Vegetarian Borscht Recipe Packs a Nutritional Punch

Now that we are in the throes of the winter months, we look to meals to be hearty and warming. There is nothing better to warm you up and provide great nutrition than soup. I love being able to throw all of the soup ingredients in my Crockpot and let them cook all day, creating a wonderful fragrance throughout the house. I decided to try a soup I am not familiar with: Borscht. Borscht is popular among Eastern European cultures. Borscht can be made without beetroots, but the most well-known version in North America comes is the Ukrainian version, which contains the purple-coloured root vegetable.

Borscht packs a wallop when it comes to nutrition since the soup contains both beets and cabbage. Beets contain Betanin and vulgaxanthin are betalains and are an excellent source of folate. They are also a very good source of manganese, potassium and copper, and a good source of dietary fiber, magnesium, phosphorus, vitamin C, iron and vitamin B6. Cabbage is an excellent source of vitamin K, vitamin C and vitamin B6, and a very good source of potassium, manganese, vitamin B1, folate and copper and fiber.

Borscht is often made with meat and/or meat broth, but I omitted both in order to make Vegetarian Borscht. You could add a cup of kidney beans if you wanted, but I have chosen not to do this.

I set the Vegetarian Borscht to cook in my Crockpot on low for six hours. You could try cooking it on the high setting four hours, although I prefer to let soups cook longer so that the flavours really get a chance to blend and create a depth of flavour. By the way, I thought this soup tasted even better the next day!

Let me know in the comments if you make this Vegetarian Borscht Recipe and what you think of it.

Vegetarian Borscht Recipe

A vegetarian Borscht recipe that is rich in flavour.

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Prep Time 1 hour hr

Cook Time 6 hours hrs

Total Time 7 hours hrs

Cuisine Vegetarian

Servings 6

Ingredients

  

• 7 beets peeled, with ends chopped off
• 2 large potatoes peeled and chopped
• 1 onion peeled and chopped
• 1 cup carrots peeled and coarsely chopped
• 3 cups cabbage shredded
• 4 cups vegetable broth
• 3 cloves garlic minced
• 4 Tablespoons tomato paste
• 1 Tablespoon Red Wine Vinegar
• 1/4 cup fresh dill chopped
• 1/2 tsp black pepper
• 1/3 cup sour cream or plain yogourt optional

Instructions

 

• Place beets, potato, onion, carrots, vegetable broth, tomato paste, red wine vingegar, garlic and black pepper in slow cooker and cook on high heat for 6 hours.
• Add 3 cups of shredded cabbage and 1/4 cup of fresh dill and continue to cook on high for another 60 minutes.
• Ladle into soup bowls and serve topped with sour cream or plain yogourt (optional).