“Ukraine’s version of borscht – the eastern European beetroot soup produced in various forms in countries throughout the region – has been added to a United Nations protection list, fast-tracked because of the Russian invasion.” Thus begins a Washington Post article bearing the headline Ukrainian borscht gets a spot on U.N. protection list. Wait. What? In a week where enormously horrible stuff is happening in the world, it’s borscht that gets a spot on the U.N. protection list??
Yes! In fact, it is Russia’s most recent invasion of Ukraine that has upgraded the humble soup from the U.N’s intangible cultural heritage list to the grandly named List of Intangible Cultural Heritage in Need of Urgent Safeguarding. And rightly so. The now months-long war has displaced millions of Ukrainians, making it impossible for them not only to grow beets, cabbage, onions, potatoes and carrots, but worse perhaps, impossible to come together to share meals in community, the backbone of all cultures. To quote Marianna Dushar, a Ukrainian anthropologist and food writer, “Food, like language, is the first and last cultural bastion…. Countries communicate with other countries through food.”
The article goes on to say that, according to the U.N., while borscht is considered part of the fabric of Ukrainian society, cultural heritage, identity and tradition, it does not imply exclusivity, nor ownership, of the heritage concerned. Well, of course not! There are dozens of versions and just as many culinary disputes over the basic ingredients, not only in Russia but throughout Romania and Poland as well; fierce disputes that pre-date today’s national borders and go so far as to even fuss about the spelling. Is it borscht or is it borshch? Is there anything too small to fight about?
Personally, I go with borshch. I can’t say for sure why and I don’t really care if it’s ‘correct’ or not. It’s just how I’ve always remembered it being spelled and how the recipe I use is labeled. Sharing borshch with friends and family on the Sunday closest to Russian Christmas (January 6th) has become part of the shredded fabric of what was once the ‘old country’ culture my grandparents brought from somewhere in Russia in the early 1900s and I intend to keep celebrating what little there is left of it for as long as I can. I’m not about to ‘put up my dukes’ about how it’s spelled, though. You spell it your way, I’ll spell it mine. I feel that way about a lot of stuff, but that doesn’t seem to be the world we live in. It doesn’t seem to take much to start a fight these days.
Why, I wonder, is it so hard to imagine a time when we might sit together over a bowl of steaming borshch or borscht and talk about the ways we can work together to make it possible for our grandkids and theirs to live together in a world with breathable air and enough food and water for everyone? How do we get there from here? Maybe one bowl at a time. So … if you are anywhere near Portland, Oregon, will you join me on Sunday, January 8th, 2023 for the renewal (first since Covid) of my traditional Russian Christmas Open House Celebration? Here’s an excerpt about it from my memoir, Arms Filled With Bittersweet.
…. It is hard to believe that so much time has passed since I celebrated the traditional Orthodox holidays of Christmas and Easter with my Russian grandparents, and yet fragments of those events have never stopped dancing around the edges of my memory. The sweetest and most prevailing one, perhaps, is of being tickled awake by the bushy mustache of the burly grandfather I called “Tato”, as he lifted me from the back seat of his big old Packard and carried me from the barn into the house through falling snow sometime after midnight. ….
…. Before the pandemic, my celebration was an open-house affair with folks coming and going into the early evening, usually filling up the cozy rooms of my home, although the most crowded spot was always around the food. I like it that way. I like it that my usually quiet space becomes crowded and noisy and that the sharing and enjoyment of honest-to-goodness food has the power to nourish and to unite so many backgrounds and personalities.
Especially, I like feeling what I imagine to be my grandparents’ pleasure knowing that not all the old ways from the old country have been abandoned. And I like it too that each year the rooms of my home are blessed with the Holy Water of Friendship. I wonder what will happen next.
Nosdrovyea!! And here, if you’d like to try it, is my recipe for borshch. Ukranian-Style Winter Borshch Ingredients:4 Medium-size tomatoes, peeled and diced, (or a 15-oz can drained)
4 Tbs unsalted butter
1 Cup onion, diced
3 Large cloves garlic, peeled & finely chopped
1 Lb beets, uncooked, trimmed, peeled & very coarsely grated (makes about 2 cups)
1 Celeriac (celery root) treated the same way
1 Parsley root, peeled & coarsely chopped
1 Parsnip, treated the same way
½ tsp sugar
¼ Cup red wine vinegar
½ Tbs coarse salt
2 Quarts beef or vegetable stock
3 Potatoes, peeled & cut into chunks
½ Medium or 1 small head of cabbage, cored & coarsely shredded
1 Lb beef or pork (optional) cut into 1” chunks seared and partly cooked
2 Tbs parsley, finely chopped (for garnish)
1 Pint thick (Russian) Sour Cream (stir in with garnish)Instructions:
1. If using fresh tomatoes, peel, dice, & set aside (discard juice)
2. In a large, heavy skillet, melt the butter over medium heat. Add onions & garlic and cook 6-8 minutes or until onions are soft, stirring frequently. Stir in half the tomatoes plus all the beets, celeriac, parsley root, parsnip, sugar, vinegar, salt & 1 ½ cups of stock. Bring to a boil over high heat, then partially cover and lower the heat to simmer for 40 minutes.
3. Meanwhile, pour the remaining stock into a 6-8 quart soup pot, add the potatoes & cabbage and simmer, partially covered, for 18-20 minutes until the potatoes are tender, but not mushy.
4. Add the other vegetable mixture along with the remaining tomatoes and meat (if using) to the pot containing the potatoes & cabbage. Simmer, again partially covered, for 10-15 minutes until the borshch is heated completely through. Taste for seasoning, add more salt if needed and black pepper to taste.
5. Pour into a soup tureen, sprinkle with parsley and serve with a huge dollop of sour cream (which I like to swirl in).
6. ENJOY!! (This recipe makes about 8 servings)
Do we need to RSVP to this?
Check back in December for an update (maybe).