Ukrainian Style Saurekraut

This is my childhood's sauerkraut. The big jar of fermenting cabbage with a precariously balanced stack of smaller jars weighing it down is pretty much a staple in any Ukrainian grandmother's kitchen, and I have very fond memories of sneaking samples from the giant jars (regardless of how close to done they were) while my grandmother was busy elsewhere.

This version is dryer, crispier and generally milder-tasting than the German-style sauerkraut you generally find at the store. While it's incredibly delicious raw, it's also the main ingredient in the tasty but underrated sour cabbage soup (Sour Schi in Russian, or the similar Ukrainian and Polish Kapusniak), and also makes for a nice stewed cabbage side dish, both of which I'll get to later.I posted a more detailed version of this recipe and process here a few years ago.

Stuffed Pickled Green Tomatoes

I love green tomatoes. They're beautiful, tangy and have a satisfying crunch both fresh and pickled. Back in Sacramento they were an occasional treat at the end of tomato season -- the swan song of your dying tomato plants, a gift from a gracious neighbor, or a lucky find at the local ethnic market. I assumed this sorry state of affairs would change when I moved to North Carolina, since what culinary tradition has more green tomato recipes than the American South? They serve them pickled, fried, in chow chows, baked into pies -- you name it!

Boy was I wrong. In six months here I have only seen them once, at the local farmer's market in August and priced equally with ripe heirloom tomatoes. Maybe next year I'll be luckier.

For those of you who somehow have regular access to these delicious little things, here is my favorite way to pickle green tomatoes and a method common in Eastern European countries.  This can be done with either full sized tomatoes or grape tomatoes. I made these with green grape tomatoes from my mother-in-law's plant. This recipe is for naturally fermented tomatoes, but I'm sure a simple vinegar brine can be substituted if that's what you prefer.

Green Borscht -- Sorrel Soup

Ever since I saw this post, I've been thinking about sorrel soup. In the absence of any sorrel (wild or otherwise) I contented myself with trawling the web for recipes, taking in suggestions from dozens of sources. Last week, I finally got my soup. My grandmother was visiting my parents, and brought along a huge bag of the stuff, of which I got half.  I told her about all of the variations on the soup I had read, in particular that a number of sources had suggested that nettles are an appropriate addition to a sorrel borscht (an idea I had been toying with mostly because I knew of a nice nettle patch, and I have always wanted to try nettles).

My grandmother replied that when she was about my age, she heard the same thing. Nettles are healthy, add color and grow abundantly wherever you don't want them to grow. When she decided to try adding them to her borscht, she found she couldn't get past the smell. See, in those times (and probably in these times as well, since nettles grow well in abandoned dwellings, and Ukraine is full of these) nettles were pig food -- you'd throw a bushel in a steaming cauldron to take the sting out and serve it still hot to the piggies. Now, I have no such association of nettles and pigs, but I take from my grandmother's story this simple moral: keep it simple.

I've kept this recipe incredibly simple.

Sorrel Soup, or Green Borscht, is a very unusual tasting soup. It has a sort of sweet/sour flavor profile with the sourness coming from the high levels of oxalic acid, which gives the sorrel an almost citrusy taste.