A baby girl is born, and her mother rejoices—she’s growing up to be a little helper, a future homemaker. But who doesn’t know how often a mother’s hopes can be dashed? The daughter may have no interest in household chores, and the kitchen might not appeal to her at all. Let’s not delve into the reasons or blame the older or younger generations. One thing is clear: often, when a girl gets married, she doesn’t realize that everything in her new home will largely depend on her. Even if she, like her husband, goes to work. If the apartment is messy, if lunch isn’t cooked, or if money runs short before payday, her husband might blame her: “It’s your fault; you’re the woman, the homemaker.”
I’d like to help young women by offering advice on how to spend money wisely and what to cook quickly with the ingredients they can still “scrounge up.” I also want to share tips for those who not only want peace in their home (read: a grateful husband and well-fed children) but also wish to maintain their youth and beauty for as long as possible. Vegetables, berries, fruits, dairy products, oils, and herbs—almost all the ingredients we use to prepare dishes can also be used for face masks, making the skin fresh and silky. Of course, it’s best not to let a man see you in such a mask.
So, where do we start? You’ve probably heard the dismissive saying:
“What kind of woman is she if she can’t even make borscht?”
So let’s begin with borscht, or rather, with borschts, since the famous Ukrainian borscht has many variations.
For the broth, you typically use beef, pork, or chicken. You can use brisket or bones for the stock. Place the meat in cold water, bring it to a boil, and skim off the foam. Clean and wash the roots of carrots, parsley, and celery, cut them in half lengthwise, and place them cut side down in a clean skillet or add fat to lightly brown them. Once the foam is removed, reduce the heat, add the roots to the broth, and season with salt. You can taste it. Oversalted? No worries. You can fix it by tying 2-3 tablespoons of flour in a clean cloth and dropping it into the oversalted broth. If it’s meant for borscht, there’s no reason to panic: potatoes, beets, and cabbage will absorb the excess salt.
It’s better to cook the broth in a large pot. Pour half of the finished broth into a container and refrigerate it. From this, you can make cabbage soup, fish soup with meat or potato balls, or a porridge-like dish with millet, among others.
Using the remaining broth in the pot, we’ll make borscht, first boiling the beets and beans. Now, shred the cabbage (without the core), pour boiling water over it, and once the water drains, add it to the borscht. Also, add the peeled and diced potatoes. When the vegetables are tender, add the beans and the sautéed beets mixed with tomato. Remove the carrot from the broth, grate it or finely chop it, sauté it, and then add it to the pot. Finally, add seasonings—bay leaves and pepper. Serve the borscht with sour cream.
You can also prepare garlic pampushki (Ukrainian garlic bread) to go with it. It’s easier to buy ready-made yeast dough from a culinary shop, form small balls, place them on a greased baking sheet, let them rise, and then bake them. Alternatively, you can buy small rolls, cut them in half, place them in a hot oven for 3-5 minutes, and then drizzle them with garlic sauce. Grate a few cloves of garlic on a fine grater or mash them with salt, add warm boiled water, and oil.
For a pot of borscht (serving 6-7 plates), you’ll need 1-1.5 kg of meat, a root of carrot, celery, an onion, 5 peppercorns, 1-2 bay leaves, 2 beets, 1/4 kg of cabbage, 2-3 potatoes, 1/4 cup of beans, tomato juice or tomato paste, salt, and sour cream.
At the end of cooking, you can add herbs, garlic, and onion (chopped or mashed with lard) to taste.
Lean borscht is made without meat; in this case, all the vegetables are sautéed in oil, salted in the skillet, and then added to the borscht. If you have dried mushrooms collected from non-contaminated areas, lean borscht can be very tasty.
Instead of mushrooms, you can use canned goods—fish in tomato sauce, which is added to the nearly finished borscht. Then you won’t need tomato paste.
Some tips:
Make sure that while cooking, the water doesn’t boil too vigorously, as a lot of aromatic substances are lost with the steam. The broth will also turn cloudy, and the fat will look gray and unappetizing. Don’t add tomato to the skillet at the same time as raw vegetables; the acidity will make the raw vegetables tough, requiring longer cooking time and significantly worsening the taste and aroma.
Soak the beans in cold water for 5 hours before cooking. Salt the legumes when they are almost done.
So, we’ve made the first dish. What should we prepare for the second? It seems simpler—cutlets or sicheniки (fried meat patties). But there are secrets here too. Take 1 kg of beef or pork, or better yet, a mix of both, 250 g of white bread, a cup of milk or water, salt, and ground pepper. The bread should be stale and crustless. Soak it in water or milk for 10 minutes before preparing the filling. Don’t squeeze out all the liquid from the bread. Many add eggs to the filling, but it’s important to know that the protein cooks quickly, making the cutlets dry. Add sautéed onions to the filling. If the meat is very lean, you can grind a bit of internal fat along with it. Mix the filling well and form the patties. Coat them in flour or breadcrumbs. Fry them in any fat—oil, lard, or margarine—starting on high heat and then reducing it. Turn them over, frying on both sides, and keep them covered. When the juices run clear (not red), they’re ready.
Potatoes are often served as a side dish or as a standalone dish. Fry them in hot fat, salting them once the slices are browned. Potatoes will be extraordinarily tasty if you toss in a few peeled garlic cloves at the same time. If baking potatoes in the oven, prick each one with a fork to prevent them from bursting.
Do you have muffin tins? You can use them to make pizza or small pies. The dough is quick to prepare. You’ll need 0.5 packs of margarine, 0.5 cups of sour cream, and an egg. Mix half a teaspoon of baking soda with vinegar into the flour (the dough should be soft). Thoroughly mix all the ingredients, divide the dough into 8-10 balls (depending on the size of the tins), roll out the flatbreads, and place them in the tins so that the dough covers the sides. Start with a teaspoon of tomato paste on the bottom, then a spoonful of grated processed or hard cheese, and finally any filling: cooked or sautéed and chopped meat, fish, vegetables, mushrooms, onions, or grated garlic. Top with a bit more paste, grated cheese, and then sour cream or mayonnaise. Place the tins in the oven. When the tops are golden brown, remove them: the pizza is ready. Want sweet pies for tea? Then add a bit of sugar, vanilla, or cinnamon to the dough, and for the filling—apples, jam, or carrots with raisins, among others.