Cold Soup Okroshka

1. Boil the potatoes and eggs until done. Set aside to cool. When the potatoes and eggs are cooled off, peel and discard skin, and dice, dice dice. Small dice for this soup is very important.

2. Dice up the cucumber (with skin) and slice the radishes. Small dice for these, too.

3. The sausage needs to be of the processed kind for this to work – homemade or deli-made sausage will crumble if you try to dice it. I use polish sausage. It has the perfect smoky/sweet taste. In any case, dice it up.

4. Combine all the diced up ingredients in a big pan.

5. In a separate pan (flat bottom), pour about a half a bottle of Calistoga. Add the tub of sour cream. It will bubble! Slowly dissolve the sour cream in the water – a potato masher works really well (that’s why you need a pan with a flat bottom). Combine until you see no lumps at all. Add the other half bottle of water, gently stir. You don’t want the water to release all of its carbonation, so be gentle.

6. Pour the water/sour cream mixture over the diced up stuff and gently stir and combine. Add enough mineral water to cover the diced up stuff, and more if you like brothy soup.

7. Small dice the fresh dill into tiny pieces so it releases as much juice as it can. Throw it in to the pan. Add the juice of about half a lemon and some salt.

8. Taste and adjust the salt/lemon combo until you like it. Chill for about an hour and serve with toasted bread. You can garnish it with smoked fish or sprats if you feel like it, but do not put fish in the main pan. It messes with the flavor if it sits in the soup.

The broth for the soup is the contentious part. A lot of people make it on kvas – a fermented drink made from bread and sugar. Others make it with buttermilk instead of sour cream. And there are even those that use chicken broth. I’ve tried them all and I like this version the most.