Borscht Worth Bragging About

You've invoked two of the best food writers working today—one who'd want me to explain why each technique works, the other who'd insist I respect the dish's origins while being honest about adaptations. Let me try to honor both.

The Foundation: Understanding What Borscht Actually Is

Borscht isn't one dish. It's a family of soups spanning Ukraine, Russia, Poland, and beyond, with variations that would start arguments at any Eastern European grandmother's table. The version most people picture—that magenta, beet-forward bowl with a cloud of sour cream—is broadly Ukrainian in origin, though claiming any single "authentic" recipe is a fool's errand.

What matters: beets are the soul, sourness is essential, and the soup should taste like something a home cook made with care, not like a beet fell into some beef broth by accident.

The Recipe

For about 6-8 servings:

Ingredients

1.5 lbs (700g) beets—about 3-4 medium ones
1 lb (450g) waxy potatoes (Yukon Gold work beautifully)
1 lb (450g) bone-in beef chuck or short ribs (optional but traditional)
1 medium onion, diced
2 carrots, peeled and grated on the large holes of a box grater
3 tablespoons tomato paste
2 tablespoons neutral oil or beef fat
6 cups beef or vegetable stock
2 cups water
3 cloves garlic, minced
2 tablespoons red wine vinegar, plus more to taste
1 tablespoon sugar (sounds weird, trust me)
2 bay leaves
Salt and black pepper
Fresh dill, chopped
Sour cream for serving

The Kenji Part: Why We Do What We Do

Roast your beets. You could boil them, but roasting at 400°F (200°C) wrapped in foil for about an hour concentrates their sugars and develops deeper flavor. The Maillard reaction isn't just for steaks. When they're cool enough to handle, the skins slip off easily, and you can grate them on the large holes of a box grater. Yes, your hands will look like a crime scene. This is correct.

Grate the carrots and beets. Large holes, not fine. You want texture, not baby food. The high surface area means faster flavor extraction and better integration into the broth.

That tablespoon of sugar isn't about making the soup sweet—it's about balance. Beets are earthy and can veer toward muddy without enough acidity and a touch of sweetness to brighten them. The sugar works with the vinegar to create a flavor that reads as "vibrant" rather than "rooty."

Add the vinegar late. Acid added too early can set pectin and toughen vegetables. More importantly, volatile aromatics in vinegar cook off. Adding it toward the end preserves that essential tang.

The Method

If using beef: Season the meat generously with salt. In a large Dutch oven or soup pot, heat the oil over medium-high heat and brown the meat on all sides—don't crowd the pot, work in batches if needed. Real browning, not gray steaming. Remove and set aside.
Build the base: In the same pot, add the onion with a pinch of salt. Cook until softened and just starting to color, about 5-6 minutes. Add the grated carrots and cook another 3-4 minutes until they soften and release their color into the fat.
Tomato paste: Push the vegetables to one side and add the tomato paste directly to the exposed pot bottom. Let it fry in the oil for about a minute until it darkens slightly and smells less raw. This is flavor development, not just an ingredient addition.
Liquids and meat: Add the stock, water, bay leaves, and the browned beef (if using). Bring to a simmer, then reduce heat to maintain a gentle bubble. Partially cover and cook for about 1.5 hours if using beef, until the meat is tender. If going meatless, skip the long simmer.
Potatoes: Cut into roughly 3/4-inch cubes. Add to the pot and simmer until just tender, about 15 minutes. Don't let them get mushy.
Beets: Add your grated roasted beets. Simmer another 10-15 minutes to let them integrate.
Season: Remove the bay leaves. Add the garlic, sugar, and vinegar. Stir well. Taste—this is critical. The soup should be slightly sweet, notably tangy, earthy, and savory all at once. Adjust salt, vinegar, and sugar until it sings. The soup will likely need more salt than you expect.
Rest: This is not optional. Borscht, like most soups, improves dramatically after sitting for several hours or overnight. The flavors meld and deepen. Reheat gently.

The Fuchsia Part: Respect and Adaptation

I want to be clear: I'm not Ukrainian, and this recipe is filtered through my understanding of the dish, not handed down through generations of family knowledge. There's a version of borscht your Ukrainian neighbor makes that would probably be better than this one, because recipes carry memory and context that can't be typed out.

That said, good cooking is about understanding principles and applying them thoughtfully. The techniques here—roasting for concentration, browning for fond, acid for brightness, time for melding—are universal. They work because chemistry works.

If you want to go further toward traditional: add shredded cabbage when you add the potatoes. Some versions include white beans. A ham bone instead of beef is excellent. Fresh beet greens, chopped and added at the end, are beautiful if your beets came with good ones.

Serving

Ladle into deep bowls. Add a serious dollop of sour cream—not a polite swirl, a proper cloud. Shower with fresh dill. Serve with dark rye bread if you have it.

The soup should be a color that makes you pause before eating. That's the point. Borscht is honest food that doesn't hide what it is.

And if your hands are still pink tomorrow, you did it right.