How Our Mothers Cooked: New Year's Recipes from Old Irkutsk Newspapers
Preparing the New Year«s table nowadays is a simple task. The choice of dishes is vast, and recipes can be found literally in 10 minutes on social media. It»s only a matter of time and money. Our mothers and grandmothers, as a rule, used tried-and-true recipes from family cookbooks. But if they wanted something new? Then newspapers came to the rescue. We decided to see what printed publications in the Irkutsk region suggested for the festive table.
Appetizers
Appetizer «New Year»s« (Pravda Severa, 2010)
Ingredients:
4 medium herrings,
4 onions,
3 apples,
1.5 cups of sour cream,
2 cups of milk,
parsley greens,
salt, sugar, vinegar – to taste.
Clean the herring, remove the bones, and soak in milk for 2 hours. Remove, scrape off the milk with a knife edge, dry, and cut into small pieces.
Finely chop the onion (or use green onion) and combine with apples grated on a coarse grater. Pour in sour cream, mix, add vinegar, sugar, salt to taste. Mix again, pour this mixture over the prepared herring, and garnish with greens.
Appetizer «Sea» (Vostochno-Sibirsky Put, 1983)
Ingredients:
boiled potatoes,
green peas,
sauerkraut,
pickled cucumber,
hard-boiled eggs,
cheese,
sour cream or mayonnaise.
Dress the boiled potatoes, green peas, and sauerkraut with sour cream or mayonnaise. Place in a salad bowl.
Top with thin slices of pickled cucumber – they somewhat resemble seawater in color. Make «wave crests» from sour cream or mayonnaise. Construct «ships» from hard-boiled eggs: cut them lengthwise, and make a «sail» from a slice of cheese.
Onion Appetizer (Alar, 2000)
Ingredients:
a large onion,
3 eggs,
2 tablespoons of grated raw carrot,
3 tablespoons of tomato juice,
1 teaspoon of fresh chopped dill.
Carefully peel the hard-boiled eggs, cut lengthwise into two halves. Remove the yolk and mash with a fork in a separate bowl, add finely chopped onion, carrot grated on a fine grater, tomato juice, chopped dill. Stuff the egg halves with the resulting filling.
Salads
Cauliflower Salad with Bananas (Ilimsky Krai, 2003)
Ingredients for 4 servings:
200 g (about 0.44 lb) of cauliflower,
1 large banana,
juice from 1 lemon,
1 tablespoon of fine raisins,
4 tablespoons of cream, a little salt or aromatic ground spices.
Wash the cauliflower, shake off water, and shred on a coarse grater. Peel the bananas, cut into rounds, and mix with the cauliflower and lemon juice. Place the fine raisins in a sieve and rinse well under a stream of hot water. Whip the cream until stiff peaks form, and dress the salad with it along with the raisins, adding salt or the aromatic mix.
Then serve the salad and optionally garnish it with tangerine slices or cherries. This salad can also be dressed with a small amount of the spicy seasoning «curry».
Salad «Piquant» (Stroitel, 1989)
Ingredients:
100-150 grams (about 0.22-0.33 lb) of lean pork meat,
5 carrots,
black and red pepper,
3-4 cloves of garlic.
Cut the raw meat and carrots into thin strips. Soak the meat overnight in a marinade (salted water with vinegar), and the next day, squeeze it well, spread in a thin layer in a metal dish, and pour boiling vegetable oil over it.
Then cool and mix with the carrots. Add a little red and black pepper, finely chopped garlic, salt to taste.
Salad «New Year»s« (Bratsky Metallurg, 1986)
Ingredients:
25 grams (about 0.06 lb) of ham,
25 grams (about 0.06 lb) of tongue,
1 egg,
10 grams (about 0.02 lb) of onion,
21 grams (about 0.05 lb) of potatoes,
20 grams (about 0.04 lb) of sour cream or mayonnaise,
20 grams (about 0.04 lb) of apples,
20 grams (about 0.04 lb) of carrots,
spices.
Cut all ingredients into slices, mix, dress with mayonnaise or sour cream, spices, garnish with greens and apples.
Main Courses
Chicken in «Snowballs» (Znamya, 1996)
Ingredients:
chicken fillet,
apple,
sweet red pepper,
chicken broth,
egg white,
sugar syrup.
Pound the chicken fillet into sheets half a centimeter thick, place shredded apple and sweet red pepper cut into strips. Then roll the chicken into a roulade and simmer in a small amount of chicken broth until cooked.
Next, prepare the garnish. For this, beat the egg white cold until fluffy. Then cut the apple into 1.5 cm cubes and scald them with boiling water. Place them in a skillet with a little sugar syrup already poured in, cover each cube with the egg white mixture, and bake in a hot oven for five minutes.
The «snowballs» are ready; use them to garnish the roulades and enjoy.
Carp Baked in Sour Cream (SM Nomer Odin, 2000)
Ingredients:
500 grams (about 1.1 lb) of fish,
1/4 cup of milk,
500 grams (about 1.1 lb) of potatoes,
1 cup of sour cream,
200 grams (about 0.44 lb) of champignon mushrooms,
2 eggs,
2 tablespoons of flour,
4 tablespoons of oil,
25 grams (about 0.06 lb) of cheese.
Clean and wash the carp, cut along the backbone, slice crosswise into pieces, and soak for 3-5 minutes in salted milk. Salt the pieces, coat in flour, and fry in oil.
Fry the champignons and potatoes cut into 5 mm thick rounds. Place the fish in a shallow dish, put a slice of hard-boiled egg and mushrooms on each piece, then surround with potatoes and pour over with sour cream sauce. Sprinkle grated cheese over the carp and bake in the oven until a golden crust forms.
The sour cream sauce is prepared as follows: heat the sour cream to boiling, add a teaspoon of flour and the same amount of oil, mix, and, salting to taste, boil for 1-2 minutes.
New Year«s Beef (Irkutyanka, 2000)
Ingredients:
1 cup of grapefruit juice,
1 kilogram (about 2.2 lb) of beef tenderloin, cut into finger-thick slices,
2 large onions, cut into rings,
3 cloves of garlic, finely chopped,
1 bay leaf,
1 teaspoon of dried basil,
0.5 teaspoon of dried oregano,
0.5 teaspoon of dried parsley,
0.5 teaspoon of ground red pepper, salt, ground black pepper to taste,
1 cup of tomato paste,
3-4 bell peppers, cut into thin strips,
boiled rice for garnish.
Pour the grapefruit juice into a saucepan or wide shallow skillet, add all the spices, onion, and garlic, place the meat in the juice, and simmer over low heat until cooked. Then add the tomato paste and bring to a boil. Add the bell peppers and bring to a boil again. Simmer covered for 15 minutes.
Place the boiled rice in a mound on a plate, top with the meat.
Desserts
Apple Roll (Selskaya Pravda, 1996)
Dough ingredients:
2 cups of flour,
2 eggs,
50 grams (about 0.11 lb) of butter,
1-1.4 cups of water,
2 tablespoons of granulated sugar,
1-1.2 teaspoons of salt.
Filling ingredients:
500-600 grams (about 1.1-1.3 lb) of apples,
2 tablespoons of granulated sugar,
1-1.2 cups of breadcrumbs,
1-1.2 teaspoons of ground cinnamon,
20 grams (about 0.04 lb) of butter.
For brushing: 1 egg.
Whisk the eggs, sugar, and salt with a whisk, add water, and mix until the salt and sugar dissolve. Sift the flour onto a board or kitchen table, make a well in the flour, place the crumpled butter in it, add the egg mixture with water, and knead into a stiff dough.
Let the dough rest for 30-40 minutes, then roll it out into a very thin (1 mm thick) rectangular sheet, place on a clean napkin, brush the sheet with butter, cover with a layer of apples sliced into thin slices, sprinkle with sugar mixed with ground cinnamon and breadcrumbs. Using the napkin, roll the dough sheet with apples into a roll, place it on a greased baking sheet, seam side down.
Brush the surface of the roll with egg, make punctures in several places with the tip of a knife, and bake for 25-30 minutes at 200-220°C (392-428°F).
Ice Cream «Surprise» (Irkutyanka, 1993)
Ingredients:
ice cream, preferably plombir (a type of Russian ice cream),
gingerbread or a sponge cake layer,
egg whites,
powdered sugar.
Cut the gingerbread or sponge cake layer into thin slices. Beat the egg whites with powdered sugar. Just before serving, place the sponge cake or gingerbread slices on a metal dish, spread them with jam or fruit preserve, and top with a mound of well-frozen ice cream.
Top again with jam, then with sponge cake or gingerbread slices, cover with whipped egg whites, and quickly bake in the oven at 200°C (392°F). As soon as it browns, serve immediately.
Orange Soufflé (Priokskaya Pravda, 1998)
Ingredients:
5 oranges,
40 grams (about 0.09 lb) of flour,
40 grams (about 0.09 lb) of butter,
50 grams (about 0.11 lb) of sugar,
3 egg whites,
powdered sugar for dusting, jam berries for decoration.
Grate the zest of one orange, squeeze the juice from the fruit. Cut the tops off the remaining 4 oranges and remove the pulp, squeeze the juice from the pulp and add to the juice from the first orange.
Melt the butter and blend it with the flour, add the zest, orange juice, and sugar. Cook the mixture, stirring, until thickened. Then cool.
Wrap the orange peels in foil and place each in a metal mold. Beat the egg whites and fold into the orange sauce. Place the molds on a baking sheet, fill them with the soufflé mixture, and bake for 20-25 minutes. Decorate with powdered sugar and berries.
Drinks
Taiga-Style «Torosy» (Znamya, 1996)
Prepare a drink from any jam or berry, or a berry assortment, cool it, and pour into glasses. Drop a piece of ice into each, and on top – a scoop of ice cream. Garnish with a red berry or cherry on top.
Lemon Milk (Irkutyanka, 1993)
Take 1 lemon, a quarter liter of milk, 3-4 teaspoons of sugar.
Pour the squeezed lemon juice into a mixer, add sugar and cold milk, blend, and serve cold with a straw.
In the same way, you can prepare orange, strawberry, apple, and raspberry milk, using the corresponding juices or simply ready-made juice syrup.
Milk-Egg Cocktail (Priokskaya Pravda, 1994)
Rub the yolks of three eggs with three tablespoons of sugar, add 3-4 teaspoons of berry syrup, then, carefully mixing, pour in 3 cups of chilled milk.
Pour the cocktail into glasses. It«s best to drink it through a straw.
