Category: Recipes

Recipes. Delicious and simple recipes with photos. Salads, first and second courses, desserts and pastries, lenten and festive dishes etc. Ukrainian Cuisine and a little bit more about Ukrainian food.

My cooking blog can tell you a lot about cuisine and traditions in my lovely country Ukraine that I love so much.

Main course Recipes Ukrainian cuisine

Potato Zrazy Roasted in Oven

Зрази з курячим філе, грибами, з картоплі

Potato zrazy… I enjoy making something special of ordinary and available food, for it to be delicious and fine-featured. Zrazy may be prepared for both everyday and festive table, since guests are sure to like them!

I made zrazy with chicken fillet and added mushrooms to some of them. They may be made with mushrooms and onion only or with adding cheese. The case is, there may be lots of stuffing up to everybody’s taste and likes. We had zrazy with chicken fillet at the first photo. And that is how the zrazy stuffed with checken fillet and mushrooms looked cut.

There are a lot of diverse ways of making zrazy:They may be fried or roasted.I think, that the deep-fried zrazy will be unparalleled :).But I prefer roasting, since it takes the least time and it is healthier way of cooking.I love to bread food due to crisps resulting from such breading.Many people use flour for breading.

Зрази з картоплі

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Recipes Soup Ukrainian cuisine

Classic Ukrainian Borscht Recipe

Ukrainian borshch recipe with photos

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
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Recipes Ukrainian cuisine

Cheese Pie

Cheese pie with raisins - Ukrainian cuisine - Recipe of Ukrainian "Zapikanka"

There is an acurate term denoting the majority of things I do in my life, and that is (shame on me 🙁 ) procrastination. And what is the point I’m trying to drive home? The point is that this cheese pie recipe has been waiting for its moment of glory for a half of year. And this is today to be the key day for the photos taken in winter to get into the infinite network which we, common people, call Internet.

And to be serious and to the point, cheese pie is one of the simplest dishes made of cottage cheese (not taking sour cream cheese into account :)). It is extremely quick in preparing, like: put everything into a bowl, blend, pour into the form – and take it to the baking oven. Interested? – Go on reading the recipe with photos.

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Recipes Ukrainian cuisine

The Ukrainian Meringue Cheese Cake

The Ukrainian Meringue Cheese Cake Recipe

First of all, I would like to say, that I’ve found some similar recipes in the Internet and now it is not so easy to tell whether it is really a Ukrainian one. However will do so. I believe, we are lucky to live in a high-tech world and share everything we want in the network. And this is the reason why everything sooner or later becomes International.

Actually, such bakery is very typical for Eastern Poland and Western Ukraine. In our country we call cheesecake “syrnyk” and we have a lot of traditional baking recipes with cottage cheese. This cheesecake is one of my favorites, it is tasty, delicate and soft, it melts in mouth and when I see it I can’t stop eating it.

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Recipes Ukrainian cuisine

Ukrainian Poppy Seed Plyatsok, or Poppy Seed Cake

Пляцок з маком та ніжним кольоровим суфле

We prepared this plyatsok for Easter and till I have time and inspiration I will share with you the recipe of a nice, tasty, soft, and light cake made of souffle and poppy. To tell the truth, I was going to present this recipe long time ago but there was no occasion for that. The situation is different now, since I hope that a new cake recipe will definitely stand somebody in good stead before the holidays.

This cake may be more colourful if to use two table jellies of different colours instead of two rosy ones. I used what I had at home, thus both the upper and the lower layers are pink. Both the souffle and the poppy pie shell – which absorbs moisture from the souffle – are just melting. Welcome those interested to the recipe :).

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Recipes Ukrainian cuisine

Kruwka (Cow) Cake

Бісквітний пляцок з кавовим суфле

This cake is one of my favorite that my mother-in-law bakes. Pastry of that type (I mean with cookies, caramelized milk and soufflé) is very popular in Poland, and we adopt our neighbors’ experience and expand the borders of Ukrainian cuisine :).

Actually, kruwka – this is how a cow called in Polish. In Ukrainian it sounds like “Korivka”. It is pastry both Ukrainian and Polish – a kind of cake, called pliacok.

This cake is a biscuit with hard sauce, two layers of cookie with caramelized milk between them and coffee soufflé topping. Perfect taste, original ingredients combination and a very delicious cake as a result.

It would be better to use crispy cookies for this cake: creamy cracker or something like that.

Бісквітний пляцок з кавовим суфле

Ingredients

Biscuit
8 eggs
240 g flour
200 g sugar
0.5 teaspoon baking powder Read More

Recipes Ukrainian cuisine

Poppy Seed Roll, the same as Ukrainian Makivnyk

Ukrainain Makivnyk, or poppy seed roll, or poppy seed roulade (roulette) – I’ve found a lot of names for this delicious pastry. It may be considered to be classical pastry for Easter. Roulettes are traditionally baked of yeast dough with various and sundry stuffings in Ukraine. In most cases they are filled with poppy, nuts, cottage cheese, apples, and cherries.

But today we will dwell upon poppy seed :). In order to knead yeast dough for the roulette we use the recipe of paska without raisins. If you bake paska for Easter on your own, you can bake a rolled cake at the same time but don’t forget to knead more dough. Poppy stuffing is recommended for 0.5 kg flour.

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Recipes Ukrainian cuisine

Paska. Ukrainian Easter Bread

Ukrainian Easter Paska Recipe

Paska is a kind of traditional Ukrainian food baked for Easter. Actually, this is a kind of sweet bread with raisins or some other dried fruits.

I like this recipe since my childhood, my mom bakes such a paska. If you follow the recipe, you will get three middle-sized paskas.

Ingredients
1 kg flour
1.5 glass milk
6-7 eggs
300 g butter or margarine (may be substituted with thick sour cream)
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Main course Recipes Ukrainian cuisine

Nalystnyky or Stuffed Pancakes. Stuffing for Blini

Mlyntsi or Blini with stuffing

I fry stuffed pancakes, the same as mlynci, following a reliable recipe of blini, which I have been using for several years. But what a variety of stuffing could be made! Sweet, salty, meaty, and veggie – everything you like and fancy.

Having stuffed pancakes you would finish them (fry or roast), especially when the stuffing includes raw eggs. If the stuffing is completely ready, there is no need in additional frying. When you roast stuffed pancakes, you would add butter.

Here I will present some tasty pancakes stuffing; these are my favourite. Find some more fantastic pancakes stuffing.

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Recipes Ukrainian cuisine

Apple Pie with Creamy Filling

Tasty Apple Pie with Sour Cream Filling - Ukrainian Pastry

This is one of the most delicious apple pies I’ve ever tried. It is very popular in the Eastern Europe, and of course in Ukraine.

Actually, I love all the varieties and types of apple pies, whether it is strudel, yeast pie, Dutch, French, all of them. Apple pies in its turn love cinnamon; however, it is an optional ingredient, you can give it if you like it.

This apple pie recipe contains sour cream; the creamy filling makes the bakery special and tender. I’ve noticed that the more different tastes are in a dish, the more interesting is the taste. For sure, harmony is also very important in combinations of different tastes. So, let’s try and combine some ingredients and get something delicious.

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Appetizers Main course Recipes Ukrainian cuisine

Festive Ukrainian Pasty

м'ясний паштет з печінкою

This pasty is a traditional dish of my husband’s family, being made for all big holidays, especially for Christmas and Easter. I believe, it may be definitely called a traditional festive dish of Western Ukraine.

This is a pasty-mix of liver and meat. It is delicious and good-looking at the festive table but it takes pains to make it. The whole process is labour-intensive and time-consuming, though the result is quite appealing. It is my husband who is engaged with this pasty, since he just loves the preparation for holidays, and the pasty itself, surely :).

I will try to describe the preparation process in as much detail as I can and in plain English, with all family secrets I know ;).

Ingredients

500 g veal
500 g fatty pork
400-500 g veal liver Read More

Main course Recipes Sides Ukrainian cuisine

Cabbage with Beans and Mushrooms

Тушкована капуста. Пісні страви

People say this recipe of cabbage with beans and mushrooms is of Polish origin. The Polanders traditionally prepare this dish for the Christmas Eve. This is a lenten, original, quite healthy and quite tasty dish. It is served both hot and cold.

The dish is traditionally prepared of sour cabbage and dry mushrooms. I had boiled mushrooms put to the freezer. If you prepare the dish with dry mushrooms, you will need to soak them in water and boil in advance.

Ingredients

500 g sour cabbage
300 g mushrooms (or 50 g dry ones)
1 glass of beans
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Main course Recipes Ukrainian cuisine

Varenyky with Potatoes and Cottage Cheese

Ukrainian varenyky with cottage cheese and potato - Katrusia's Kitchen Easy-Cooking Recipes

This is a classic Ukrainian varenyky (vareniki) recipe. The potatoes and cheese filling for vareniki (pierogi) is very popular in the Western Ukraine. However, it’s not so popular in the eastern part of our country.

Do you know anyone who doesn’t love hot, just boiled home-made varenyky? I don’t! Some would think it’s as easy as abc. All they need is to knead dough, wrap stuffing into it, boil, and that’s it. They are almost right :).

The ‘right’ dough is one of the most important moments in cooking varenyky. No matter how tasty the stuffing is, stiff dough may spoil the taste. The major secret of tasty and soft dough, believe it or not, is less egg, because eggs as they bind the dough, both strengthen and stiffen it.

Another crucial point is to roll the dough pieces thin. And finally, water for kneading dough should be hot. Yes, in many (especially in old) recipes of Ukrainian varenyky it is recommended to add cold water, justifying it with the fact that dough gets dried slower but as a result it becomes too stiff. I put dough into a plastic bag and it doesn’t get dried too quickly. And just made varenyky should be boiled immediately.

Ingredients

Ingredients for Varenyky Dough
3 glasses (cups) wheat flour
0.75 glass (cup) warm water
1 egg
0.5 tsp salt
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Recipes Soup Ukrainian cuisine

Lenten Borshch with Vushka for the Holy Supper

Ukrainian recipe for the Holy Supper

Lenten borshch with “vushka” is a traditional western Ukrainian dish cooked exactly for the Holy Supper.Vushka are a kind of dumplings, like ravioli or potstickers, with lenten mushrooms stuffing. Lenten transparent borshch may be sometimes dressed with garlic but do as you like.Some time ago this festive borshch was soured with beetroot sour adding peculiar slightly sour taste.It is used lemon juice or vinegar with this purpose now.

One more ingredient being added to Christmas borshch is broth of mushrooms used as stuffing for vushka. It supplements borshch with special flavour and taste.

Ingredients

For borshch (for 3 l water):
3-4 beetroots
a carrot
parsley root
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