Russian Cabbage Borscht

Soup is soul food. At least in our house it is. There is nothing better than a hot bowl of soup and some fresh bread. Yummmm! And this Borscht is a family favorite, helping the stretch the delicousness of summer into the late fall.

Full disclosure: This recipe is based on this recipe our family found on AllRecipes.com. It  has adjusted it a tiny bit to suit our tastes but the original is so close to perfection, so why mess with that?

Ingredients:

• 1 1/2 C thinly sliced potatoes
• 1 C thinly sliced beets
• 4 C vegetable stock
• 2 T butter (or oil)
• 1 1/2 C chopped onions
• 2 t salt (leave it out if you are using a powdered veggie stock-they tend to be salty enough)
• 1 celery stalk, chopped
• 2 large carrot
• 3 C coarsely chopped red cabbage
• black pepper to taste
• 1/2 C chopped fresh dill weed (about 2 T dried). Be generous
• 1 T cider vinegar
• 1 T honey
• 4 chopped tomatoes (or 1 C tomato puree)
• Sour cream for topping (optional)
• Chopped tomato (garnish)
• Red Cabbage Shoots (garnish)

Directions:

1. Wash the beets and potatoes carefully and boil whole in the veggie stock in a medium sauce pan over high heat until soft. Remove from stock with a slotted spoon and SAVE THE STOCK!
2. In a large thick bottom pot pan over medium heat cook butter, onions and salt until onions are soft and translucent. Add celery, carrots, cabbage and stock. Cover and simmer until all veggies are tender. (10 mins)
3. Add remaining all remaining ingredients except the beets. Simmer at least 30 mins. Just before serving, add beets, bring back to a simmering boil and let cook another 5 minutes.
4. Serve garnished with a scoop or sour cream, a sprinkle of dill and red cabbage shoots and a few chopped tomatoes.

Notes:

• Adjust the salt in accordance to your stock. Most store bought varieties have another salt that you wont need any extra.
• Adding the beets at the end will make them stand out from the rest of your soup. But if you want a uniform flavour throughout your soup, you can throw them in with the rest of the ingredients in step 3.
• This is a great option for the vegetarian/vegan out there. Use a vegetable or olive oil instead of butter and leave out the sour cream. It will still be so so good.

We hope you love this one as much as we do! There aren’t many recipes we find online that we come back to year after year- but with this one we do just that.

Enjoy!