perfect borscht

Borscht. That gleaming red blood soup. Blood building soup. I lost a lot of blood this year through a couple of different surgeries and needed to rebuild my blood. I have not stopped eating borscht. It is so incredible.

I studied Chinese medicine and Shiatsu last year, full time, and it solidified a lot of other teaching I had sought through out my life. So I went back to healing myself with food, lots of Spleen supporting foods like soup. There will be so so many soup recipes coming.

I experimented with quite a few borscht recipes but this is the best one, trimmed down to the essentials so I could make it quickly. Serve with some tofu sour cream. I also threw in some gnocchi to really bulk this up but when I have time I also make pierogies (recipe coming soon).

adapted from this recipe

ingredients
3 medium beets, peeled
3 tbsp of nuttelex
1 small onion, diced
1 small carrot, diced
1 small leek, sliced
1/2 bay leaf
1.5 litres of vegie stock
2 medium potatoes, peeled and cut into a small dice
1/2 cabbage shredded (I used homemade sauerkraut when I didn't have fresh)
4 cloves garlic, crushed
2 tbsp apple cider vinegar
1 tsp sugar
a couple of grinds of pepper

method
1. Dice beets into 1cm cube bites. Melt the Nuttelex in a large pot and soften the onions over a medium heat.

2. Once onions have softened add the carrot, leek, beets and bay leaf and stir well to coat with the marg. Cook for 10 minutes, stirring frequently. Add a little stock if the bottom gets too dry and the vegies start to stick.

3. Add the stock and potatoes and simmer for 15 minutes then add the cabbage and garlic. Cook for a further 10 minutes,

4. Add the vinegar, sugar, pepper and a pinch of salt to taste. Serve with sour cream and fresh dill.