I’m about to attempt this recipe which Eva Luna so kindly shared with us. I have a few questions though.
My grocery store didn’t have 2-3 pounds of shank with bone ( I had to ask what it was). They only had .6 pounds. The butcher guy told me to get a marrow bone and stew beef and it’ll be the same thing, with the added bonus that the beef will be tendererer. My question is this (and I apologize if it’s really dumb) - if the marrow bone is 1 pounds, do I only want 2 pounds of the stew beef?
How small should the beef be in the soup? I’ve never had borscht before and my great grandmother’s recipe was vegetarian so no one in my family knows either. Are we talking small bits of beef or huge chunks like you’d see in a beef stew.
No fresh basil leaves. Is the same qty of dry the same thing?
Um, I’ve never cooked beets before. Actually, I had never even eaten them before Wednesday. I’m assuming I wash them and cut the leafy bits off and then bake them before peeling and chopping but at what temp and for how long? How small should they be?
I got red wine vinegar. Is this acceptable?
Any other tips you can give me would be greatly appreciated. My boyfriend and I are really looking forward to our first borscht experience and I don’t want to screw it up.
Well, I’m not Eva Luna and I’ve never made Borscht, but I can take a guess at some of these as the technique is something I’m very familiar with:
1 - Meat: You have a lot of leeway here. 1 pound of bones plus 2 pounds of stew beef will be fine. As would 3 pounds of just meat. The bone will add a nice velvety feel to the stock, so it’s a nice thing to have. I’d say use what you’ve got and make a note if you find there’s too much meat or not enough so you can adjust the quantities next time.
2 - I’ve never had borscht either (but now I want to!) so I don’t know the ideal size for the meat. But in general, for stew, you want it cut in about 1/2-3/4" chunks. Think about how big of pieces you want to put in your mouth, and cut them a bit larger as they’ll shrink during cooking.
3 - I don’t see basil in the recipe you linked (am I blind?). I do see Bay. Those are different. If you don’t have a Bay leaf, don’t worry about it. It’s nice if you do, but it’ll turn out without it.
4 - To cook beets: Heat oven to 400. Trim the leaves & stems off the beats, then dry them. Put them in a sheet of tin foil, add a bit of olive (or whatever) oil and rub it all over them. Wrap up the tinfoil so the beets are sealed inside. Bake for 60-90 minutes, depending on how big the beets are. They’re done when a paring knife slips into them with no resistance. Let them cook, then just rub the skins off (they’ll come off REALLY easily)
5 - Sounds good to me! But a borscht expert might have other ideas. I can’t see that red wine vinegar would be bad, though, there just might be another type that’s slightly better.
Thanks Athena. I did mean bay leaves. I have no idea where basil came from.
Another silly question. As the meat, bone, and water simmer, a lot of what looks like pond scum is acumulating on the top. Am I supposed to stir that in and enjoy it or skim it off. It doesn’t look appetizing (I’ve also remembered that I hate the smell of simmering meat).
Skim it off. It’s so strange that I saw this tonight: I’ve been planning all week to take the last of the beetroots out of the garden and make borscht tomorrow!
Another question - what the heck do I do with the marrow bone? When do I take it out? There’s still marrow in there. Do I freeze it and use it later? Throw it out? Let my dogs fight over it?
I have to say, I am pretty amused at being called out by name in a borsch-related thread. Just got back from grocery shopping. I must say, though, borsch is the kind of food that is eaten by people who don’t have a wide variety of groceries available to them, and proportions, etc. are highly flexible. Really, it’s pretty hard to screw it up. Thoughts:
Meat: shank is not a requirement by any means. You just want a pound or two of something with a decent proportion of bone. If you cook it long enough, it will fall apart anyway. I usually take the whole shank cross-cut and thow it in in one piece. What the butcher told oyu makes a lot of sense.
Further on meat: if you hate the smell of simmering meat, it will help if you throw some of the longer-cooking veggies in there with it (like the onions and carrots). You can skim off any scum, but if you just leave it, it will end up blending in with everything else anyway.
Red wine vinegar is fine. You’ll want to taste everything at the end and adjust salt, pepper, vinegar, etc. to taste anyway. The amount will depend on the acidity of your other ingredients (tomato sauce, etc.) and how much carrot and other sweet vegetables you put in. Beets are airly sweet. This is all very much a matter of taste.
Basil would definitely be odd, but fresh dill IMO is a must. Throw it in at the very end, just before you eat.
Beets: cooking time depends a LOT on size. I cooked some last weekend (with foil, as described above, but I don’t bother with oil, and it works fine). They were about the size of large oranges, and I baked them at 400 - it took almost 2 hours! If you squeeze the foil and feel a bit of “give,” they are done. Of course you can always just simmer them in the soup a bit if they aren’t as tender as you would like.
I bet the marrow would be mighty tasty mixed into the soup. The bone can stay in basically forever; I usually just leave it in even when I’m storing leftover soup, especially if there’s still meat on it. I figure it can’t hurt.
Thanks for the input Eva! The beets almost didn’t make it into the pot because I ate a piece right out of the oven and it was heavenly. I can’t believe I made it 32 years without ever knowing the greatness of the simple beet. I’ll definitely be baking some for a simple snack.
I’m pretty sure it’s ready but we’re gonna let it simmer more while we go clear the driveway. I figure we’ll appreciate it most after freezing our asses off as we warm up by the fire with a big bowl of soup.
The recipe I use doesn’t call for baking the beets at all: Instead, you grate them first, and then pan-fry them.
For measurements of herbs, no cook ever actually measures them. Just sprinkle on top until it looks right, which is something that you’ll learn with experience. In the meanwhile, if you end up adding twice as much or half as much as ideal, it probably won’t hurt much.
And my recipe doesn’t call for vinegar at all, but red wine vinegar probably isn’t a bad choice if yours does (I’d probably use cider vinegar, but that’s a matter of taste, and influenced by the fact that that’s what my gramma used for everything). Just don’t ever use white vinegar in anything intended for consumption: You’re missing out on all the wonderful things vinegar can be, that way. White vinegar is a cleaning product, not a food.
I think the only constant among borscht recipes is that it contains beets. Oh, and probably also that it’s liquid, but I’m not going to bet on that. It can be hot or cold, can contain meat or not, can contain other vegetables or not, can have a variety of different herbs or not, and so on.
My mom remembers being given borscht that was hot and full of veggies - no meat, no sour cream and borscht that was basically just beet broth for drinking. I like it the way I I just made it. If I am going to deviate from Eva Luna’s recipe, I’d only remove the meat.
You are not alone in having the Beet Experience in your early 30s. Happened to me, happened to a lot of people I know.
For whatever reason, it’s a vegy that kids tend to hate, then you grow up, then someone gives you one (or you make 'em) and you’re like “BEETS!?! Where have you been my whole life???”
You’re probably thinking of the clear, Polish style of borscht, which looks like this (and often served with uszka, those little torellini-like things you see there.) Even that style of borscht often does not contain vinegar, but gets its sourness from fermented beets (called a “beet sour.”) Basically, you take an earthenware crock or glass jar, put some cut-up beets in there, lukewarm water, and a slice of Polish or similar rye bread with the crusts intact, cover with cheesecloth, and let it sit from 3-5 days at room temperature (around 70F or so). The beets begin to ferment and naturally sour over this time (just like when you’re making sourdough bread), and this is what is used to sour the soup. Of course, that is just one way of doing it. My mom usually uses the juice from pickled beets or plain ol’ vinegar when she doesn’t feel like making a beet sour.
Hallboy and I were just talking about this tonight–beets, that is. I’d cut some up and put them in the microwave with a teensy bit of water and that’s how we eat them. I’d never had beets until about three years ago when I just happened to buy some at the farmer’s market. Since then, we’ve been trying to figure out how we’ve lived so long without them.
For you beet lovers - I’ve been growing a variety of beets in my garden the last few years and I really encourage you to try some of the other varieties like golden beets and chioggas. Aside from the lovely range of colors, the heirlooms do have slightly differing taste/texture qualities while retaining their essential beetness.
Just got back from grocery shopping. I must say, though, borsch is the kind of food that is eaten by people who don’t have a wide variety of groceries available to them, and proportions, etc. are highly flexible. Really, it’s pretty hard to screw it up. Thoughts:
