It takes 3 hours to cook lean borscht, 1 hour in the kitchen. Borscht with dry beans takes longer to cook, it is better to soak the beans at least a day before cooking borscht.
How to cook lean borscht with beans
Products
per pan 2.5 liters
Beets – 1 large
Beans – 100 grams of dry beans or 300 grams of canned
Cabbage – 250 grams
Potatoes – 3 pieces
Carrots – 1 medium
Onion – 1 small head
Parsley – half a bunch
Bay leaf – 1 leaf
Vegetable oil – 4 tablespoons
Salt – 2 teaspoons
Pepper – 10 peas
How to cook lean borscht
1. Pour the beans into a saucepan, soak in cold water overnight, drain, pour fresh cold water over.
2. Put the saucepan on the fire and cook for 1.5 hours until soft, then drain the water.
3. Peel the onion and chop finely.
4. Peel the carrots and grate on a coarse grater.
5. Peel and grate the beets on a coarse grater.
6. Heat a frying pan over medium heat, pour 2 tablespoons of butter.
7. Put the chopped onion in the pan, fry it for 7 minutes, stirring, over medium heat without a lid.
8. Add grated carrots to the onion and fry for another 10 minutes.
9. Pour 1.5 liters of water into the pan, put the pan on the fire.
10. When the water boils, put the fried vegetables into the pan.
11. Heat the pan again, put the grated beets.
12. Stew the beets for 10 minutes over low heat under the lid, stirring regularly.
13. Put the stewed beets in a saucepan, continue to cook the soup.
14. Peel the potatoes and cut into cubes with a side of 2-2.5 centimeters, add to the soup and cook for 5 minutes.
15. Peel the cabbage from the top leaves, wash and chop finely, put in the soup.
16. Add salt, pepper, beans and bay leaves, cook for 5 minutes.
17. Remove the pot with borscht from the heat and insist borscht for half an hour.
18. Wash parsley, dry and finely chop.
Serve ready-to-eat borscht sprinkled with chopped parsley.
Tasty Facts
– Borsch without beans can be cooked by replacing it with fresh champignons (150 grams, fried with vegetables and added along with frying), and red bell pepper (1 piece, fried with vegetables and added to borscht along with frying).
– To use dried mushrooms in lean borscht, you need to soak them in water for 2-3 hours – then, if necessary, cut. To cook a 5-liter borscht pot, you will need 25 grams of dried mushrooms.
– In lean borscht, to taste, you can add 2 tablespoons of tomato paste and a little (half a teaspoon per 2.5-liter saucepan) sugar.
– Serve lean borscht with bread, herbs, garlic, marinades and pickles.
– To reduce the cooking time of lean borscht, you can add canned beans to the borscht.
– To make the borscht bright red and acquire a special sourness, you can add a little 9% vinegar to the borscht – 1 tablespoon per 2.5 liters of borscht at the stage of adding spices.
– Dried prunes are perfect for borscht – it must be poured with boiling water for 10 minutes, chopped if desired, added to the soup along with cabbage. For 5 liters of borscht, 8-10 pieces of prunes are needed.
– To diversify lean borscht, on fish days you can add sprats in tomato sauce to borscht – 1 can of 200 grams is needed for 2.5 liters of borscht. Add sprats at the frying stage – first fry with vegetables, and then.
– If food with frying in vegetable oil is prohibited on fasting days, you can fry all the products in a Teflon-coated pan until golden brown, or simply chop all the vegetables and add them raw to the borscht one by one.