 1/2 and 2/3 of the pot's total capacity. Turn on medium heat and wait until the water is boiling.
7. Add the potatoes to the boiling water and wait 3-4 minutes.
8. Add the cabbage and wait about two minutes.
9. Add everything in the frying pan to the pot.
10. Add the garlic, parsley, and dill.
11. Add the salt and sugar.
12. Wait until the water is boiling again (as it should have stopped when everything was added) and then turn off the heat. Cover the pot with a lid, leaving a crack for steam to escape.
13. Let the soup cook in its own heat for about 2 hours. The longer it cooks, the better it tastes. You may want to refrigerate it and microwave it the next day for an even better taste.
14. Serve with sour cream. Enjoy!

History of Borscht

Borscht or borshch (Russian and Ukrainian: борщ, Polish: barszcz, Lithuanian: barščiai, Romanian: borș) is a vegetable soup from Eastern Europe. It is traditionally made with beetroot as a main ingredient, which gives it a strong red color. Other, non-beet varieties also exist, such as the tomato paste-based orange borscht and the green (zelioni) borscht (sorrel soup).

Etymology

The soup is part of the local culinary heritage of many Eastern and Central European nations. The Ukrainian and Russian name is borshch (борщ). It is also a staple dish in Eastern Europe, and made its way into United States cuisine and English vernacular by way of Jewish immigrants (as well as other Eastern Europeans) with the spelling borsht; the Yiddish word for the soup is "בורשט" (borscht). Alternative spellings are borshch and borsch.

Hot and cold Borscht

There are two main variants of borscht, generically referred to as hot and cold. Both generally are based on beets, but are otherwise prepared and served differently.

Hot Borscht

Hot borscht (mostly Ukrainian and Russian), the kind most popular in the majority of cultures is a hearty soup with many common optional ingredients, depending on the cuisine, including various vegetables (beans, cabbage, carrots, cucumber, potatoes, onions, or tomatoes), mushrooms, and meats (chicken, pork, or beef). It is more akin to a stew than most soups, and may be eaten as a meal in itself, usually with thick dark bread.

Polish variants

The basic Polish borscht (barszcz) recipe includes red beetroot, onions, garlic, and other vegetables such as carrots and celery or parsley roots. The ingredients are cooked for some time together to produce kind of clear broth (when strained) served as boullion in cups or in other ways. Some recipes include bacon as well, which gives the soup its distinctive, "smoky" taste.

Other versions are richer as they include meat and cut vegetables of various kinds where beetroots aren't the main one (though this soup isn't always called barszcz, but rather beetroot soup). This variation of barszcz isn't strained and vegetable contents are left in it. Such soup can make the main course of obiad (main meal eaten in the early afternoon).

Barszcz in its strictly vegetarian version is the first course during the Christmas Eve feast. It's served with ravioli-type dumplings called "uszka" (lit. "little ears") with mushroom filling (sauerkraut can be used as well, again depending on the family tradition). Typically, this version does not include any meat ingredients, although some variants do.

As other Christmas traditions, barszcz served at that time has its own symbolic meaning. Most of food served at that time isn't quite the food of the living ones, but of those that passed away. Dried fruit, mushrooms — all symbolise death of the old year as opposed to birth of the new one a day later. Change of food on December 25 (Christmas) is a visible sign that old traditions are still preserved in those little, sometimes unclear ways.

A key component to the taste of barscz is acidity. Whilst barszcz can be made easily within a few hours by simply cooking the ingredients and adding vinegar, lemon juice or citric acid; the traditional way is to prepare barszcz several days before and allow it to naturally sour. Depending on the technique; the level of acidity required and the ingredients available, barszcz takes 3-7 days to prepare in this way.

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Polish Country Kitchen Cookbook

From top-selling author Sophie Hodorowicz Knab comes a new book that combines recipes for favorite Polish foods with the history and cultural traditions that created them. Arranged according to the cycle of seasons, this cookbook explores life in the Polish countryside through the year. The Polish Country Kitchen Cookbook gives its readers priceless historical information such as the type of utensils used in Poland at the turn of the century, the meaning behind the Pascal butter lamb, and many other insightful answers to common questions asked by descendants of Polish immigrants.

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Now updated with a new chapter on Lighter Polish Fare! First published in 1983, this classic resource for Polish cuisine has been a favorite with home chefs for many years. This new edition includes a chapter on Light Polish Fare with ingenious tips for reducing fat, calories and cholesterol, without compromising the flavor of fine Polish cuisine. Fragrant herbal rubs and vinegars add panache without calories. Alternatives and conversion tables for butter, sour cream and milk will help readers lighten other recipes as well.

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The Best of Polish Cooking is available here.