Soup of the week: Russian Borscht

Each week, I have found myself jumping from continent to continent sampling soups from all around the world, and in this third installment, I bring you the soup that I grew up on, Borscht. This soup has an incredible history, and thousands of varieties, in fact, everyone I have met seems to have a different recipe for the soup. Some call for sausage or veal, others stick with chunks of beef and potato, but we all can agree on three ingredients: beets, cabbage and sour cream!

This soup has a tremendous number of memories for me: from evenings sitting in a sunflower themed kitchen with my chin barely reaching over the kitchen table to high school days coming home from school and frantically putting out soup pot fires, where a lonely blackened beet rested at the bottom of a dried out pot.

I used to spend the summers with my younger brother and my grandmother Ada in a little cottage in the woods. She would make us amazing, fresh soups with ingredients plundered from the forest and watch us shovel them down before she would sit down to eat. It took me over a decade to realize that we were poor and she wanted to make sure we were full before she would eat our leftovers. Borscht is a noble and filling dish, and particularly inexpensive to make.

I dedicate this week's soup to my grandmother who spent her life loving and caring for her obnoxious, ungrateful grandchildren. You will never be forgotten.

Borscht

Russia's Traditional Beet Soup

2 lbs beef, small chunks
3 beets, diced
2 carrots, chopped
4 shoots celery, chopped
1 onion, diced
3 tbsp, veggie oil
18 oz diced tomato
1/2 head of cabbage, coarsely chopped
3 cloves garlic
3/4 cup dill
18-20 cups beef broth, or water
sour cream - to serve

In a large pot add onions to veggie oil and brown. Add beef, brown. Add Carrots, celery and beets and cook for 5 minutes. Add cabbage. At this point you may find that you want to separate your soup fillings into two different pots, at least I did, Add 2 cups broth to each, cover and simmer for 10 minutes. Add garlic, tomato and the remainder of the broth (as well as salt and pepper to taste) and allow to boil for about 40 minutes to one hour until your broth has turned beety red and the beef is soft and tender.

To serve, add a generous scoop full of sour cream and a tablespoon of dill.

Enjoy and share with friends and family. Happy Holidays!

Soup of the Week: Cream of Cauliflower

My parents brought me a beautiful head of cauliflower over Thanksgiving, and it has been sitting in its lonely plastic bag since the holiday. I felt sorry for the poor guy and figured a cauliflower soup would be just the answer.

Cauliflower is high in fiber and thus fairly low in net carbohydrates, but the magic of cauliflower is its innate ability to absorb flavors. Unlike so many ingredients that lose flavor the more you meddle with them, this simple plant improves with every dollop of cream or spoonful of butter.

Below is a light and flavorful, yet creamy recipe that I have been working on. I hope you enjoy it. :)

Cream of Cauliflower

1 large head of cauliflower, chopped
1 stick butter
1/2 onion, diced
1 carrot, diced
1 celery stick, diced
2 tbsp cilantro
2 quarts chicken broth
3 cups milk
1 cup sour cream

In a large pot, melt butter and add onion. Cook until lightly browned. Add carrots and celery and continue cooking for five minutes. Add cauliflower and cilantro. Lower heat, cover and cook for 15 minutes.

Add chicken broth and bring to a boil on high heat. Reduce heat and simmer for 15 to 20 minutes. At this point you can add milk and continue to simmer for another fifteen minutes. Add salt and pepper to taste.

Move pot to a cool burner, add sour cream. Serve immediately!

Servings: 9 Carbohydrates in pot: 83 Carbohydrates in bowl: 9.2

Soup of the Week

Soup! It is getting quite cold outside, and all I can think about is soup. The incredibly diverse aromas and flavors that can be achieved by altering just a few simple ingredients and spices. It is truly inspirational.

With the first winter chill, my mind turned to creaming vegetables and boiling chickens and I have decided to indulge myself with a December full of soups, some of which I would love to share with you.

I have been feeling a deficit in Thai food, in the wake of my new low carbohydrate diet. I have missed the coconut soup, Tom Kha Gai, with some fervour. Looking into the recipes, I discovered that it wasn't a deal breaker after all, so I have formatted a really yummy recipe that is pretty low in carbs.

I hope you enjoy!

Tom Kha Gai
with Chicken

broth:
2 13.5 oz cans of coconut milk
4 cups chicken broth
3 stalks lemongrass
3 shallots
handful of fresh cilantro
2 limes juice and zest
1/4 cup soy sauce

chunkage:
1 package of chopped mushrooms
1 green pepper, chopped
1 full rotisserie chicken, deboned

Bring coconut milk, soy sauce and chicken broth to a boil. Add chopped shallots and lemon grass. Add juice and zest of lime as well as cilantro. Lower heat and simmer for 20 minutes. Salt and pepper to taste.

Drain the flavoring ingredients out, and return your broth to the pot. Add chicken, mushrooms and green pepper. Allow to boil for another 15 minutes.

Serve immediately.

Servings: 6 Carbs in pot: 48.5 Carbs in bowl: 8