Just Like Mom

My mom is a wonderful cook.

When we were growing up, we had everything when it came to good food.  Everything = farm raised beef, pork, chickens, turkey and all organic (ha ha ha ha ha - organic = garden grown) vegetables.  We were organic before there was organic.  Our animals were grain fed and enjoyed their summer trips to the grassy pastures.  Our gardens were never sprayed with chemicals, but were fed yearly with compost and well rotted cow manure.  We never used Round Up to get rid of weeds; we picked them out one by one with our fingers and chopped their wicked heads off with a hoe.

On top of the fresh produce and meat, we had a wood cook stove in the kitchen.  I never used to think it made much of a difference.  Now I dream about loaves of bread browned from the heat of a wood stove - there was something in the flavor that you can't get out of an electric stove. 

This post is making me feel old.

Anyway, back to my mom.  She has always been a good cook and was definitely the person who inspired me to both cook AND enjoy cooking.  I remember how she taught me.  Besides all of the times when I had to help her with cooking and learned by watching, there was another way that she taught me how to cook.

She got a job.

And when she got a job, there was no one else to cook but me!  She would write out in simple point form the "how to's" of making scalloped potatoes, macaroni with meat sauce, chili, etc., etc., etc.  I remember even cooking for my aunts and uncles one time when they had to meet at our farm over some family business - I was a young girl, and they were pretty impressed that I had gone to the bother of a hot cooked meal.  I shrugged it off as "it's nothing", but really, inside, I was bursting with pride that I had pulled off a meal for several people, and guests at that. 

So when I left home, cooking for myself never intimidated me.  I was reasonably proficient and very interested in experimenting with new foods.

New foods are easy - no precedent has been set.  You get what you get and either you like it or you don't like it.

Trying to cook like mom - that's scary!  You KNOW what mom's cooking tastes like and either your version of it measures up or it doesn't.

I've probably spent most of my grown up life trying to replicate some of mom's meals.  My buns are good, but they aren't mom's.  My stew - also good, but not mom's either.  Tender beef steak - can't do it the same.  Ben frequently reminds me "nope, not as good as Nana's" when it comes to things that both she and I cook.  And that's okay.  I can take it. 

But, there are some things that really need to resemble mom's cooking.  Foods that are family traditions, that represent "us", the familiar, the expected, the hand-me-down flavors of the generations. 

Borscht is one of those things.  I know that there are lots of good borscht recipes out there.  But I want to make borscht like my mom.

Here is her version. 

Let's call it:

Annie's Borscht  (no one calls her Annie except her Ukrainian nieces and nephews, so we'll add it here to make the recipe authentic  ;) )

12 cups beef broth
Beef from soup bone or stewing beef, small cubes, browned
1 onion, chopped
2-3 medium beets, shredded
1/2 cup celery, chopped
1-2 carrots, shredded
1 medium potato, shredded
2-3 whole tomatoes, chopped OR generous squirt of ketchup
1/2 cup (or more) vinegar OR dill pickle juice (I favor the dill pickle juice)
1-2 Tbsp dried dill (or fresh from the garden in season)
1 tsp sugar
salt and pepper to taste

Add all ingredients together and let simmer for a couple of hours to let the flavors meld.  When nearly ready to serve, take about 4 cups of soup out of the pot and add cream milk to the 4 cups and stir to temper.  When tempered, add it all back to the soup pot and stir to blend.  May serve with a dollop of sour cream.

A few notes:
* one time when I made borscht, I couldn't get the right amount of tang/sour to the soup, no matter how much vinegar/pickle juice I added.  My conclusion was that I may have used too many beets.  Beets, being naturally sweet, sweetened the soup to the point that I couldn't counteract the sugar content enough to balance the flavors.  Even though it's tempting to use a generous amount of beets, don't!  Today I used one small beet and half of a large beet.  The balance was much better.

* I saw a great recipe on TV years ago for making beef broth and I used that technique today.  Take beef soup bones and place in a large, flat roaster along with a roughly cut onion (quartered is good), 2-3 carrots roughly cut, a couple of ribs of celery, salt and pepper and completely cover it all with water. Place the roaster in a very slow (250 F) oven for 8-10 hours and walk away.  Do not cover the pan.  The resulting broth is rich and flavorful with virtually no effort on your part.  There is less foam in the end product and much better flavor than when you boil bones.  The meat is tastier.  You can do this in a slow oven over night and be ready to make the soup the next day.  Discard the bones and vegetables; let the broth sit on the counter for a couple of hours and the fat rises to the top for easy skimming.

* Some people use pork for the soup base as well.  Pork ribs are good, apparently.  I think you would want to make sure you got the fat skimmed off very well.





For the record, mom and I have developed a mutual respect for each other's cooking over the years.  Several years ago, I made roast beef for her and dad when they came to visit, using my own slow cooker method.  I knew the roast beef was good but I didn't give it any more thought.

A few weeks later, she told me "I've been trying and trying to make a roast beef that is as good as yours was, but I just can't get it right". 

I've been living on that compliment for years!

Love you Mom!

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