Khersonskyi Borshch (херсонський борщ, catfish borshch)

Ingredients

Equipment Needed

• •A big modern stockpot
• •A wide pan for the zasmazhka
• •A box grater
• •A rimmed baking tray

Instructions

1. 1

   Bake the catfish

   Heat the oven to 200C. Rub the catfish with sunflower oil, salt, and black pepper, lay it skin-side down on a tray, and bake until the flesh turns opaque and lifts in large flakes when pressed with a fork. Keep it in generous pieces. You want fish that can sit in the bowl, not fish that dissolves into the pot.

   Catfish is rich and fatty in the best way. Baking keeps that richness clean, while boiling it hard makes the broth muddy and the fish tired.
2. 2

   Start the broth

   Put the catfish skin, any bones, the halved onion, bay leaves, and celery or parsley root into a big stockpot with 2.5 litres cold water. Bring it slowly to the quietest simmer and skim what rises. Let it murmur until it smells clean and river-sweet, then strain it. No rolling boil. Fish broth likes manners.

3. 3

   Cook the beets

   Simmer the whole beets in a separate pot until a knife slides through without argument, then cool, peel, and grate them coarse. Leave the tails on while they cook so the color stays inside. When the beet smell turns from raw earth to something sweeter and rounder, almost like warm bread, you're there.

4. 4

   Layer the vegetables

   Return the strained fish broth to the pot and salt it lightly. Add the potatoes and let them soften at the edges, then add the shredded cabbage. Stir in the grated beets and watch the broth go dark ruby. The spoon must stand up straight, not from thickness alone, but from enough vegetables to make a proper bowl.

5. 5

   Build the zasmazhka

   Warm the sunflower oil in a wide pan and add the diced onions. Sweat them gently until they lose their sharp smell and turn glossy, then add the grated carrots. Cook until the carrot softens and stains the oil orange. Stir in the tomato paste and let it darken a little, until it smells sweet and roasted rather than tinny.

   This is the why of the pot: the zasmazhka goes in near the end so the onion and carrot sweetness sits brightly on top of the broth instead of vanishing into it.
6. 6

   Sour the pot

   Scrape the zasmazhka into the borshch, then add the fermented tomato mors or beet zakwas. Taste before adding all of it. You want the broth sweet first, then sour enough to make your mouth wake up. Vinegar can do the job in an emergency, but fermented tomato tastes like the south remembering August.

7. 7

   Finish with fish

   Add the smashed garlic and most of the dill, then turn off the heat and let the pot sit so the flavors settle. Put a large piece of baked catfish into each deep bowl and ladle the hot borshch over it. Serve with smetana if you want softness, more dill because we are not shy, and a little lemon only if your ferment was gentle.

Chef Tips

• •If catfish is hard to find, use carp, pike, or another firm freshwater fish. Salmon will make a different, more modern bowl, but it will still feed people.
• •Fermented tomato mors is best here: the strained sour liquid from lacto-fermented tomatoes. Beet zakwas works too. Plain vinegar is the shortcut, sharper and less interesting.
• •The broth forgives a simple pot. The fish does not forgive a hard boil, so bake it separately and add it to the bowl.
• •Make it a day ahead, but keep the baked fish separate. Reheat the borshch gently, then lay fresh pieces of fish into the bowls.
• •Unrefined sunflower oil matters in the zasmazhka. It is Ukraine in a bottle of oil, green-gold and nutty, and here you taste it.

Advance Preparation

• •The beets can be cooked, peeled, and grated a day ahead.
• •Fish broth can be made a day ahead and chilled.
• •The finished borshch improves overnight; store the baked catfish separately and add it when serving.

Frequently Asked Questions

Nutrition Information

1 serving (about 520g)