Sauerkraut Borscht
Where I grew up, in the Canadian West Kootenay region of British Columbia, borscht was common fare and adored by many. In the early 1900s, many Russian Doukhobors settled in the region, and with them came many delicious dishes. Borscht was always my favorite of them. Borscht comes in many varieties, and I have yet to encounter a restaurant borscht outside of my hometown region that tastes the same. It's a vegetarian borscht with a creamy broth, an obvious dill flavor, and is typically made without beets. This borscht is reminiscent of that borscht. However, it is certainly not the same and I am making no claims that this borscht is in the least bit authentic. I've made many many changes to the traditional recipe. But dayum! This soup is so delicious in all its rampant inauthenticity! I urge you to give it a try. Being that this is a very low-protein dish, I'd suggest enjoying it with a high-protein side. A serving or two of the Hemp & Pumpkin Seed Crackers or Flax & Fill-in-the-Blank bread from my first book would both be great options.
Yield: 8 servings of about 1 cup (240g) each or 6 servings of about 1⅓ cups (320g) each, totaling 8 cups (1,920g) ✎
Macros (per 1 cup serving): 210 calories | 2.5g protein | 19g fat | 5g net carbs
Macros (per 1⅓ cup serving): 280 calories | 3.5g protein | 25g fat | 7g net carbs
Prep: 15 minutes | Cook: 30-40 minutes
Storage: refrigerated for up to 5 days.
Macros (per 1 cup serving): 210 calories | 2.5g protein | 19g fat | 5g net carbs
Macros (per 1⅓ cup serving): 280 calories | 3.5g protein | 25g fat | 7g net carbs
Prep: 15 minutes | Cook: 30-40 minutes
Storage: refrigerated for up to 5 days.
Ingredients:
- ⅓ cup (80ml/73g) refined (i.e. flavorless) coconut oil, light olive oil, or neutral-flavored oil of choice ✎
- 1 cup (107g) chopped cauliflower
- ½ cup (64g) grated or diced carrot (about 1 medium carrot)
- ½ cup (50g) diced celery (about 1 medium stalk)
- ½ medium (59g) green pepper, diced (about ½ cup)
- ½ medium (55g) onion, diced (about ⅓ cup)
- 2 cups (480ml) vegetable broth or 1 bouillon cube and 2 cups (480ml) water ✎
- 1 15-ounce can (425g) crushed or finely diced tomatoes ✎
- 1 13.5-ounce can (400g) full-fat coconut milk
- 1 cup (180g) cabbage sauerkraut
- ⅓ cup (80ml) sugar-free dill pickle juice (optional) ✎
- 2 tablespoons (4g) chopped fresh dill or 1¼ teaspoons dry dill
- 1 tablespoon (5g) nutritional yeast flakes
- ½ teaspoon ground black pepper
- ½ teaspoon onion powder
- ¼ teaspoon garlic powder
- 2 medium (30g) green onions, chopped (about ½ cup)
Directions:
- Prepare the cauliflower, carrot, green pepper, and onion as per the ingredient list.
- In a large saucepan, heat the oil on medium-low heat. When hot, add the vegetables and sauté for 5 minutes. Stir often and adjust heat as necessary. If using a fat-based bouillon cube, you can add it now to melt it.
- Meanwhile, prepare the fresh dill.
- Add all remaining ingredients, apart from the green onion, to the pan. Bring to a simmer, reduce to low heat, cover with a well-fitted lid, and cook for 25-30 minutes, or until cauliflower is fork-tender.
- Meanwhile, chop the green onions.
- Blend a small portion of the soup. This can be done with a few pulses of a heat-safe immersion blender in the pan, or by putting a couple ladles worth of soup in a heat-safe blender, blending it, and then returning it to the pot. This step is optional. The soup is equally good unblended.
- Add the green onion, cover, and simmer for an additional 5 minutes.
- Divide equally between 6 or 8 soup bowls (1⅓ cup [320g] or 1 cup [240g] per bowl) and enjoy hot. Top with additional chopped dill, green onion, and black pepper if desired.
✎ Notes:
- Soup yield can vary quite a bit depending on how much water is lost while cooking. Using a well-fitted lid will help reduce water loss. If you want to be sure to have 8 cups (1,920g), I suggest you weigh the final amount and add water, broth, or pickle juice to bring up the quantity to a full 8 cups (1,920g) if necessary.
- Coconut oil has a more similar meltiness and mouthfeel to animal-based fats, and butter and cream are typical ingredients in the borscht made where I grew up. This is why I prefer it in this recipe. Palm oil would be another option with a similar quality.
- Vegetable broths are often high in net carbs due to added sugars and starches, so check your labels. I use Edward & Sons bouillon cubes, which have almost no carbs, and water. If you can only get high-carb veggie broths and that doesn't fit your macros, this soup would probably be fine made with just the water.
- If you can't get crushed or finely diced canned tomatoes, you can just use more readily available chopped/diced tomatoes. They can be mashed with a fork to have a more crushed tomato texture if you like.
- The pickle juice might make this soup overly salty for some palates, especially if the broth or sauerkraut you've used are saltier than mine. For me, it make this soup addictively delicious. In place of the pickle juice, you could also use additional vegetable broth, neutral-flavored plant-milk, or additional canned coconut milk.
- Macros for this recipes are calculated with American national nutritional data (i.e. NCCDB & USDA entries in Cronometer) for all ingredients apart from vegetable broth (Edward & Sons bouillon cubes), canned tomatoes (Hunt's), coconut milk (Aroy-D), and nutritional yeast flakes (blend of Bob's Redmill and Foods Alive unfortified). No data is added for pickle juice.
- Macro numbers are rounded. Numbers equal to or greater than 10g are rounded to the nearest whole number (e.g. 10g, 11g, 12g, etc.) and numbers below 10g are rounded to the nearest 0.5g (0.5g, 1g, 1.5g ... 9g, 9.5g). Any numbers below 0.5g are given as is (e.g. 0.1g, 0.2g, etc.). Calories are rounded to the nearest multiple of 5.