For Olia Hercules, Borsch Is More Than a Soup

After a Milk Street Cooking School class with chef and cookbook author, Olia Hercules, our students made it very clear that we couldn’t have her back soon enough. Before we even had a chance to ask her, Olia proposed a workshop on the Ukrainian dish that just might be closest to her heart: borsch.

You’ll have to take her virtual workshop on January 24 to learn how to make her version of this nourishing, earthy soup, but Olia was nice enough to sit down and chat about its key components and hyper-regional variations, as well as how to tell a good borsch from a subpar one.

What is the cultural significance of borsch in Ukraine?

I've actually traveled around Ukraine for my book, “Summer Kitchens.” I knew that it was one of the most important dishes for us, but what struck me was the amount of variations that you get, not even from one region to another, but from one village to another.

It's a dish that is ubiquitous, that exists everywhere, but it's also adapted to hyper-local ingredients—landscape, culture, you name it. You know how in some Asian countries, when they greet each other, they say, “Have you eaten rice today?” I say in Ukraine, we would probably say, “Have you eaten borsch this week?” Because I remember my mom pretty much every other week, or every week, would make a pot of borsch. And it becomes better and better every day. And so three times a week, at least, we're eating borsch.

But when my parents lived in occupation in 2022, they were in Kakhovka in the south of Ukraine, and the Russian tanks rolled in. And my parents refused to leave at first. They were protesting. They were saying, “This is our home. Who are you strangers? What are you doing here?” And then it became too dangerous. My dad started getting phone calls and all sorts of threats. And my mom and dad couldn't cook during that period. I couldn't cook or eat here, either. And then one day my mom said, “We finally cooked today.” And she said it was borsch. I'll never forget that message. And she said, “I really feel it in my bones and my DNA. This is something in our genetic makeup. It gave me strength today and I think, whatever happens, we can do whatever we need to do.”

What are the key components of borsch?

I would say that everywhere, in whichever country you go, it's not a blended soup. It's never a pureed beetroot soup. That's what really gets my goat. It's a broth everywhere. Whichever country you take, it's a broth with bits of things. Even within Ukraine, it can be wildly different.

For example, the Christmas borsch in Western Ukraine, which is very close to Poland, is like a clear beetroot consommé. You make the broth, the stock and everything with vegetables. Then you strain it so it's completely clear. And then you put these dumplings called vushka, which means “little ears,” stuffed with mushrooms and onions and whatever. It's this beautiful, elegant consommé vibe. And it's made mostly during Christmas in Western Ukraine.

Where I'm from is the south of Ukraine. There's influences from the part of Ukraine that used to be part of Crimean Khanate, the Crimean Tatars and also part of the Ottoman Empire. There's quite a lot of these Turkic influences. In our regional cuisine, we've got loads of fresh herbs like coriander.

But the specific South Ukrainian borsch that I grew up with, for example, we don't use red beetroot. We used either pink or yellow, but we have these incredible tomatoes. Probably this kind of borsch appeared in the early 20th century when tomatoes became big, but still it became such a significant, idiosyncratic part of South Ukrainian cuisine. Our borsch is pink, like that beautiful dusty pink, because we don't have the redness from beetroot. The color comes from tomatoes.

And beetroot—I mean, it's an ingredient, but I wouldn't say it's a beetroot soup. We also make green borsch using loads of herbs and sorrel in spring. Even within Ukraine, it's just wildly different. And I think that's why Ukraine has the biggest claim for borsch as a national dish, because of hundreds and hundreds of different recipes—very hyper regional. It's really a serious business in Ukraine, the borsch situation.

It's not made anymore, because Stalin did so many ecological crimes against Ukraine. He created all of these horrible dams and artificial water sources in the south of Ukraine, and then up north he dried up all of these beautiful marshes and swamps. But up north I found out that in the past, before these ecological changes, they used to make borsch using elvers, which are baby eels.

And in the south of Ukraine, there's another borsch that they made using sun-dried tomatoes and sun-dried fish. We have these little fish, which live in bracken water or something like that, and they're called gobies. They have these really funny faces. We call them bychki, which means “little bulls,” because they look like they have little bull faces. And they taste almost like red mullet, almost like a crustacean, because I think they eat little shrimp or something. You salt them, dry them out, and then you bash them into flakes. And over winter—because ingredients [were] scarce in winter, in the past—you just throw that in for nutrition and flavor and salt. And you make borsch with it.

So, normally you would have potatoes, cabbage, beetroot. These are the ingredients that everybody would have. Then it can be either meat or fish, or dried fish or mushrooms, vegetarian, whatever.

Then there's the green borsch, which is different. It's like a cousin. I would call it borsch, but it doesn't have beetroot at all and it has loads of wild herbs that come in spring, so sorrel is a must. That's really the distinctive feature of the green borsch—sorrel, wild leeks or wild garlic, loads of spring onions, loads of dill, any other kind of wild green or green, fresh herbs that you get in spring. And you serve it with boiled eggs, so it's a very springtime kind of recipe.

How do you tell a good borsch from a bad borsch?

My grandmother used to say, if you put a wooden spoon inside your borsch—which is still a broth, but there are so many vegetables and beans and all of these things—that the wooden spoon has to stand up.

Otherwise, in terms of borsch being cooked completely outside of Eastern Europe, the only problem that I see is that people just blend beetroot with some potatoes or whatever, and then they say that this creamy soup is borsch. Just because it has beetroot in it, it's not borsch. “Borsch” doesn't even come from beetroot. The name comes from hogweed.

So, this was initially what they used—we call it borshevik—and that's what they used to make borsch with before they started making it with beets in the 17th or 18th century.

What does hogweed taste like?

I don't know, actually, because I don't cook with it. Weirdly, it grew right outside my window and I thought it was so beautiful. I was in my ADHD phase of drying flowers so I dried it, and now I have it in this vase over here.

Unfortunately, the ancestral tradition of foraging wild plants has gone out of favor in Ukraine, partly because of Holodomor, this period when Stalin was starving peasants. They basically took away all the wheat [and] all the bread and locked everyone in villages. And those who survived would forage, but then that association of trauma and foraging became so strong that everybody was just like, “Fuck this, I'm not foraging anymore. I don't want to see chickweed.” Even though there's loads of these plants that are so delicious and medicinal. That's one of the theories, anyway...but mushrooms are still fine. People still forage for mushrooms, thank god.

You're teaching a mushroom broth as part of your class. Why mushroom instead of the usual meat?

I just wanted to be nice to vegetarians. My husband is actually vegetarian. We are pretty much an 80% vegetarian household. I cook meat, even my husband would cook meat for us if we ask for it. And he's amazing. I'm like, “You don't even taste it. How do you make it so bloody delicious?” [It's] perfectly seasoned, everything.

So, it wasn't a forced decision, but I just thought I'll be democratic and it'll be delicious.

Mushrooms bring an almost meaty flavor and umami.

Yeah, exactly. Actually it will be vegan because we don't even use any butter. So, it'll be vegan borsch but, accidentally vegan, if that makes sense.

This interview has been edited for clarity.

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Claire Lower

Claire Lower is the Digital Editor for Christopher Kimball’s Milk Street, with over a decade of experience as a food writer and recipe developer. Claire began writing about food (and drinks) during the blogging boom in the late 2000s, eventually leaving her job as a lab technician to pursue writing full-time. After freelancing for publications such as Serious Eats, Yahoo Food, xoJane and Cherry Bombe Magazine, she eventually landed at Lifehacker, where she served as the Senior Food Editor for nearly eight years. Claire lives in Portland, Oregon with a very friendly dog and very mean cat. When not in the kitchen (or at her laptop), you can find her deadlifting at the gym, fly fishing or trying to master figure drawing at her local art studio.