Green Borscht – Ukrainian Sorrel Soup with Egg
Ingredients:
Preparation mode:
👉 Green borscht (zelenyi borshch) is Ukraine’s spring soup: no beets at all, but lots of tangy sorrel, potatoes, fresh herbs and boiled egg, finished with a spoon of sour cream. It’s bright, sour, comforting and ready in under an hour.
In Ukraine it appears as soon as the first sorrel leaves come up in the garden – but with jarred sorrel you can make it all year.
How to Make Green Borscht
- Start the soup. Bring the broth to a boil with the bay leaf. Add the potatoes and simmer for 10 minutes.
- Cook the vegetables. Meanwhile, fry the onion and carrot in butter over medium heat for 5–6 minutes until soft. Add them to the pot.
- Add the greens. When the potatoes are tender (about 15 minutes in total), add the sorrel, spinach and green onions. Simmer for just 3–5 minutes – sorrel turns olive-green quickly, which is normal.
- Season. Add salt, pepper and dill. Taste: the soup should be pleasantly sour from the sorrel. If it’s not sour enough, add a squeeze of lemon.
- Serve. Ladle into bowls and top each with chopped or halved boiled egg and a big spoon of sour cream.
🛒 Kitchen Tools for This Recipe
- Damascus Pattern Chef Knife with Wooden Handle – razor-sharp for herbs, onions and vegetables ($39.99, free shipping)
👉 More comfort food from around the world: 25 Cozy Comfort Food Recipes
Footnotes:
No fresh sorrel? Use jarred sorrel from Eastern European shops, or spinach with lemon juice.
Make it heartier: cook the broth with pork ribs or chicken legs, then shred the meat back into the soup.
Green borscht tastes even better the next day and is often eaten cold in summer.
Photo: Lisenok111 / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0 (cropped and color-adjusted).
