Shchi

Cooking time —
Complication —

Shchi is a national Russian cabbage soup. They can be vegetarian, or cooked on meat, mushroom or fish stock. There are various kinds of shchi – with fresh cabbage, with sauerkraut, Sutochnye (Daily) shchi (made of sauerkraut stewed with smoke cured pork bones), Lenivye (Lazy) (without potatoes and tomatoes), green shchi (with sorrel and spinach), shchi with nettle, Ural (with pearl-barley and sauerkraut), Don shchi (with fish), Neva shchi (on mushroom stock), etc. Shchi is cooked according to all the rules of thick soups. Vegetables are diced or sliced. Shchi is served with sour cream and fresh herbs. Before the beginning of the 20th century, the word "shchi" meant not only soup, but also special sour kvass. Vladimir Gilyarovsky, the famous Russian writer, said that "this drink is so sparkling, that it must be put into a champagne bottle, any other bottle will burst". In summertime fresh cabbage was stewed with such "sour shchi " and used to replace sauerkraut in various dishes. Alexander Pushkin wrote:
My high ideal now is a housewife,
Quiet life with no need to run,
And pot of shchi, the biggest one

Welcome to our table!

Lenten Shchi with Mushrooms

500g fresh champignons
1.5L vegetable stock
1 onion
200g sauerkraut
2 tbsp vegetable oil
10-12 pitted black olives
salt, pepper, low-fat sour cream to taste
Wash and slice mushrooms, fill them with stock and boil 15 minutes. Dice onions and brown them 2 minutes in oil. Press out cabbage, add it to the onions, and stew 10 minutes at average heat. Put the stewed vegetables into a saucepan with mushrooms, add salt and pepper, and boil 5-7 minutes more. Add black olives, bring to boil again, and turn off the heat.

The Don Shchi with Fish

800g sturgeon or pikeperch
1.5 kg cabbage
3 carrots
100g parsley root
3 onions
1 turnip
200g tomato paste
50g flour
100g baked butter
fresh herbs, bay leaf, pepper corns, salt
Cut fish filet into 20 to 25g pieces, fill them with water and simmer, or boil until ready. Cube cabbage, and slice the other vegetables. Take the fish out of the stock, add fish waste products (head, fins, tails), and make fish stock. Add the cabbage to the boiling filtered stock, and bring to boil. Add vegetables simmered with tomato paste and cook 15-20 minutes. Add black peppercorns, bay leaf, salt, browned flour, and boil thoroughly 5 minutes more. When serving, put 4-5 pieces of heated boiled fish and fresh herbs in each plate.

Shchi with Sturgeon Head

400g sauerkraut
400g potatoes
5-6 pepper corns
2 tbsp vegetable oil
2 tbsp tomato paste
2L water
1-2 bay leaves
1 sturgeon head (700-800g)
1 carrot
1 onion
1 parsley root
1 tbsp flour
black ground pepper
ground nutmeg on a knife end
salt to taste
Carefully wash sturgeon head, remove gills, split it into several pieces, put in a saucepan, fill with water and boil 60 to 90 minutes. Filter the stock, bone the meat, and put it back into the stock. Wash sauerkraut, press it out, put into a saucepan, add a little stock, and stew 30-40 minutes. Then fill it with stock and boil another 30 minutes. Add peeled cubed potatoes and boil 15-20 minutes. Peel and dice onions, carrots and parsley. Fry in oil, add flour, and fry another 3-4 minutes stirring slowly. Add tomato paste, stir it, and stew 3-4 minutes more. Put the mix into the saucepan with shchi, add salt, pepper, bay leaf and nutmeg.

Byelorussian Shchi with Veal

600g veal
600g sauerkraut
200g baked lard
250g onions
100g parsley root
5g celery root
500g cabbage brine
2L bone stock
50g flour
bay leaf, black peppercorn, caraway seeds, sugar, salt
Cut meat into portioned pieces and boil in bone stock. Finely slice sauerkraut and simmer it until soft in 100g fat. Pour in cabbage brine. Simmer finely sliced roots and onions in the remaining fat until soft. Put them and the cabbage into the stock with meat, add bay leaf, black pepper, salt, sugar, caraway seeds. Dress with flour dissolved in water and cook another 10 minutes.

Rich Shchi

750g beef
750g sauerkraut
20g cep mushrooms dried
100g pickled mushrooms
75g carrots
80g potatoes
70g turnip
140g onions
40g celery root
40g parsley root
fresh dill, parsley, celery - 30g each
10g garlic
20g butter
100g sour cream
0.1g bay leaf
5g marjoram
0.5g big peppercorn
salt
Put beef, onion and half the roots (carrots, parsley, celery) into cold water and boil 2 hours. Add salt after 1-1.5 hours, then filter the stock, and throw away the roots. Put sauerkraut into a clay pot, and fill it with boiling water (0.5L). Add butter, close it, and put into a moderately heated oven. When the cabbage becomes soft, take it out, and combine with filtered stock and beef. Put dried mushrooms and sliced potatoes into an enameled pan, fill them with two glasses of cold water, bring to boil. Take out the mushrooms, slice them and put back into the stock. When the mushrooms and potatoes are ready, add meat stock with cabbage and beef, minced onion, the remaining julienned roots, spices (except garlic and dill), and salt, and cook 20 minutes. After that turn off the heat, dress the soup with dill and garlic, leave to rest for fifteen minutes, having wrapped the pot into something warm. Before serving, put chopped pickled mushrooms and sour cream into each plate with shchi.

Village Shchi

150g boiled meat
30g marrow
25-30g sour cream
20g butter
4-5 potatoes
2 tomatoes
1 carrot
1 onion
1.5L stock
1-2 bay leaves
fresh dill and parsley
black ground pepper
salt to taste
Prepare beef or pork stock, take out the prepared meat and filter the stock.
Finely chop fresh cabbage and put it into boiling stock. 3-5 minutes after, add marrow and French fry shaped potatoes. Also add onions browned in butter, and julienned carrots. Cook 20-25 minutes, add sliced tomatoes, salt, pepper and bay leaf 10 minutes before completion.
Serve Village shchi in pots. Add sour cream and fresh parsley and dill to each portion.

Rakhmanov Shchi

500g sturgeon
1kg large ordinary fish
1kg small fish for stock
1 parsley root
1 celery root
2 onions
500g spinach
500g sorrel
50g flour
150g baked butter
100g sour cream
fresh herbs, spices
Cook stock with ruffs or other small fish, add white roots at the end of cooking.
Filter the stock and boil whole parts of sturgeon fish. Cut the boiled sturgeon into portioned pieces. Bone ordinary fish, cut the filet, batter and fry it. Cook green shchi on fish stock, put boiled and fried fish into a clay pot, fill it with hot shchi and serve with medium-timed egg. Serve sour cream separately.

The Neva Shchi

50g dried mushrooms
800g beef
1.2 kg sauerkraut
2 carrots
1 parsley root
2 onions
200g tomato paste
1-2 choves garlic
50g flour
100g baked butter
100g sour cream
fresh herbs
salt
Cook shchi with sauerkraut and mushrooms. Dice and fry meat. Put the fried meat into the prepared shchi, add chopped garlic, meat juice, and boil everything thoroughly.

Tsar Shchi

400g boiled buckwheat
300g cabbage
300g potatoes
200g bacon
2 carrots
2 celery roots
2 onions
1L bone stock
fresh parsley and dill
spring onions
black ground pepper
salt
Cube the bacon and fry it until golden. In the melted fat, fry peeled sliced potatoes, carrots, celery and minced onions. Chop cabbage finely. Pour the hot stock into portioned pots. Add prepared vegetables and fried bacon. Put the pots with shchi into heated oven for 30-35 minutes. Five minutes prior to completion, add salt, pepper, and sprinkle with fresh herbs. Serve shchi in pots, and boiled buckwheat separately.

Shchi with Dumplings

0.5kg sorrel
1kg spinach
1 parsley root
2 onions
150g spring onions
100g flour
150g baked butter
100g sour cream
bay leaf, ground black pepper
fresh herbs
for pastry:
400g flour
150g water
1 egg
for forcemeat:
400g pork
200g slab bacon
spices
Put boiled dumplings into ordinary green shchi without potatoes. Prepare the dough as for usual dumplings, roll it out, cut into squares, put the forcemeat in the middle of each piece. Fold the squares into triangles, press the edges tight, and cook in boiled water. To make the forcemeat, grind pork and slab bacon, and dress it with salt and ground black pepper.