Borscht I

This was a terribly complicated recipe that was orange in colour and tasted like potatoe soup. I am currently working to save the soup because I hate to throw out my valuable ingredients and waste my time.

Growing up Polish and eating Borscht, I can tell you this is pretty close to authentic. We use to eat this during the cold winters to warm us up. I made this recipe almost exactly as written – only I used 3 beets, 5 small potatoes, 3 parsnips, and of course added sauté onions, carrots, celery, green cabbage, and fresh parsley. Serve it with a dollop of sour cream and a lemon wedge. It is delicious! Reminds me of my childhood.

I had to rate again, because I didn’t get to add all my thoughts. 1) I use way more beets, usually 5-6 medium to large beets. I usually cut them smaller than quarters, and I enjoy the flat and texture, so I leave them in. 2) You can control how thick your base is, depending on how many potatoes you pull out to mash. Mashing some of the potato in the butter from the sautéed onions and tomatoes thickens the base, so change how much potato you use to your liking. 3) Some call it heresy, but I just tried for the first time adding in a stew beef. I seared it first, had to look up how to even do that, but then put it in and let it boil the same amount of time as the beets. Added a distinct and delicious twist to the dish.

I used vegetable broth instead of water and replaced the tomatoes with canned stewed tomatoes containing celery and green pepper. The family loved it.

I used Napa cabbage, celeraic, red bell peppers 2 small fresh tomatoes and veggie stock. I kept the beet and pureed it all together. I though borscht was ‘just beets’! This recipe is great – all the flavors are fabulous together, thank you!

This recipe is a little tricky because of all the preparations steps, but is hard to really mess up. I added a large clove of garlic, which improved the soup’s mild taste, and served it with sourdough bread. The sourdough was a great addition, as was a whole branch of fresh dill. The bright pink color was hard to get over at first, but my dad loved it and even my picky 8-year old sister ate it. Even though none of us had tried beets before, this soup was surprisingly tasty.

This was incredibly tasty and worked well as leftovers. However, I peeled the beets (I used several small beets) before adding, and when I removed them, I pureed them and added them back in. A bit of sour cream on the top when served made it just right.

I followed this recipe to the letter, at least as far as I could, but maybe the post office was closed. There are several problems here: First, the ingredients list dill, yet there is no mention in the preparation how or when to use this. I just added it to the boiling broth. Second, it does not indicate how long the potatoes should boil on high. I left it until the step to remove potatoes. By then there was very little liquid left and the final result was a light pink “soup” with the consistency of creamy mashed potatoes. I had to add 2 cups of water just to make it a thick soup and it had no resemblance to borscht from the photos I’ve seen. The bright side is that it tasted good, but it just tasted like many potato soups. I was looking for something completely different. I have since located a classic borscht recipe on another website by an actual Russian woman that looks really good. It is far different and has meat in it.

I am from Russia, and we do not put celery into borsht; it absolutely has to be made in beef or pork bouillon, so that veggies be cooked in it. Start with potatoes, add cabbage and onions with carrots, nothing fried before, finally add precooked and shredded beet with tomatoes, bay leaf and dill is the key; want it sour? use sauerkraut. Enjoy!

I used mostly the same ingredients, but I didn’t go through all the procedures, because I didn’t really see the point of it. I just wanted to say that I roasted 3 large beets, then left them in the soup and used red cabbage AND purple potatoes! Then, after everything was soft, I used my immersion blender to puree the whole thing. This soup is the most beautiful ruby color. It’s gorgeous! I’m eating it next day, cold with a dollop of yogurt, and drinking a Purple Haze from Abita, just to go with the theme. 🙂

Never had Borscht before — red beets lower your blood pressure which prompted our visit. This recipe was delicious. Didn’t have a few ingredients, had to use some spaghetti sauce instead of tomatoes, but still was very tasty! Highly recommend.

Love this borsch. I never use water making soups. I put about 10 cups of chicken broth. First I saute the onions, green pepper, celery, carrots, chopped up beets(which I don’t throw out once cooked. I leave in the soup). When these are sauteed where they are not real hard, I then add the 10 cups of broth, 1-28oz. diced tomatoes & diced potatoes. I then saute more onion with another can of diced tomatoes(14oz). When I’ve sauteed where the onion gets softer, I add 1/2 the cabbage and cook a little longer. I mash my potatoes as the recipe says & add to the soup along with the rest of the cabbage. I always end up adding more of the veggies & broth than the recipe calls for because my husband & I love a hearty soup. The dill & pepper spices of course. This is a wonderful recipe that obviously I’ve tweaked to our likes. It is a regular, especially in the winter at our house. I make an 8 qt. pot of it & it freezes wonderfully.

Very yummy…considering this was a meatless borscht. I have made before with a lamb base. Still very yummy. Shredding the cabbage finely instead of chopping added a lovely texture to the soup.

This is an authentic borscht, because there are in fact different types of borscht from region to region in Eastern Europe. This borscht in particular is from the Doukhabors of Russia and Ukraine who migrated to BC, Alberta and Saskatchewan. It is meant to be orange in colour, and is actually spelled Borsch. To be called borsch, or barszcz (Polish), the soup doesn’t need to be full of beets, or even have any at all. This version of borscht is amazing, and not to be messed around with!

This was fabulous for a cool, rainy day. I’m lactose intolerant so I substituted the dairy products called for with LF creamer and margarine. Delicious!

To Monzie…this is a traditional Russian borscht. Russian borscht uses the beet more for a bit of color and less for the making the soup to beet-like. My husband is Ukrainian, the cook the beet and dice it and put it in the soup,,,so it is alot more beet filled. My sister in law was Russian. I prefer the Russian borscht. The butter is what gives borscht it’s rich flavoring. Russian borscht uses a heavy cream added at the end, so it doesn’t curdle. Ukranian borsht uses sour cream…So this is an excellent Russian borscht, I use fresh dill when in season and amounts depend on personal tastes.

I am half russian and half native american and after studying the Russian culture I wanted to try the food. This recipe was the first one I tried and MMMM!! was i missing out! This is a regular routine in my kitchen and is my absolute favorite.

This soup is sooo good!! The mixture of ingredients creates an amazing taste! I used the same ingredients only in different amounts (4 carrots, 2 beets, 1 pint grape tomatoes, a whole celery stalk, a whole small onion, a whole red pepper, and 2 teaspoons of dill) and I left out the salt and cream. The recipe doesn’t need it. I also took an extremeshsort cut by cutting up and food-processing all the veggies except for the onion, which I did saute in the butter. I also used an extra cup of water. I placed all the ingredients in boiling water, lowered the heat and covered the pot, and simmered it for about an hour. It was one of the best soups I have ever tasted!

A great starter soup for learning to make borscht. I made it for the first time tonight and my guests really rave about it, includig a guest who intially only took a bite to be polite. I will make it again, but will definately play with modifictions. I used four small beets and did’t get the color or flavor I wanted…I will definately increase that. I diced the beets this time, but will puree next time. The veggie to liquid ratio was too high for my taste. A little more water and a little less vegetables next tme.

I’ll rate it after I’ve eaten it. BUT..this is the most disjointed recipe I’ve ever seen and I’ve used lots of recipes and done plenty of quite complicated cooking. Next time please make it easier to follow. This is not meant as a criticism because it looks as if it is going to be delicious, but don’t want to put others off as I am.

This is an incredibly good Borscht, but watch out for the strangely written recipe. A few alterations I’d recommend: Cut the amount of cabbage in half, use two or three beets, and don’t discard the beets after boiling; instead, dice them and add them back to the stock for a heartier stew. I’ve made this five times and only had a bad result once, when I tried to double the recipe using the same ratios. I couldn’t tell you why, but the end result was orange and tasted slightly off. The default measurements always yeild a good result.