Russian Cuisine - Cold Soups

Russian cuisine derives its rich and varied character from the vast and multi-cultural expanse of Russia. Its foundations were laid by the peasant food of the rural population in an often harsh climate, with a combination of plentiful fish, poultry, game, mushrooms, berries, and honey. Crops of rye, wheat, barley, and millet  provided the ingredients for a plethora of breads, pancakes, cereals, kvass, beer, and vodka. Soups and stews full of flavor are centered on seasonal or storable produce, fish, and meats. This wholly native food remained the staple for the vast majority of Russians well into the 20th century.

Russia's great expansions of territory, influence, and interest during the 16th–18th centuries brought more refined foods and culinary techniques. It was during this period that smoked meats and fish, pastry cooking, salads and green vegetables, chocolate, ice cream, wines, and liquor were imported from abroad. At least for the urban aristocracy and provincial gentry, this opened the doors for the creative integration of these new foodstuffs with traditional Russian dishes. The result is extremely varied in technique, seasoning, and combination.

From the time of Catherine the Great, every family of influence imported both the products and personnel — mainly French and Austrian — to bring the finest, rarest, and most creative foods to their table. This is nowhere more evident than in the exciting, elegant, highly nuanced, and decadent repertoire of the Franco-Russian chef. Many of the foods that are considered in the West to be traditionally Russian actually come from the Franco-Russian cuisine of the 18th and 19th centuries, and include such widespread dishes as Veal Orloff, Beef Stroganoff, and Chicken Kiev.

Soups

Soups have always played an important role in the Russian meal. The traditional staple of soups such as shchi, ukha, rassolnik, solyanka, botvinya, okroshka, and tyurya was enlarged in the 18th to 20th centuries by both European and Central Asian staples like clear soups, pureed soups, stews, and many others.

Russian soups can be divided into at least seven large groups:

  * Cold soups based on kvass, such as tyurya, okroshka, and botvinya.
  * Light soups and stews based on water and vegetables.
  * Noodle soups with meat, mushrooms, and milk.
  * Soups based on cabbage, most prominently shchi.
  * Thick soups based on meat broth, with a salty-sour base like rassolnik and solyanka.
  * Fish soups such as ukha.
  * Grain- and vegetable-based soups.

Cold soups

Okroshka is a cold soup based on kvass or less often sour milk. The main ingredients of both types are vegetables that can be mixed with cold boiled meat or fish in a 1:1 proportion . Thus vegetable, meat, and fish varieties of okroshka are made.

There must be two sorts of vegetables in okroshka. The first must have a neutral taste, such as boiled potatoes, turnips, rutabagas, carrots, or fresh cucumbers. The second must be spicy, consisting of mainly green onion as well as other herbs—greens of dill, parsley, chervil, celery, or tarragon. Different meat and poultry can be used in the same soup. The most common ingredient is beef alone or with poultry. If it is made with fish, the best choice would be tench, European perch, pike-perch, cod, or other neutral-tasting fish.

The kvass most commonly used in cooking is white okroshka kvass, which is much more sour than drinking kvass. Spices used include mustard, black pepper and pickled cucumber (specifically, the liquid from the pickles), solely or in combination. For the final touch, boiled eggs and smetana (a heavy sour cream, similar to crème fraîche) are added.

For sour milk based okroshka, well shaken up natural sour milk(often with the addition of seed oil) is used with the addition of pure water and ground garlic. Sometimes manufactured kefir is used instead of natural sour milk for time saving reasons, though some say it detracts from the original taste of okroshka.

Tyurya is very similar to okroshka, the main difference being that instead of vegetables, bread is used. It is rather historical meal, that was consumed during rough times (WWII, WWI, Revolution) and by poor peasants. Also, due to its simplicity, it was very common as a meal during religious fasting. Comparing to other cold soups it is based on water and rarely on milk.

Botvinya is one of the most typical cold Russian soups. It almost became extinct because it is difficult to make. Some modern cookbooks list recipes showing how to prepare it "easily" by substituting some of the ingredients, but cutting corners tends to diminish much of the authentic taste.

A full botvinya consists of three parts:

   1. The soup.
   2. Boiled "red" (most prized) fish (salmon, sturgeon, or stellate sturgeon), that is served separately from soup.
   3. Crushed ice, served on a separate platter or cup.

The name of the soup comes from the Russian word botva, which means "leafy tops of root vegetables", and the ingredients are in line with the name: leafy tops of young beet, beetroots, oxalate sorrel, green onions, dill, cucumbers, and two types of kvass, then some mustard, lemon juice, and horseradish as spices.

It is eaten as the first course or right after a hot soup, before the second course as an appetizer. It is eaten using two spoons and a fork: the fork is used to eat the fish, the first spoon to sip the soup and the second spoon to put ice into the soup, so it stays cold for a long time. Botvin'ya is eaten with fresh rye bread.