Monday 27 April 2009

Spring cold soups

Polish: Chłodnik
Belarusian: Хaлaднiк
Russian: Холодник
Ukrainian: Холодник
Lithuanian: Šaltibarščiai

Chłodnik means cold summer soup. It is eaten not only in Poland but also in other east-European countries. The most popular variant is made with beets and/or young beet leaves, kefir or soured milk and many differrent young fresh raw vegetables and vegetable greens. There are also non-beet variants, sour: with sorrel, tomato, kohlrabi or cucumber, and several fruit ones: especially with currants, strawberries (or wild strawberries), melon or cherry soup. And countless new creative versions. As a child, when my mum was pregnant with my brother, we had to eat meals at a dairy bar and we were eating chłodnik and crepes with curd cheese filling. My homemade chłodnik tastes much better :) The one made with beet leaves is called botwina. If you don't have baby beet fresh leaves, hopefully you could see, to inspire yourself, my attempts of making chłodnik when I was abroad and far away from beet leaves :)

for 3 portions:
2 bunches young beet leaves (each bunch contains 3-4 tiny beets)
2 medium beets
2 bunches radishes
1 bunch chives
1 bunch dill
1/2 lemon
3 cups kefir
1 cup yoghurt
3 eggs



1. Boil eggs for 10 minutes.

2. Cut beet leaves and stalks very finely. Peel tiny beets (those from leaves) and normal beets. Cut those bigger into fourths. Cook them in few (1 cup) water (some people take vegetable broth) until beets are soft. When ready, add freshly squeezed lemon juice.

3. Chop very finely other vegetables: chives, dill and radishes. Pour kefir and yoghurt into the bowl and add chopped vegetables.

4. Using a vegetable grater, grate cooked beets. Add beets, beet leaves and the water in which they were cooked, to the kefir.

5. Season with salt, pepper, lemon juice or apple vinegar and maybe also with garlic. Serve with egg halves (and probably some chopped parsley green)



and here comes another recipe, less popular but also tasty: sorrel chłodnik with whey(chłodnik szczawiowy na serwatce)

250 gr sorrel leaves
3 cups whey (see here how to make whey)
1 cup sour cream
3 tablespoons flour
3 eggs
1 tablespoon butter
dill

1. Bring whey to boil. Whisk cream (of room temperature; not taken directly from the fridge!) with flour until there are no clumps and add to warm whey. Stir and let boil again. Set aside.

2. Chop sorrel finely and stew it with butter and probably very few water for about 10 minutes. Set aside.

3. Add sorrel to cooled whey, salt to taste and sprinkle with dill. Serve with potatoes (serve warm boiled potato chunks on a separate plate or pour cold soup over warm potatoes in a bowl). You can also add boiled egg halves.

11 comments:

Agata Chmielewska (Kurczak) said...

wiesz ja tak naprawdę nigdy nie jadłam chłodnika z botwinką, na kefirze tak, ale bez botwinki

Ewa said...

to koniecznie musisz sprobować! osobiście, polecam :)

Tra La La Boom De Ay said...

Ewa, thank you so much for sharing with me in the USA. I do love your blog and featured you this week in one of my posts. I hope that you have a blessed weekend. Happy May Day!

Anonymous said...

Hello, I miss your recipes. I was a regularly reader of your blog. Hope all is well and perhaps one day you'll return!

forestblue factory said...

Hiii Ewa, your blog is going to be my new favourite!! :D
What a collection of best Polish delicacies, and not only...
I allowed myself to linked to you from my weblog, so I can often check on your updates, and, honestly, in hope I can learn from you a thing or two! Yuuumm!
Pozdrawiam cieplutko,
Kasia

Anonymous said...

It was certainly interesting for me to read the blog. Thanks for it. I like such themes and everything connected to them. I definitely want to read a bit more on that blog soon.

Kate Hakkinen

Anonymous said...

Damn, pretty great post. How can I find that subscription?

Brandy Flouee
bugdetectors

Fizzyface said...

Mmm sounds good! may have to make some.

Ewa said...

Dear FoodFriends! Thank you so much for your comments! It is spring time again so you can make cold vegetable soup from fresh young products again!

@Cherie, two years are gone and here I am blogging again, I hope everything is fine!

@Anonymous & Kate here I am again :) thanks!

@Kasia, masz przepiękne zdjęcia na blogu!

@Fizzyface try the recipe and let us know :)

GreenIdeas said...

Ewa those polish reciepes are some of my favorite, will go to the market this weekend and follow your reciepes.. will post my results.

Ewa said...

Dear friend, hope to ready about your results soon!