Rare Russian cooking: Vinegret

This is rare in the sense that I rarely cook straight up Russian food when I’m not at home. But I had to make something ‘cultural’ for this potluck dinner this week so here is one of those dishes – a classic Russian salad known as vinegret. It has beets and pickles and potatoes – classic Russian cuisine ingredients!

As most Russian salads, the vegetables are all cooked and chopped (the finer the better) so the process is somewhat laborious. This is a classic in the way that everyone makes it and everyone makes it differently. I like that because you can really adjust it depending on what you have available. You can also add cold meats into the mix if you’d like.

You’ll need:

• 3 large (or 5 to 6 medium-sized) beets
• 3 large (or substitute similarly to beets) potatoes (please, the not baking kind as that would fall apart).
• 4 pickles
• 1 small-medium red onion
• 3 medium-sized carrots
• 300 g sweet pickled cabbage (see below for what to do if you can’t find it or don’t have time to make your own)
• 400 g fresh/frozen/canned peas (in order of preference)
• olive or sunflower oil
• salt & pepper to taste

1. I roast the beets covered in foil in a large baking dish on a big layer of salt (I like to cook chicken and potatoes that way too). About 180-200C fot 1.5 to 2 hours depending on the size of the beets. You can also boil them but roasted beets taste much better.

2. Bring a pot of water to a boil and cook the rest of the vegetables (potatoes, carrots, peas if fresh or frozen) until tender. Don’t overcook because you don’t want potatoes to become mashed potatoes while you are chopping them. Remember to peel all of these while they are still hot as that is the easiest and the skins should just slide off.

3. Chop all of the vegetables (including onion) finely, the finer the better.

4. If using canned pickled cabbage, check that it is not too vinegary. The one I bought at Waitrose last night was and I had to rinse it under cold water a few times, drain it, dry it, chop it and then add about 2 – 2.5 tsps of sugar to balance the taste.

5. Chop the pickles but add them last(!) as they give off a lot of liquid.

6. Mix everything together, dress with a bit of parsley on top and some oil. I wouldn’t salt this too much as the pickles add that bit of salty kick that you need.