Housewives in Ukrainian villages in the Poltava region knew exactly how to prepare the most delicious cabbage soup. This is a hearty dish - two in one, as they say now - both the first and the second. Although they classify it as a first course. And if you have never cooked cabbage on your own, try it together with Smart Tips, and you will definitely succeed!
In late autumn, work in the gardens and fields ended. The cellars were full of pickles and preserves, vegetables and fruits. Cabbage was fermented in barrels, and tubs of salted lard stood in a row on the shelves. A lot of work has been put in and energy has been wasted so that a rich harvest can feed the family in winter and spring. By the way, we have a great recipe for pickling apples on our website! Read the article “How to ferment apples - a simple, proven recipe.”
It was getting cold. It's time to prepare a hot dish of sauerkraut, lard and fresh meat. It was believed that cabbage soup or cabbage soup would return vigor, activity and satiety to the body. And there’s no need to talk about the taste, it’s excellent.
What the most delicious cabbage is made from - ingredients
Naturally, different countries and localities have their own recipes for cabbage, and the products in it may differ. The traditional dish came to us from Ukrainian cuisine and is simple, healthy, tasty and satisfying. The main distinguishing ingredient in it is sauerkraut with its special aroma and sourness. This dish is prepared in Russia, Poland and Slovakia and many countries around the world.
Secrets of experienced cooks
Smart tips collected secrets on how to cook the most delicious cabbage from the most famous cooks and cooks. And although each recipe is quite simple, there are still some subtleties. You need to know not only about the main stages, but also some subtleties.
- First, cook the broth until tender. It can be made from pork, chicken, or even fish. But the most delicious cabbage soup is made with pork and beef broth - take note! When cooking, do not forget to add onions, garlic, carrots and white roots to it for a rich aroma.
- Meat and bones are removed from the finished broth. The meat is chopped and added back to the dish at the end of cooking.
- Potatoes and millet cereals are placed in the boiling broth (in some recipes this can be rice, buckwheat, barley). An important point: before cooking, millet must be washed in cold running water until it is completely transparent. The bitterness and unpleasant aftertaste will go away.
- It is better to take boiled and sugary potatoes for cabbage.
- Sauerkraut is added last. And after it - chopped meat.
- It is a great art to prepare the dressing correctly, but more on that a little later.
- Take the traditional greens for cabbage: dill and parsley. It is better to add it immediately before serving, directly to the plate.
- A good cabbage plant costs a spoon. And if not, then it’s not cabbage soup, but a dull soup :)
Many people will immediately want to know how to cook the most delicious cabbage soup in Poltava. Let's start with it.
Poltava cabbage - recipe
This dish is prepared using fatty pork broth and millet. You will need a set of products for 3 liters of water:
- pork with lard – 400 g (ham or ribs);
- potatoes – 400 g;
- carrots – 2 pcs.;
- onions – 2 pcs.;
- millet – ½ cup;
- little vegetable – 50 ml;
- tomato paste – 3 tbsp. spoons;
- sauerkraut – 400 g;
- fresh dill (optional);
- salt and pepper to taste.
Cooking process
If the meat broth seems too bland to you, or the cabbage soup is not filling enough, add to it a dressing made from crushed in a mortar: 1 boiled egg, 3-4 cloves of garlic and a finely chopped piece of salted, slightly aged lard.
If the cabbage soup does not seem thick enough to you, boil 2-3 potatoes separately, mash them and add them before the end of cooking.
If you add bay leaves, do so at the very last moment and remember to remove after 15 minutes.
Read also: How to cook borscht. The simplest and most popular recipes
Fish cabbage - Lenten recipe
Cabbage with fish is prepared with fresh cabbage instead of meat. The taste and sourness of pickled wine in this case are incompatible with the fishy aroma.
Products for 2–3 liters of water:
- fresh fish or canned fish – 200 g;
- potatoes – 3–4 pcs.;
- carrots – 1 pc.;
- onion – 1 pc.;
- millet – 100 g;
- tomato paste – 2 tbsp. spoons;
- fresh cabbage – 200 g;
- parsley, spices, salt to taste.
Cooking process:
Useful article Lenten recipes - first courses.
Recipe for chicken cabbage soup with rice
In the villages they prepared a hot dish of sauerkraut for weddings and funerals. And since in ancient times chickens were not counted in the farmstead, the bird was the basis for the broth. The heads of families who returned from the fields especially loved to treat themselves to a hearty meat dinner. Housewives from yard to yard passed on their secrets on how to cook the most delicious cabbage and it turned out more and more delicious.
Products for 3 liters of water:
- chicken carcass or giblets – 400 g;
- potatoes – 3–5 pcs.;
- rice – ½ cup;
- one piece each of onion and carrot;
- vegetable oil – 2 tbsp. spoons;
- tomato paste – 2 tbsp. spoons;
- sauerkraut – 300 g;
- spices and fresh dill.
Cooking process:
There are many cabbage recipes. Choose and try your dish. The main thing is that it allows you to create and experiment, add different products and enjoy new tastes. Smart kitchen wishes you bon appetit.
Calories: Not specified
Cooking time: Not indicated
As far as I remember, always when we came to the village, the first thing my great-grandmother did was cook delicious rich Ukrainian cabbage with sauerkraut in the oven, because this was dad’s favorite first dish, and she so wanted to please her beloved grandson and his family. True, I could never say that I loved this dish so much, but when grandma took a cauldron of such soup out of the oven, it was simply impossible to refuse it. I have described a detailed recipe with a photo of a delicious dish for you.
You definitely can’t make this kind of soup at home, no matter how hard you try, but in the oven everything comes out much tastier and richer. But this is not a reason to refuse to prepare such a dish in urban conditions, especially if, which is the main ingredient of this dish, is homemade and moderately sour, then the soup turns out very tasty.
It’s also very important to cook it in good meat broth. This is generally the basis and therefore the fate of the entire cabbage depends on its taste. I sometimes cook cabbage soup from sauerkraut in chicken broth to make the dish more dietary and tender, but my men prefer when such a soup is cooked with pork or veal, and that the meat has a bone.
There are no particular difficulties in preparing this dish: add potatoes to the broth, then washed, squeezed sauerkraut and rice, a little later add sautéed vegetables with the addition of tomato paste or fresh tomatoes, and at the very end add spices and chopped garlic.
- meat (pulp) – 500 g,
- water – 3 l,
- cabbage (sauerkraut) – 300 g,
- carrots – 1 pc.,
- onion – 1 - 2 pcs.,
- potato tuber – 4 pcs.,
- rice – 3-4 tbsp.,
- tomato paste – 2-3 tbsp. or tomato juice – 50 ml,
- kitchen salt (medium grind), spices - to taste.
Recipe with photos step by step:
Preparation:
First, we wash the meat, then place it in a pan and fill it with cold water. As the water boils, a foam from the coagulated protein will appear; we must remove it. Cook the meat over medium heat until done. 
Next, peel the potatoes, chop them coarsely and put them in a pan. 
Wash the rice and after 20 minutes add it to the soup. 
After 10 minutes, squeeze out the cabbage: if it is sour, be sure to rinse it with water.
We send it to the frying pan. Add. 
Pour some more broth into the cabbage, stir and simmer for 5 minutes, and then send it to the cabbage soup. 
Finely chop the peeled onion.
Peel the carrots and chop them on a coarse grater.
Sauté vegetables with added oil until golden brown. 
Add the sauté to the soup and cook it for another 20 minutes over very low heat.
At the very end, add chopped garlic, maybe herbs and spices.
When the cabbage is infused, 
pour it into plates and serve with sour cream. 
Bon appetit!
How to cook cabbage, the recipes for which today number in the hundreds? How not to make a mistake with ingredients and their correct combination? It is to these questions that we will try to give the most complete answer possible, presenting to your attention several completely different recipes, each of which complies with all the rules for preparing this dish.
Sauerkraut cabbage recipe
Ingredients:
- sauerkraut – 300 g;
- pork – 400 g;
- onions – 2 pcs.;
- potatoes – 4 pcs.;
- millet – 3 tbsp. spoons;
- carrots – 1 pc.;
- tomato paste – 2 tbsp. spoons;
- bay leaf – 1 pc.;
- salt – 5 g;
- pepper – 5 g;
- garlic – 1 clove.
Preparation
A real cabbage soup with millet is prepared, but if desired, you can replace it with rice, then you will get cabbage with rice.
First you need to deal with the meat, rinse it, pour 2.5 liters of water, add a bay leaf to it and let it cook for an hour.
While the meat is cooking, you can do the rest of the ingredients. Potatoes, carrots and onions need to be peeled. Peeled but not cut potatoes should be sent to cook in a pan with meat, and after 20-25 minutes, take them out and mash them with a fork on a plate. When you remove the potatoes from the pan, add cabbage and millet to the broth and cook them too for 25 minutes. If you use rice instead of millet, add it towards the end, along with the tomato dressing.
While the cabbage is cooking, fry finely chopped onion and grated carrots in vegetable oil. Next, you need to add tomato paste diluted with water and fry for a few more minutes. Finally, mashed potatoes, garlic, salt and pepper should be mixed with tomato dressing and added to the pan, then simmer the cabbage on low heat for another 15-20 minutes.
Before serving, it is advisable to let the dish brew.
Ukrainian cabbage can be prepared from either sauerkraut or fresh cabbage. The latest recipe for making cabbage cabbage differs in its set of initial ingredients.
Cabbage from fresh cabbage
Ingredients:
- meat (beef or pork) – 400 g;
- fresh cabbage – 400 g;
- onions – 2 pcs.;
- potatoes – 5 pcs.;
- carrots – 1 pc.;
- tomato paste – 3 tbsp. spoons;
- pepper – 5 g;
- salt – 10 g;
- millet – 2 tbsp. spoons.
Preparation
The meat must be washed, placed in a deep pan with cold water and simmered over low heat until half cooked. Also, do not forget to remove the foam when the meat begins to boil.
While the broth is preparing, you can do the vegetables, namely, peel the potatoes, onions and carrots, grate the latter, and cut the onion into cubes. The cabbage must be cut into thin strips.
10-15 minutes after the meat boils, you need to add whole potatoes to the pan and boil them until tender. The finished potatoes need to be caught from the broth and mashed with a fork. Very large potatoes can be cut into several pieces before adding to the pan.
After the potatoes, add cabbage to the broth, and while it is cooking, start preparing the dressing. For this you need 
fry the onions and carrots in vegetable oil, add tomato paste and millet to them and simmer the thoroughly mixed products for 5-7 minutes.
The resulting dressing must be sent to the pan with the meat and the cabbage should be cooked for another 15 minutes, then turn off the heat and be sure to let the dish brew.
If you pour cabbage soup into plates right away, its taste will be noticeably different from a real Ukrainian or Polish dish. When the soup is steeped for 30-40 minutes, all the ingredients become saturated with each other’s aromas, and everyone who tries this dish for the first time always asks for more.
Want even more classic recipes on your table? Then try authentic recipes and enjoy your meal!
For a homemade lunch, I recommend everyone to prepare a rich, thick and very tasty cabbage soup from sauerkraut with millet. It is cooked by adding millet and sauerkraut. The soup turns out to be so tasty that rarely anyone refuses the addition. Every housewife can prepare it, but you can either ferment the cabbage yourself or just buy it. If you don’t have time to pickle, then certainly buying ready-made sauerkraut will make it easier and faster for you to solve the problem. I described the recipe with a photo of this dish in detail for you. Also see how to cook. 
Required Products:
- 200 grams of sauerkraut,
- 2.5 liters of meat broth,
- 150 grams of millet,
- 250 grams of potatoes,
- 100 grams of carrots,
- 100 grams of white onions,
- 1.5 tsp. l. tomato paste,
- 20-30 grams of vegetable oil,
- a little salt.
Recipe with photos step by step:
Cut the peeled potatoes into medium-sized cubes. 
Place potato cubes into boiling, slightly salted meat broth. Let's start cooking the soup. Any meat broth is suitable for soup, but if you are on a diet, replace it with vegetable broth, it will also turn out delicious. 
Immediately after the potatoes, add the washed millet to the soup. Cereals cook just as quickly as potatoes, so combine these two ingredients at once. You need to cook potatoes and millet over low heat. 
When the potatoes and millet are cooked, add sauerkraut to the soup. Cook the cabbage for 10-15 minutes. There is no need to add any more salt to the soup. In general, you need to salt cabbage very carefully so as not to oversalt it, since by adding sauerkraut you can oversalt it. Therefore, it is better to first under-salt the soup, and then adjust the taste during the cooking process. 
While the ingredients are boiling, prepare the vegetable frying: fry the chopped carrots and onions. Fry in vegetable oil until soft, then add tomato paste and fry for a couple more minutes. Tomato paste must be fried to make it tastier. 
Place the roasted tomato and vegetables into the boiling soup when the sauerkraut is cooked. Cook the soup for another 5-7 minutes and the dish is ready. I would also like to draw your attention to. 
We immediately serve hot cabbage to the table for everyone. Bon Appetite!
Kapustnyak is one of the most delicious dishes in Ukraine; in terms of its taste, it is no worse than the usual borscht, it’s just not that widespread.
As a rule, the presented Lenten soup is usually prepared in autumn and winter, since one of its main ingredients is sauerkraut. You can slightly modify the composition at your discretion, but cabbage is what always remains in this soup. Let's try to cook this delicious Ukrainian cabbage soup with sauerkraut, millet and tomato, but without traditional meat.
Ingredients for the recipe for Ukrainian cabbage with sauerkraut and millet:
- A few potatoes
- Carrot,
- Bulb,
- Garlic,
- Sauerkraut - 300 grams,
- An incomplete glass of millet,
- Tomato paste - 2 tablespoons,
- A few peppercorns, a mixture of ground pepper,
- Salt and bay leaf,
- Sunflower oil.
How to cook cabbage soup with sauerkraut and millet:
1) Let's start preparing cabbage. First of all, put a pan of water on the stove, throw a few peppercorns into the water.
The onion needs to be peeled, then finely chopped and placed in a saucepan with water.
2) At this time, peel the potatoes and then cut them. About 5 minutes after the onions, you can add the potatoes into the pan and continue cooking.
3) The millet should be poured into a deep bowl, and then rinsed under running hot water to remove all possible impurities. When the water in the pan boils, you can add millet and stir the soup.
4) Sauerkraut must first be washed under water and then chopped a little with a knife.
5) You will need three times more of it than usual, since when grinding its volume changes greatly.
As soon as the potatoes are soft enough and the millet is almost cooked, you need to add the cabbage and mix the soup well.
6) The cabbage should simmer a little along with the soup, so let’s prepare the frying. Rinse the carrots under running water, peel them, and then grate them.
7) Place a frying pan on the fire, add a couple of tablespoons of sunflower oil and heat it up. As soon as the oil is hot, you need to put the carrots in the frying pan and fry a little, stirring well.
8) At the end of frying, add tomato paste.
9) Stir and add another 100 ml of water, simmer for another 5 minutes. Stir, add spices and salt.
10) Pour the dressing into the soup and stir.
11) Peel the garlic and cut into strips.
