Cabbage or Greens
Medieval Russia -- Food and Drink
From Yana's Russian Food Page at http:web.archive.org/web/20040502165707/http:braid.freeservers.com/russianfood.html.
Russian Cabbage or Greens pp. 162-3, [[1]]
Instructions from the Master or Mistress to the Cook or Steward, on Cooking Food for Meat or Fast Days for the Family, the Servants, and the Poor Chop cabbage, greens, or a mixture of both very fine, then wash them well. Boil or steam them for a long time. On meat days, put in red meat, ham, or a little pork fat; add cream or egg whites and warm the mixture. During a fast, saturate the greens with a little broth, or add some fat and steam it well. Add some groats, salt, and sour cabbage soup; then heat it. Cook kasha the same way: steam it well with lard, oil, or herring in a broth. (You can also wash, chop and clean dried fresh, or salt meat, or dried, smoked, or pickled fish. Boil these well, too.)
Cariadoc's Redaction
(This was found on a page of Duke Sir Cariadoc's online version of the Miscellany, a wonderful source for medieval cookery. This is the only Russian recipe found in his work.) Note: the ingredient translated as "sour cabbage soup" turns up elsewhere in the Domostroi in lists of things to brew; the quote below suggests that it may really be something like alegar (beer vinegar). We therefore use malt vinegar. "For brewing beer, ale, or sour cabbage soup, take malt or meal and hops. Beer from the first grade makes good sour cabbage soup. You can make vinegar, too, from a good mash." 2 3/4 lb green cabbage (1 head) 3/4 lb turnip greens 3 c water meat: 1 1/2 lb beef or lamb 6 egg whites (or cream) 1 c dry buckwheat groats 2 t salt "sour cabbage soup": 4 t malt vinegar Chop cabbage and greens very fine. Bring water to a boil, add cabbage and greens and simmer 30 minutes covered. Cut meat into bite-sized chunks. Add meat and simmer another 25 minutes (this time probably depends on the cut of meat). Add groats, salt and vinegar, and cook another 15 minutes uncovered on moderate heat, until the liquid is almost absorbed. Stir in egg whites, heat for a minute or two, and remove from heat. This is one possible interpretation of a recipe with lots of alternatives. In particular, it is not clear whether the groats, salt, and "sour cabbage soup" belong only to the fast-day version or to both meat-day and fast-day versions; we have assumed the latter.
My own notes
I think that the final result was too salty. I used ham in my redaction because it seemed like it would go well with the cabbage. If I would have used beef or lamb, perhaps it would have been okay with the salt called for in the recipe. My recommendation is to either add the salt (to taste) at the end of the cooking time, or to add less salt (maybe one teaspoon) during the cooking time, and then add more salt at the table if needed. In looking at the Russian version of the Domostroi, I found that the word which Pouncy translated as "cream" was smetanik//. The modern Russian word for "sour cream" is //smetana//, and the word for "cream" is //slivki . Could this be an older term for sour cream instead of plain cream? I'll have to do some investigating.
