Текст книги "Mastering the Art of Soviet Cooking"

Автор книги: Anya von Bremzen

сообщить о нарушении

Текущая страница: 21 (всего у книги 23 страниц)

^{PART V}
MASTERING THE ART OF SOVIET RECIPES

^{The fantasy of abundance: the opening spread from the 1952 edition of The Book of Tasty and Healthy Food}

^1910s
KULEBIAKA
Fish, Rice, and Mushrooms in Pastry

Our decadent, farewell-to-the-czars fish kulebiaka layered with blinchiki (crepes) was probably the most spectacular thing Mom and I have ever made in our lives. And so time-consuming that I can’t really recommend you try it at home. Instead, I offer here a far less laborious version—minus the complicated layers and blinchiki—that will still leave your guests gasping with awe. The sour cream in the yeast dough (Mom’s special touch) adds a lovely tang to the buttery casing. Inside, the flavors of wild mushrooms, dill, and two types of fish all mingle seductively. Serve the kulebiaka for special occasions with a green salad and lemon-flavored vodka. Lots of it.

KULEBIAKA

Serves 6 to 8

¼ cup warm milk

1 package active dry yeast

(2¼ teaspoons)

2 teaspoons sugar

1 large raw egg; plus 2 hard-cooked eggs, finely chopped

¾ cup sour cream

½ teaspoon kosher salt, plus more to taste

8 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into small pieces; plus 4 tablespoons for the filling

2¼ cups flour, plus more as needed

3 tablespoons canola or peanut oil

8 ounces boneless, skinless salmon fillet, cut into 1-inch pieces

8 ounces boneless, skinless cod fillet, cut into 1-inch pieces

2 medium onions, finely chopped

10 ounces wild or cremini mushrooms, wiped clean and finely chopped

1 cup cooked white rice

3 tablespoons finely chopped dill

3 tablespoons finely chopped flat-leaf parsley

2 tablespoons vermouth or dry sherry

2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice

3 tablespoons chicken stock

1 pinch freshly grated nutmeg Freshly ground black pepper, to taste

2 to 3 tablespoons dried bread crumbs

Glaze: 1 egg yolk whisked with 2 teaspoons milk

1. MAKE THE PASTRY: In a medium bowl stir together the milk, yeast, and sugar and let stand until foamy. Whisk in the raw egg, ½ cup sour cream, and the salt. In a large bowl, combine the 8 tablespoons of cut-up butter with the flour. Using your fingers, work the butter into the flour until the mixture resembles coarse bread crumbs. Add the yeast mixture and stir well with your hands to make a soft dough. Wrap the dough in plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 2 hours.

2. Bring the dough to room temperature, about 1 hour. Grease a mixing bowl with a little butter or oil. Turn the dough out onto a floured work surface and knead, adding more flour as needed, until smooth and no longer sticky, about 5 minutes. Transfer the dough to the greased bowl, cover with plastic wrap, and leave in a warm place until doubled in size, about 2 hours.

3. MAKE THE FILLING: In a large skillet heat the oil and 2 tablespoons butter over medium-high heat. Add the salmon and cod and cook, turning once, until fish just begins to flake, about 7 minutes. Transfer the fish to a large bowl. Return the skillet to medium-high heat and add the remaining 2 tablespoons butter. Add the onions and cook until light golden. Add the mushrooms and cook until they are golden and the liquid they throw off has evaporated, about 7 minutes, adding more oil if the skillet looks dry. Transfer the mushrooms and onions to the bowl with the fish. Add the remaining ¼ cup sour cream, the hard-cooked eggs, rice, dill, parsley, vermouth, lemon juice, stock, and nutmeg. Mix everything well with two forks, stirring gently to break up the fish. Season with salt and pepper. Let the filling cool to room temperature.

4. Preheat the oven to 400°F. with the rack set in the center. Halve the dough and form two logs. On two lightly floured sheets of wax paper, roll each dough log into a 10 by 16-inch rectangle. Transfer one dough sheet to a large foil-lined baking sheet. Sprinkle with bread crumbs, leaving a 1-inch border. Spread the filling over the bread crumbs in a neat compact layer. Drape the remaining dough over the filling and pinch the edges to seal. Trim excess dough from the edges, and reserve scraps. Fold up the edges of dough and crimp decoratively. Let the kulebiaka rise for 15 minutes. Brush the top of the pastry with egg glaze. Roll out the dough scraps, cut into decorative shapes, and press on top of the dough. Brush again with the egg glaze. Poke small holes through the top of dough for steam to escape. Bake until golden and beautiful, about 35 minutes. Let cool for 10 minutes, cut into slices, and serve.

^1920s
GEFILTE FISH
Stuffed Whole Fish, Odessa-Style

Mom and I had our first-ever seder upon immigrating to Philadelphia in 1974. There we were, at the posh suburban home of our kind Jewish sponsors, being paraded around as “heroic refugees” in our shabby Salvation Army clothes. Everyone stared and sang “Let My People Go,” while Mom and I wept, from emotion mixed with embarrassment. To make matters worse, stammering out passages from the Haggadah in my still-broken English, I kept saying “ten pleasures” instead of “ten plagues.” Then came the gefilte fish. Flashing back to the red-haired sisters of my Odessa summer, I tucked into the neat American fish ball with great curiosity… and could barely swallow! The taste was so shockingly sweet, Mom and I later concluded that the hostess must have accidentally added sugar instead of salt. At our second seder the following night, the fish balls were even sweeter. Noticing our bewilderment, the host explained that his people come from Southern Poland, where Jews liked their gefilte fish sweet. “You Russians, don’t you make your fish peppery?” he inquired. Mom blushed. She’d never once made gefilte fish.

Now, many seders later, she and I know that Russian and Ukrainian Jewish babushkas usually cut the fish into thick steaks, remove the meat to grind with onions and carrots, then pack this stuffing (unsweetened) into the skin around the bones. The fish simmers forever with vegetables until the bones all but dissolve—delicious, though not very pretty. Perfectionists go a step further. Like those Odessa sisters, they stuff a whole fish. If you can find a submissive fishmonger willing to remove the skin in one piece—like a stocking, with the tail still attached—this is by far the most festive and dramatic gefilte fish presentation. The head is packed with some of the filling and poached alongside. At serving time, you reassemble the beast and get ready for compliments. If you don’t have a whole skin, just make a loaf and lay a long strip of skin on top as a decoration. And of course, you can always prepare delicious fish balls from this mixture, in which case you’ll need about 3 quarts of stock.

Back in 1920s Odessa my great-grandmother Maria prepared her gefilte fish with pike from the Privoz market. In America many émigré matrons use carp. My personal favorite is a combo of delicate whitefish with the darker, oilier carp. And while this recipe does contain a large pinch of sugar, it’s the masses of slowly cooked onions that deliver the sweetness. With plenty of horseradish at table, please.

GEFILTE FISH

Serves 10 to 12 as a first course

4 to 5 tablespoons peanut oil or pareve margarine, plus more as needed

2 large onions, finely chopped; plus 1 small onion, coarsely chopped

2 sheets matzo, broken into pieces

3 medium carrots, peeled; 1 carrot coarsely chopped, the other 2 left whole

1 whole whitefish, pike, or another firm fish, about 4 pounds, skinned (see headnote) and filleted (you should have about 1½ pounds fillets), head reserved; fillet cut into small pieces

1½ pounds carp fillets, cut into small pieces

3 large eggs

1 tablespoon ice-cold water

1 teaspoon sugar, or more to taste

2 teaspoons kosher salt and freshly ground white or black pepper to taste

4 cups fish stock (store-bought is fine) or chicken stock

Fresh watercress for decoration, if desired

Fresh or bottled horseradish, for serving

1. In a large skillet heat the oil over medium-low heat. Add the 2 finely chopped onions and cook, stirring often, until softened, about 12 minutes. Let the onions cool for 15 minutes. While the onions are cooling, soak the matzos in cold water to cover for 10 minutes. Drain thoroughly, squeeze out the liquid, and crumble the matzo into a paste with your hands.

2. In a food processor, pulse the coarsely chopped raw onion and the chopped carrot until finely minced, and transfer to a large mixing bowl. Working in 4 batches, pulse the whitefish and carp fillets, the sautéed onions, and the matzo until finely ground but not pureed, transferring the finished batches to the bowl with the onion and carrots. Stir in the eggs, water, sugar, 2 teaspoons of salt, and pepper to taste. Blend until the mixture is homogenous and a little sticky. To taste for seasoning, poach or sauté a small fish ball. If the mixture looks too loose to shape, refrigerate it for about an hour, covered with plastic.

3. Preheat the oven to 425°F. with the rack set in the center. Line an 18 by 12-inch metal or foil roasting pan with a piece of foil. If using a whole fish skin with tail attached, lay it out on the foil and stuff with the fish mixture so it resembles a whole fish. With wet hands, shape any leftover mixture into oblong balls. If using a fish head, stuff it with some of the fish mixture, and add to the pan along with the fish balls. If making a loaf with a strip of skin as a decoration (see headnote), shape the fish mixture into a loaf approximately 16 by 6 inches on the foil and lay the skin along the top. Brush the top of the stuffed fish or loaf with a little oil. Bake until the top just begins to color, about 20 minutes.

4. While the fish bakes, bring the fish stock to a simmer. Add enough hot stock to the pan with the fish to come two thirds of the way up the side of the fish. If there is not enough, add a little water. Add the whole carrots to the pan. Reduce the oven temperature to 325°F., cover the top of the pan loosely with foil, and continue braising the fish until set and cooked through, about 45 minutes. Baste it with the poaching liquid once or twice, and turn the fish balls, if using.

5. Allow the fish to cool completely in the liquid, about 3 hours, cover with plastic, and refrigerate overnight. To serve, using two large spatulas, carefully transfer it to a long serving platter, lined with watercress, if desired. Attach the head, if using, to the fish. Cut the carrots into slices, and use to decorate the top of the fish. Serve with horseradish.

^1930s
KOTLETI
Mom’s Russian “Hamburgers”

Kotleti for lunch, kotleti for dinner, kotleti of beef, of pork, of fish, of chicken—even kotleti of minced carrots or beets. The entire USSR pretty much lived on these cheap, delicious fried patties, and when comrades didn’t make them from scratch, they bought them at stores. Back in Moscow, Mom and I harbored a secret passion for the proletarian, six-kopek variety produced by the meat-processing plant named after Stalin’s food supply commissar, Anastas Mikoyan. Inspired by his 1936 trip to America, Mikoyan wanted to copy Yankee burgers in Russia, but somehow the bun got lost in the shuffle and the country got hooked on mass-produced kotleti instead. Deliciously greasy, petite, and with a heavy industrial breading that fried up to a wicked crunch, Mikoyan factory patties could be scarfed down by the dozen. Wild with nostalgia, Mom and I tried a million times to recreate them at home, but no luck: some manufactured treats just can’t be duplicated. So we always reverted back to Mom’s (far more noble) homemade version.

Every ex-Soviet cook has a special trick for making juicy, savory patties. Some add crushed ice, others tuck in pats of butter or mix in a whipped egg white. My mother likes her kotleti Odessa-style (garlicky!), and adds mayo as binding instead of the usual egg, with delightful results. The same formula works with ground turkey or chicken or fish. Buckwheat kasha makes a nostalgic Russian accompaniment. Ditto thin potato batons slowly pan-fried with onions in lots of butter or oil. I love cold kotleti for lunch the next day, with some dense dark bread, hot mustard, and a good crunchy dill pickle.

KOTLETI

Serves 4

1½ pounds freshly ground beef chuck (or a mixture of beef and pork)

2 slices stale white bread, crusts removed, soaked for 5 minutes in water and squeezed

1 small onion, grated

2 medium garlic cloves, crushed in a press

2 tablespoons finely chopped dill or parsley

2½ tablespoons full-fat mayonnaise

1 teaspoon kosher salt

½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper, or more to taste

2 to 3 cups fine dried bread crumbs for coating

Canola oil and unsalted butter, for frying

1. In a mixing bowl, combine the first eight ingredients and blend well into a homogenous mixture. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes.

2. With wet hands, shape the mixture into oval patties approximately 3½ inches long. Spread bread crumbs on a large plate or a sheet of wax paper. Coat patties in crumbs, flattening them out slightly and pressing down for the crumbs to adhere.

3. In a large skillet heat 2 tablespoons of the oil with a pat of butter until sizzling. Working in batches, fry the kotleti over medium-high heat until golden-brown, about 4 minutes per side. Cover the pan, reduce the heat to low, and fry for another 2 to 3 minutes to cook through. Transfer to a plate lined with paper towels. Repeat with the rest of the patties. Serve at once.

^1940s
KARTOCHKI
Ration Cards

As we started work on the 1940s chapter, Mother and I batted around various menu ideas for the decade. Maybe we’d bake millet, like my grandmother Liza did at the evacuation warehouse in Lenin’s birth town of Ulyanovsk. Or we could improvise wartime “pastries”—a slice of black bread with a barely there dusting of sugar. We even entertained recreating a banquet from the February 1945 Yalta Conference where the “Big Three” and their entourage feasted on quail pilaf and fish in champagne sauce, while the battered country half starved.

In the end, we changed our minds: cooking just didn’t seem right. Instead of a recipe I offer a photo of a ration card book. Place of issue: Leningrad. Date: December 1941, the third month of the terrible Siege, which lasted nine hundred days and claimed around a million lives. Temperatures that winter plunged to minus thirty. There was no heat, no electricity, no running water in the frozen city; sewage pipes burst from the cold; transport stood motionless. Peter the Great’s imperial capital resembled a snow-covered graveyard where emaciated crowds, so many soon to be ghosts, lined up for their ration of bread. By December 1941 the rations had fallen to 250 grams for industrial workers; for all other citizens, 125 grams—barely four ounces of something sticky and damp, adulterated with sawdust and cattle fodder and cellulose. But those 125 grams, those twenty small daily bites gotten with a puny square of paper, were often the difference between survival and death.

An image like this calls for a moment of silence.

1940s

Reproduction of a Rationing Card (ITAR-TASS/Sovfoto)

^1950s
CHANAKHI
Georgian Stew of Lamb, Herbs, and Vegetables

In Soviet times, without access to travel or foreign cuisines, Russians turned to the Union’s exotic fringes for complex, spicy foods. Georgian food was Moscow’s de facto haute cuisine, satisfying our northern cravings for smoke, herbs, garlic, and bright, sunny seasoning. If you can forget that this might have been Stalin’s favorite dish, this soupy one-dish meal is a marvel. The Georgian penchant for masses of aromatic herbs is on captivating display, and the meat essentially braises in its own herbaceous, garlicky juices, along with tender eggplants, tomatoes, and spuds. By tradition the stew is baked in an earthenware pot called chanakhi. But enamel cast iron, such as Le Creuset, or a large, sturdy Dutch oven will do just as well. All this stew needs is good hot flatbread to soak up the juices, and a sprightly salad of peppery greens.

CHANAKHI

Serves 6 to 8

1 tightly packed cup chopped cilantro, plus more for serving

1 tightly packed cup chopped basil, plus more for serving

1 tightly packed cup chopped flat-leaf parsley, plus more for serving

12 large garlic cloves, minced

Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste

1 teaspoon paprika, plus more for rubbing the lamb

Large pinch of red pepper flakes, such as Aleppo, plus more for rubbing the lamb

3 to 3½ pounds shoulder lamb chops, trimmed of excess fat and halved lengthwise

3 medium onions, quartered and thinly sliced crosswise

2 tablespoons olive oil

2 ripe plum tomatoes, chopped; plus 4 plum tomatoes quartered lengthwise

1½ cups tomato juice

2 tablespoons red wine vinegar

Boiling water as needed

3 slender long Asian eggplants (10 to 12 inches long)

3 medium Yukon Gold potatoes, peeled and cut into wedges

1. Preheat the oven to 325°F. with the rack set in the lower third. In a mixing bowl combine the cilantro, basil, parsley, and garlic. Toss the mixture with ½ teaspoon of salt, generous gratings of black pepper, paprika, and pepper flakes.

2. Rub the lamb chops with salt, black pepper, paprika, and pepper flakes. In a mixing bowl toss the lamb with the onions. Add a large handful of the herb mixture and the oil, and toss to coat.

3. Place the lamb and the onions as snugly as possible on the bottom of a very large enamel cast-iron pot with a tight-fitting lid. Set the pot over high heat and cook until steam begins to rise from the bottom, about 3 minutes. Reduce heat to medium-low, cover tightly, and cook until the lamb is opaque and has thrown off a lot of juice, about 12 minutes. Turn the lamb, cover, and cook for 3 to 4 minutes longer. Add the chopped tomatoes, another handful of herbs, 1 cup of the tomato juice, and 1 tablespoon of the vinegar, and bring to a vigorous simmer. Cover and transfer the pot to the oven. Cook until the lamb is tender, 1½ to 1¾ hours, checking periodically and adding a little water if it looks dry.

4. While the meat cooks, place the three eggplants directly on three burners set over medium-high heat. Cook, turning and moving the eggplants until the surface is lightly browned and begins to char in spots but the flesh is still firm, 2 to 3 minutes total. Watch out for drips and flame sparks. Using tongs, transfer the eggplants to a cutting board. When cool enough to handle, cut each eggplant crosswise into 4 sections. With a small sharp knife, make a slit in each section, and stuff some of the herb mixture into each slit. In two separate bowls, season the potatoes and the quartered tomatoes with salt and a little of the herb mixture.

5. Remove the lamb from the oven and stir in the potatoes, using tongs and a large spoon to push them gently under the meat. Add the remaining tomato juice and vinegar, another handful of the herb mixture, and enough boiling water, if needed, to generously cover the potatoes and meat. Scatter the eggplant sections on top, nestling them in the liquid. Cover and bake for 30 minutes longer. Add the tomatoes, scattering them on top without stirring, and sprinkle with the remaining herb mixture. Cover and bake for another 20 minutes.

6. Raise the oven temperature to 400°F. Uncover the pot and bake until the juices are thickened, about 15 minutes. Remove the stew from the oven and let cool for 5 to 10 minutes. Serve straight from the pot, sprinkled with additional herbs.

^1960s
CORNBREAD FOR KHRUSHCHEV
Moldovan Cornbread with Feta

Say “Khrushchev” and a Russian will laugh and immediately cry kukuruza (corn)! And so, in memory of Nikita “Kukuruznik” (Corn Man) Khrushchev and his loony crusade to hook our Union on corn, Mom and I wanted to prepare a maize tribute. The notion of cornbread, however, struck Mom as odd. To a northern Slav, she insisted, bread made from maize sounded oxymoronic; it verged on sacrilege. Bread was sacred and bread was wheat. The breadlines that sprouted during the 1963 crop failure helped push Khrushchev into early retirement, and after he’d gone, corn was either forgotten or recalled as an agricultural gag in northern parts of the Union. But not so in southwestern USSR, I reminded my mother. There cornmeal had been a staple for centuries. Georgians prepared it into gomi (white grits) or mchadi, griddled cakes to be dipped into stews. Western Ukrainians and Moldovans ate mamalyga, the local polenta, as their daily kasha (gruel).

I myself discovered the bounty of the Union’s corn recipes when researching my book Please to the Table. And I fell in love with this fantastically moist, extra-savory Moldovan cornbread—enriched, local-style, with sour cream and tangy feta cheese. Recently, I made it for Mom. It came out so yummy that we ate it straight from the pan—warm and topped with fire-roasted red peppers. Mom recalled how in breadless 1963 she’d thrown out a bag of cornmeal someone had given her. What am I to do with this yellow sawdust? she’d wondered back then. Well, now she knows. Here’s the recipe.

CORNBREAD FOR KHRUSHCHEV

Serves 6

2 large eggs, lightly beaten 2 cups milk

6 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted, plus more for greasing the pan

½ cup sour cream

2 cups fine yellow cornmeal, preferably stone-ground

¾ cup all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon sugar

2 teaspoons baking powder

½ teaspoon baking soda

2 cups grated or finely crumbled feta cheese (about 12 ounces)

Roasted red pepper strips for serving, optional

1. Preheat the oven to 400°F. with the rack set in the center. In a large bowl, thoroughly stir together the first four ingredients. In another bowl sift together the cornmeal, flour, sugar, baking powder, and baking soda. Whisk the dry ingredients into the egg mixture until smooth. Add the feta and whisk to blend thoroughly. Let the batter stand for 10 minutes.

2. Butter a 9 by 9 by 2-inch baking pan. Pour the batter into the pan and tap to even it out. Bake the cornbread until light golden and firm to the touch, 35 to 40 minutes. Serve warm, with roasted peppers, if desired.