Classic Mixed-Meat Solyanka
Tastier than at a restaurant! Easy, simple, bright, and beautiful! Classic mixed-meat solyanka is made from several kinds of meat and leaves an unforgettable impression. You can make it for Sunday lunch or for a festive table. Rest assured — your guests will be asking for seconds!
Cooking method
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Step 1:
How do you make classic mixed-meat solyanka? Start by making a fragrant broth. Use bone-in beef with plenty of meat. Beef ribs, shank, and other cuts all work. The smoked ribs can be pork or beef.
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Step 2:
Put the bone-in beef and the smoked ribs in a pot. Cover with water, set over high heat, and bring to a boil, skimming off the foam.
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Step 3:
Add a whole onion and simmer over low heat for 2 hours.
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Step 4:
Fifteen minutes before it's done, add a little salt, the bay leaves, and the allspice peppercorns.
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Step 5:
While the meat cooks, prepare all the other ingredients. You can replace the ham with another meat: pork loin, pork neck, boiled sausage, and so on. I'm using dry-cured sausage, but cooked-smoked works too. You can leave out the capers entirely.
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Step 6:
Cut the ham into strips.
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Step 7:
Cut the sausage into the same strips.
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Step 8:
Cut the gherkins into strips. Solyanka usually calls for salt-brined cucumbers, but pickled ones work too. If you don't have gherkins, you can use 2 regular ones instead.
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Step 9:
Take the meat out of the pot. Remove the onion, ribs, bay leaf, and peppercorns and discard them. Strain the broth and return it to low heat.
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Step 10:
Let the beef cool, separate the meat from the bones, and cut it into strips.
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Step 11:
Pour 3 tablespoons of broth into a skillet, add the cucumbers, and braise for 5–7 minutes. Transfer the cucumbers to the pot of broth.
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Step 12:
Now make the sauté.
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Step 13:
Cut the onion into thin strips. To do this, cut it in half, then each half in half again, and slice the quarters into strips.
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Step 14:
In the now-empty skillet, heat the butter and vegetable oil. Fry the onion, stirring, until golden.
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Step 15:
Add the tomato paste. Stir and fry everything together for another minute.
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Step 16:
Transfer the sauté to the pot.
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Step 17:
Return the chopped beef and the smoked meats to the pot. Add the olives and, if you like, 50 ml of their brine. Cook the solyanka for another 15 minutes over low heat.
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Step 18:
At the end, add the capers if you like. They bring a light, tangy, piquant note to the solyanka, making it even tastier. Stir the soup and season with salt and pepper to taste.
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Step 19:
Let the solyanka rest under the lid for about 15 minutes. Then ladle it into bowls. Add a slice of lemon and some herbs to each bowl. Serve with sour cream. Enjoy!
- Important! Whether or not the recipe specifies an amount of water for the soup, it's best to go by your own preferences (whether you like a thicker or thinner soup), as well as the size of your pot and the ingredients you're using. Keep in mind that the author has their own view on how much meat, potato, grain, and other ingredients belong in the soup, and it may not match yours. In practice, this means that if you're making it for the first time, you shouldn't cook a whole pot at once. Make a tasting batch — enough for one or two people. To do that, scale all the recipe's ingredients down to 1–2 servings, and figure the water at one cup per serving for a very thick soup, up to 1.5–2 cups for a thinner one. Don't forget that some of the liquid will boil off during cooking. After tasting a small portion, you can adjust both the amount of liquid and the proportions of the ingredients to suit your taste. Over time, like most experienced cooks, you'll be able to add the water and the ingredients by eye.
- Since everyone's sense of saltiness, sweetness, bitterness, spiciness, acidity, and heat is different, always add spices and seasonings to your own taste! If you're using a seasoning for the first time, keep in mind that some are especially easy to overdo (chili pepper, for example).
- For how to choose the perfect pot for soup, porridge, or pickling cucumbers, read the article on pots.
Caloric content of the products possible in the composition of the dish
- Onion - 41 kcal/100g
- Rendered beef fat - 871 kcal/100g
- Fatty beef - 171 kcal/100g
- Lean beef - 158 kcal/100g
- Beef brisket - 217 kcal/100g
- Beef sirloin - 380 kcal/100g
- Lean beef roast - 200 kcal/100g
- Beef shoulder - 137 kcal/100g
- Beef ribs - 233 kcal/100g
- Beef leg - 104 kcal/100g
- Beef tail - 184 kcal/100g
- Boiled ham - 269 kcal/100g
- Corned beef - 216 kcal/100g
- Sour cream, 30% fat - 340 kcal/100g
- Sour cream, 25% fat - 284 kcal/100g
- Sour cream, 20% fat - 210 kcal/100g
- Sour cream, 10% fat - 115 kcal/100g
- Sour cream - 210 kcal/100g
- Lemon - 16 kcal/100g
- Lemon zest - 47 kcal/100g
- Bay leaf - 313 kcal/100g
- Parsley - 45 kcal/100g
- Olives - 115 kcal/100g
- Butter, 82% - 734 kcal/100g
- Unsalted premium butter - 709 kcal/100g
- Unsalted farmhouse butter - 661 kcal/100g
- Salted farmhouse butter - 652 kcal/100g
- Clarified butter - 869 kcal/100g
- Ham - 270 kcal/100g
- Beef ham - 133 kcal/100g
- Boiled ham - 282 kcal/100g
- Raw ham - 270 kcal/100g
- Ham sausage - 242 kcal/100g
- Vegetable oil - 873 kcal/100g
- Canned capers - 23 kcal/100g
- Capers - 23 kcal/100g
- Tomato paste - 28 kcal/100g
- Salt - 0 kcal/100g
- Smoked sausage - 507 kcal/100g
- Water - 0 kcal/100g
- Gherkins - 28 kcal/100g
- Allspice - 263 kcal/100g
- Smoked pork ribs - 514 kcal/100g
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