Siberian Cuisine

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The Siberian cuisine – like the cuisines of many other peoples living in the territory of Russia – has ancient origin and culinary traditions. Dishes of the Siberian cuisine became spread nationwide since approximately the 19th century when active railway construction began in Russia.
From the ancient times until today the Siberians have been engaged in cattle breeding, hunting and fishing. Therefore genuine Siberian cuisine is a combination of meat, game, fish and unique taiga seasonings. The well-known traditional Siberian dish widespread and favourite all over Russia is pelmeni dumplings. Under the classic recipe, the pelmeni filling includes three sorts of meat – beef, pork and lamb in equal proportions. The Siberians prepare plenty of dumplings (for the future) and store them frozen in big bags. Since long ago, the Siberian hunters, when going to the wood, have necessarily taken along frozen dumplings in linen sacks. It is enough to put them into boiling water, wait until they float – and a nourishing tasty meal is ready.
One of the best-known delicacies of the Siberian cuisine is lightly marinated Baikal omul whose tender taste is famous far outside Siberia. Especially popular among the Siberians are snack pies (with mushrooms, sorrel, fish, game) and sweet pies (with cowberry, bird cherry, fruit). On the menu of modern Siberian restaurants you can see both traditional dishes of the Russian cuisine – soups, cutlets, pancakes, and primordially Siberian dishes - various game, dumplings, mushroom soups, taiga meat, every possible dish with omul.
The home menu of the Siberians, certainly, differs from the restaurant one. If you are invited to a Siberian's place, you are sure to see well-known Siberian starters on the table – pickled or dried fish, pickled damsons and cucumbers, tomatoes tinned in own juice, pickled milk mushrooms and saffron milk caps, pickled yellow boletuses, pickled cowberries and cranberries, jam from taiga berries.
The Siberians prefer to drink bilberry mors. Especially they love tea with frozen cloudberries or cowberries.

Stroganina

300-400g chilled meat or liver
1 onion
black ground pepper, salt to taste
Shred well-frozen meat very finely. Dip it into a mix of black ground pepper and salt.
Serve with peeled raw onions sliced into circles.

Siberian Kholodets (Aspic)

1kg pork or veal legs
300g veal shin
1 onion
3 carrots
2 celery stalks
2 cloves garlic
80ml vinegar
2 tbsp crushed fresh parsley
3 bay leaves
5 corns flavory pepper
lemon
salt to taste
Wash and dry pork or veal legs, and chop them into several parts. Put the legs and the veal into water, add vegetables, bay leaf, peppercorns, peeled and chopped garlic, and cook 2 hours at low heat. Then add salt to taste, washed and chopped celery stalks, vinegar, and cook another 2 hours. Take legs, meat and carrots out of the broth. Filter the broth and leave to rest. Crush the meat, slice peeled and washed carrots. Put the carrot slices on the bottom of a form, put the meat on top, add 1 tablespoon of parsley, and fill it with broth. Chill for 4 hours. Carefully remove fat. Serve with remaining parsley and lemon slices.

Siberian Borscht

2 large beets
150-200g fresh cabbage or 100-150g sauerkraut
1 potato
90g dried beans
1 carrot
1 onion
60g tomato paste
20g baked pork lard
3-4 cloves garlic
30-40g vegetable oil
30g sugar
1.5l broth or water
for meatballs:
200-250g beef
0.5 onion
40g butter
1 egg
2 tbsp water or milk
salt to taste
Peel, wash and slice the beets. Stew them in a frying pan with heated lard and a little water until soft. Wash the beans, and pour them with cold water. Boil them at low heat in a covered saucepan until soft, then dry them. Put peeled, washed and diced potatoes into boiling broth or water, and boil 10-15 minutes. Add stewed beet. Add peeled, washed and sliced onions and carrots simmered in heated oil. Add fresh cabbage, sauerkraut, and tomato paste. Add boiled beans, sugar, spices, and garlic rubbed with salt approximately 5-10 minutes before the borscht is ready. Prepare meatballs as follows. Wash and dry meat, grind it twice through a meat grinder together with peeled and washed onions slightly fried in heated lard. Add raw egg, salt, pepper, cold water or milk to the forcemeat, and mix everything well. Make small meatballs and put them into the borscht 10-15 minutes before it is ready.

Siberian Pelmeni (Dumplings)

for dough:
500g wheat flour
2 eggs
1-1.5 tbsp vegetable oil
200ml water
salt to taste
for forcemeat:
300g pork
300g beef
300g lamb
1 average onion
black ground pepper, salt to taste
Prepare the dough as follows. Put the flour on a board shaped as a hill and make a little deepening in it. Carefully pour in salted water, add eggs and butter. Knead the dough gradually taking the flour from the sides to the middle until thick. Continue kneading until homogeneous. Prepare the filling: wash and dry meat and onions, grind them twice through a meat grinder, add salt and pepper, carefully mix. Roll out the dough thin. Use a cup to cut out circles. Put a teaspoonful of forcemeat on one half of each circle, fold the circle in half, and pinch the edges. Put the ready pelmeni on a floured board and place them into the freezer.

Taiga Meat

1kg beef or pork tenderloin
200g bacon
20g dried mushrooms
30g fresh parsley
150g cheese
3-4 cloves garlic
black ground pepper, salt to taste
Wash and dry the meat and make several deep cuts along it so each layer is not thicker than half inch. Tenderise both sides of each layer with mallet, salt and pepper it. Prepare the stuffing as follows. Boil and dry mushrooms, slice them fine. Wash and dry fresh parsley, chop it fine. Grate cheese coarse. Combine everything, add peeled and crushed garlic, salt, pepper, and mix thoroughly. Put bacon slices on meat layers. Put the prepared mushroom stuffing on the bacon, roll the meat, and tie it up with a thread. Put the roll on a frying pan with heated oil. Fry on all sides until a ruddy crust appears, add a little water and stew under a lid until ready. Chill down the prepared meat, remove the threads, and slice it.

Boyar Tench

1 tench (1-1.2 kg)
80g cream or 70g vegetable oil
0.6 cup sour cream or white dry wine
0.5 cup fish broth
3-4 lemon slices
5-6 boiled champignons or cep mushrooms
black ground pepper, salt to taste
Put the tench in boiling water for 2 minutes, scale it trying not to damage skin, disembowel and wash it, cut the fins off. Make a deep cut along the back, carefully remove bones, salt it and leave to rest about 20 minutes. Heat oil on a frying pan; when it is about to boil put the tench there. Fry it on both sides until a crust appears, then put it in a saucepan and add the oil from the frying pan. Add fish broth, sour cream or white wine, pepper, sliced boiled mushrooms, lemon slices without cores, and bring it all to boil. Put the ready fish on a dish with boiled or fried potatoes around.

"Volga" Fish

1kg fish filet (large perch, catfish, halibut, pikeperch)
2 onions
5-6 apples
1 lemon
1.5 cups white dry wine
30g butter
fresh parsley
black ground pepper, salt to taste
Wash, dry and slice prepared fish filet and salt it. Grate lemon peel, press out lemon juice and sprinkle fish filet with it. Peel onions and apples, slice finely and fry slightly in preheated butter. Put them in a buttered form, add salt, pepper, sprinkle with grated lemon peel, and put fish on top. Cover the form with a lid and put into the heated oven for 25-30 minutes. Pour wine into the pan where the onions and apples were fried, and leave to rest a little. Put the fish on a dish, pour with wine mix and decorate with fresh parsley.

Siberian Vatrushki (Cheese Pies)

700-800g sponge leavened dough
for stuffing:
2 short cups cottage cheese
2 eggs
60g sugar
25g wheat flour
vanilla sugar
salt to taste
Prepare sponge leavened dough. Prepare the filling as follows. Grate cottage cheese through a sieve, add sugar, raw egg, flour slightly fried on a dry frying pan, salt, and vanilla sugar. Mix everything thoroughly to make homogeneous mass.
Roll the dough into a rope, cut into 20 equal parts, roll them into balls, and put them on a buttered baking tray 2 inches from each other. Leave to rest for 12-15 minutes. Make a deepening in each ball with a cup bottom. Brush the sides of each vatrushka with egg, and put the cottage cheese filling evenly into each deepening with a spoon. Leave to rest 7-10 minutes, put vatrushkas into the oven heated to 220-240