borscht right

The popularity of borscht is growing in the West. Since the end of February, the American and European press has been publishing articles on borscht and its recipes, addresses of restaurants where you can try “rich and healthy Ukrainian soup”, and reports on charity events for which there will be income for its preparation. Go to support refugees from Ukraine.

For example, last week the British Evening Standard reported on an event scheduled for this Saturday at Brigade Bar + Kitchen, catering to the poor in London: its chef will prepare “typical Ukrainian dishes” together with chef Yuriy Kovrizhenko. minced meat, borscht with porcini mushrooms, Kyiv cutlet and cabbage dumplings.

Previously, Western borscht was often called a Russian dish, now borscht can only be Ukrainian or Eastern European.

They’ve been fighting for it in Ukraine for a long time: in late March 2021, Ukrainian Minister of Culture and Information Policy Oleksandr Tkachenko said on Facebook (the owner of Meta is considered an extremist organization) that Ukraine sent it. Official application to UNESCO for the inclusion of borscht in the list of intangible cultural heritage. Stop manipulating on the basis of “Russian borscht”. You cannot change the truth. The borsh is ours,” Tkachenko wrote at the time. Before this announcement, there was a series of scandals related to borscht. So, at the end of 2020, Ukrainian diplomats in France demanded to correct the message in the Michelin gastro guide in Moscow, where borscht is included in the list of Russian national dishes.

Ukraine’s desire to be “suitable” for borscht was criticized last week by Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova.

During the next briefing, he talked about the destruction of books in Ukraine, including culinary books. “Even cooking books are banned. Why? Because borscht was impossible to share. You can not! It should have belonged only to one person, one person,” said Zakharova.

At the same time, borscht is cooked in many countries of Eastern Europe – these are Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Lithuania and Poland, Moldova and Romania.

“Each of these countries has their own recipe for borscht, and some even claimed the title “we invented borsch.” But let’s get it right, we are not arguing, because we are all brothers and sisters of the same planet”, a culinary expert and a Mukhin Denis Mukhin, the owner of the Plate Telegram channel, calls in an interview with socialbites.ca. .

The culinary specialist admits that Ukraine can be called the birthplace of borscht: according to Mukhin, the culture of cooking spread in Moscow in the 1670s, due to the emergence of the Little Russian order here. “And Petersburg in general became the center of Ukrainianism. Many Ukrainians stood at the origins of the empire of Peter the Great. Hetman Mazepa contributed to Peter’s involvement, Feofan Prokopovich was the ideologist of the new state. So what’s there to be surprised about? Muhin says.

However, Russian cuisine historian, book author and TV presenter Maxim Syrnikov believes that Little Russian borscht is one of the varieties of the dish. He told socialbites.ca “19. Collections of recipes from the first half of the century gave various recipes for borscht, among which there was always a recipe for Little Russian,” he explains.

What distinguishes Ukrainian food from others?

“Little Russian borscht differs from all other borscht in only one but very important detail. It always has lard in it. In one way or another. Either just a few pieces of bacon, or a crispy or lard-fried vegetable base, ”says Maxim Syrnikov. And he adds that if you cook soup on broth, it will no longer be Ukrainian, but all Slavic borscht.

Speaking to socialbites.ca in December 2020, culinary historian Maxim Marusenkov said, “Borscht is a Russian, Ukrainian and Polish dish and only a certain variety can be “patented.” He expressed his belief that the attempt to determine the nationality of a dish is “a trend of modernity”. The recipe for borscht has changed over the centuries and from region to region, and even such an important element as beetroot didn’t spread until the 18th century.

According to Denis Mukhin, the problem of ownership of borscht has become especially acute due to the fact that today Ukraine insists on calling it the birthplace of the dish.
“Now he is positioned as Ukrainian because he is working on the Ukrainian brand of borscht. The Borscht Museum, the Borscht Festival, the problem of postage stamps, the scandal with Michelin – all this shows that Ukraine is not indifferent to the fate of the borscht property, ”she explains.

In Russia, they react with mixed feelings to Ukraine’s desire to include borscht in UNESCO’s list of intangible heritage.

“Why don’t they want to add an omelet? Maxim Syrnikov answers a question about this. Or boiled potatoes? Great Russians are much more entitled to borscht than little Russians, to use this terminology. Just for one reason – much more documentary evidence. The same “Domostroy” that spelled the word borscht: the word “borscht” is fixed, no matter how he interprets it as pork stew. Not a single Little Russian source mentions the word “borscht” before it is mentioned in Domostroy. Everything is documented.”

If Ukrainian borscht differs from others in the presence of fat, what kind of borscht is cooked, for example, in Belarus? As 84-year-old Ekaterina Borisovna Rozhko, who worked for many years as a labor teacher in one of the schools in Minsk, told socialbites.ca, the main distinguishing feature of Belarusian borscht is the absence of cabbage in it. “Our borscht is very similar to Ukrainian, and indeed Russian. The common product that unites all these beets is, of course, the beet. But there is no cabbage in the Belarusian recipe. We cook without cabbage,” says Ekaterina Borisovna.

According to him, in Belarus they mainly cook pork borscht – this is due to the fact that cows are kept in the villages to get milk from them. Another feature of Belarusian borscht is to impart a sour taste not with vinegar or lemon juice, but with fermented milk whey. In Belarus, potatoes for borscht are kneaded. And they add crushed bacon sauce with garlic to the finished dish.