Ukrainian borscht recipe with photos 

Borscht is a traditional beetroot soup, one of the most popular Ukrainian dishes in the world – I believe it is at the same level of popularity as Ukrainian varenyky or salo. I can say that borscht became a kind of a business card of Ukraine. I don’t know exactly how to spell it in the most appropriate way. It can be written as borsch, borshch and the most popular borscht. In Ukrainian it looks like this: “борщ”.

Actually, we have some varieties of borscht recipes: lenten borscht we cook on Christmas Eve, we may cook borscht with or without tomatoes, with beans or mushrooms, with meat bullion or without meat at all. Finally, we may slice or rub beets, but still there are some classical things that make this dish tasty, popular and interesting for all of us.

So, let’s cook borscht.

Ingredients for borscht

800 g of beet
400 g of potatoes
150 g of cabbage
200 g of carrots
100 g onions
1-2 tbsp vinegar or lemon juice

Spices:
1-2 bay leaves
allspice (grains)
black pepper (grains)
ground pepper
fresh parsley and dill

Borscht cooking process

	Peel potatoes and slice.
	The same with carrot – peel and slice.
	And also with onion. Peel and dice.
	Peel and rub beets.
	Thinly shred cabbage.
	Now add beets into a soup pot with boiling hot meat broth or water (2-2,5 l). Boil it about 10 minutes, then add potato, carrot, onion and salt. Boil it again about 10 minutes and then add cabbage, bay leaves and pepper peas.When all the vegetables are cooked, add the vinegar, chopped fresh herbs, black pepper and paprika. Give a boil and turn off.

For better flavor and taste you can add chopped parsley root in the borscht, at the same time with carrots. You can also add cooked beans. Someone likes to add 1-2 tbsp tomato paste in borscht.

We usually serve the borscht with sour cream and pampushkas (donuts) with garlik. Bon appetite 🙂 !