My onion recipes
February 19th, 2011 in Hot Soups, Soup Recipes by Julia Volhina This soup doesn’t include any meat, it is based on mushrooms and have vegetables (carrot, parsley and celery roots, potato) as well as pearl barley.
Such kind of mushroom soup is very popular in Russia. Various kind of mushrooms can be used in this recipe, but I must say fresh or frozen porcini are the best tasting ones, if you can find them, of course.
If you are not trying to follow Great Lent rules – my advise is don’t skip on sour cream, 1 tablespoon of sour cream to the bowl of mushroom soup not only adds nutrients, but also gives the soup its unique rich taste.
Tags: carrot, celery root, dill, garlic, grain, lenten, mushroom, no meat, onion, parsley root, peas, potato, russian, soup, vegetables
January 29th, 2011 in Main Dish Recipes, No-meat, Side Dish Recipes by Julia Volhina Braised cabbage can be a nice meat-free dish on its own, however it also makes a good side dish for various meats, especially pork and sausages.
You can braise fresh white cabbage alone or mix of white cabbage with sauerkraut (1:1 proportion) to your taste. If you choose to use sauerkraut, rinse it with water before adding to the skillet.
Fresh tomatoes in this recipe can be replaced with tomato paste, if you don’t want to spend time blanching and de-seeding tomatoes.
Tags: cabbage, no meat, onion, russian, side dish, tomato, vegetables
January 22nd, 2011 in Chicken, Main Dish Recipes by Julia Volhina An easy tweak to classic pilaf recipe – chicken instead of lamb – will make this dish to shine all different colors. Chicken require less time to cook, it is more lean so, let’s say it is more healthy and also faster to prepare 
Using whole chicken is an option, but in this case you probably need to bone it first (unless you like to chew on bones).
Take boneless thighs, if you don’t like to spend time removing bones. Chicken breasts can be used as well, but may end up being too dry – mix them up with some other parts such us thighs or so.
Another trick to this recipe is using cast-iron pan, ideally round one. It makes rice to cook more evenly which is more important part – get soft not overcooked rice.
Tags: carrot, chicken, dinner, garlic, grain, lunch, onion, pilaf, rice, spicy, vegetables
December 18th, 2010 in Hot Soups, Soup Recipes by Julia Volhina One of the challenges when cooking classic beet root soup, borscht, is to get all vegetables (and there are quite few) cooked till perfect readiness at the same time.
Considering different vegetables require different cooking time it is sometimes hard to achieve. For borscht you need to make sure beens are soft, while potatoes are not over cooked and beets don’t lose their color.
So, to make this happen: I cook beens in a separate cooking pot (just until they are soft and ready), cook beets skin on (like for salad) in separate pot in advance, and add these two to the main cooking pot at appropriate times.
By the way, using of canned beets and beens instead of cooking them yourself is an option (which I never did, but it may safe you some time).
Tags: bean, beet, bell pepper, borscht, cabbage, carrot, celery root, dinner, onion, parsley root, potato, russian, soup, tomato, ukrainian, vegetables
November 20th, 2010 in Main Dish Recipes, Pork by Julia Volhina Kruchenyky or zavyvantsi – meat rolls prepared with pork (less often with beef) and stuffed with various mixes. This is very popular dish of traditional ukrainian cuisine.
Stuffings for kruchenyky, as well as sauces, vary from region to region and, actually, from cook to cook.
I like kruchenyky prepared from pork loin and stuffed with mushrooms or mushroom mix with some other ingredients, fried and then baked under cream sauce. Just like in this recipe.
It may seem like lot of hassle to cook these stuffed pork rolls, but it is really not as hard as it looks; and is really tasty
Tags: cheese, cream, dinner, hard boiled egg, meat, mushroom, onion, pork, romantic, stuffed, ukrainian
November 13th, 2010 in Salad Recipes by Julia Volhina Beet salad with prunes, walnuts and onions dressed up with mayo or sour cream or both is one of the traditional salads of ukrainian cuisine.
Also, this dish is one of the not many dishes which uses beets as a main ingredient.
It is very important to use sweet and rich red color beets for this salad. So, when buying beets scratch their skin with a nail: dark red pulp under skin is a sign of good beet, not pink and not white.
It is also important to use good quality walnuts; taste before you buy them: old walnuts can be bitter and using such will make you salad taste bitter as well.
Tags: beet, mayo, no meat, nuts, onion, prune, salad, shallot, ukrainian
October 30th, 2010 in Hot Soups, Soup Recipes by Julia Volhina This is good soup to cook at winter: time when fresh herbs are not full of flavor and most of vegetables are not as full of nutrients as fresh ones.
Root vegetables used in this recipe (potatoes, carrots, parsley and celery roots) are good on keeping their nutrient through whole winter and buckwheat grains add even more.
As for most of meat broth based soups, you can save some time cooking it by preparing meat broth in advance: night before or so, and then reheat before cooking buckwheat soup itself.
I really encourage you to cook beef broth yourself, whatever they say in those advertisements, but broth from can can’t be the same good as broth prepared by yourself from ingredients you choose, it is not that hard after all.
Tags: beef, broth, buckwheat, carrot, grain, meat, onion, parsley root, potato, soup
