The Great Lent has began, thus many of you are preparing more meatless meals, during this time, than any other time of the year, and searching for new recipes.

If you are not used to meatless cooking, it could be quite challenging to figure out what to cook.

I used to be in that predicament in my early cooking years, but by now I would easily become a vegetarian, if only the rest of my family developed the same taste for meatless dishes.

To simplify your search for the meatless recipes I have posted so far, please click on the provided links below, or search my “Meatless Dishes” category.

Homemade Varenyky/Pierogi – Recipe & Technique

Whole Wheat Varenyky(Pierogi) – Recipe

Potato Dumplings (Palushky)

Sweet Potato (Palushky) Gnocchi – Recipe

Steamed Fruit Dumplings – Recipe and Technique

Halushky (Ha-loosh-ky) – Vegetarian Recipe

Pasta with Portobello Mushrooms and Sauce – Quick and Inexpensive Meal

Pasta With Stir-Fry Veggies – Vegetarian Recipe

Cabbage Rolls – Vegetarian Recipe & Technique

Fruit Filled Crepes

Pan Apple Fritters (Ratsushki)- Recipe

Tuna Melts – Recipe

Broiled/Grilled Salmon – Recipe

Veggie Burger – Recipe

Tomato Soup – Recipe

Ukrainian Christmas Borscht with Vushka – Recipe

This should give you an easy access to these recipes, and a good start for meatless cooking.

If you are not following the Great Lent, but love meatless dishes, enjoy these recipes.

Please share your comments.

Ukrainian Christmas Eve is a very solemn family time, and just as important of a holiday, as Christmas Day.

The day of Ukrainian Christmas Eve is a fasting day, thus no meat is consumed at all,  and all the meals are small, and very simple.  Some people abstain from eating all-together for the whole day, until the first star appears, and a 12 course meatless meal is being served for the whole family, to break the fast.

My mother did not use any shortening for Christmas Eve meal preparations, but rather a very fresh flax seed oil, which she had made especially the week before Christmas.  I loved the flavor of the fresh flax seed oil in all the meatless dishes.

I have been searching for good flax seed oil,  and the Spectrum Organic Flax Seed Oil (above) comes closest to my recollection of my mom’s flax seed oil.

One of the 12 course meatless dishes served during a Ukrainian Christmas Eve, is a Traditional Ukrainian Borscht (Red Beet Soup).

This  is my favorite borscht recipe, and the only one I ever use for making borscht any time of the year, except that I use chicken or beef stock for non-meatless borscht.

This recipe serves 6-8 servings.

Ingredients:

• 6 cups boiling water, or vegetable soup stock
• 2 medium beats, peeled and shredded
• 1 onion, chopped
• 1 stalk celery, chopped
• 1 carrot, shredded
• 2 Tbs white vinegar, or lemon juice (you may add more later one, once you get your salt and pepper just right to your taste)
• 2 Tbs tomato paste  ( I use  Contadina brand)
• 1 cup Savoy cabbage, shredded (this cabbage is much lighter in flavor and texture , than the regular green cabbage)
• 2 Tbs flax seed oil
• 1  whole onion
• 1bay leaf
• 10 peppercorns
• 1 Tbs fresh dill , chopped
• 1 oz dried mushrooms (optional) See TIP below

Directions:

1. Saute 1 chopped onion in 2 Tbs oil until golden.
2. Add shredded beats, carrot and celery.
3. Cook for about 10 min.
4. Add tomato paste and white vinegar, or lemon juice (I use vinegar)
5. Cook for 10 minutes.
6. Add to the boiling water or soup stock.
7. Add whole onion, bay leaf , peppercorns.
8. Bring to boil again and simmer for 20 min.
9. Add shredded savoy cabbage.
10. Simmer for another 15 minutes,  or until cabbage is done.
11. Remove the whole onion , bay leaf and peppercorns.
12. Add salt and pepper to taste.
13. Add chopped dill (for a more tangy flavor, you may add more vinegar, 1 tsp at a time).

Serve with homemade vushka (mushroom dumplings, pictured above), or  mushroom tortellini, cooked according to package directions.

To make vushka, you may follow my varenyky (pierogi) recipe for the dough, but cut the recipe in half, and use a much smaller cutter (2 inch in diameter – a shot glass is perfect for this).   Once you seal in the filling, then wrap the varenyky around your index finger, and pinch the ends together, to form a vushko (ear like shape).

Filling:

1. Use 1 Tbs of vegetable or flax seed oil, to saute 1/2 onion, chopped.
2. Add the chopped mushrooms, or saute 1/2 cup of finely chopped fresh mushrooms, until all the liquid is cooked out.
3. Season with salt and pepper to taste.
4. Remove from heat, and mix in 1 Tbs of flavored bread crumbs, to hold the mixture together, for easier handling.
5. Fill as mentioned above.

TIP: You may add another 1 Tbs of flax seed oil to the finished borscht, if you feel it needs more flavor.  I also add a couple of dried mushrooms into the borscht at the beginning of cooking time, and remove them at the end, for additional flavor.

You may remove half of the cooked veggies from the cooked borscht, process them in the food processor, then add 1/2 of the mixture back to the borscht, for additional texture.

If you prefer clear borscht, you may remove all the veggies, puree them and save them for later use to make a batch of “quick borscht” by adding several cups of soup stock to the puree, and bringing it to boil.

I still have dried mushrooms from Ukraine and Poland, (I buy them there when visiting), so I do use them in my borscht, and add them to my vushka.  It definitely adds special flavor to the borscht. If you decide to use dried mushrooms, you need to simmer 1 oz of dried mushrooms in 3 cups of water, for an hour.  I also soak my dried mushrooms overnight in 1 cup of water, and use that water for cooking them.  Once cooked, strain the mushrooms through a cheesecloth, or coffee filter, save the mushroom broth to add to the borscht during  the last 10 minutes of cooking.  Chop the mushrooms very finely to use for vushka filling.  If you do not make vushka, you can discard the mushrooms, or chop them up to serve with the borscht .

photo credit: sweetonveg

The Great Lent began about two weeks ago, which means that those who follow this tradition, abstain from eating meat at least on Friday of every week, or some even do it on Wednesdays as well.

If you are like me, and are used to having meat at least once or twice per day, preparing meatless meals a couple of times per week might create a challenge.  I used to really stress out about this during my early years of cooking, but after a while I built quite a long list of meatless meal choices, and could easily be a vegetarian, if I could only win my family over to that eating style.

I have been posting some of my  meatless recipes during this past year, so if you are searching for ideas, here are the links to these posts:

Palushky (Potato Dumplings)

Halushky (Pasta with cabbage)

Vegetarian Holubtsi (Cabbage Rolls)

Varenyky (Pierogies)

Homemade Pasta (in the lower section of the linked post)

Crepes

Tuna Melts

Veggie Burgers

Tomato Soup

Red Beet Soup

Sorrel Borsch

If you are interested in a rather quick meal, there is always Macaroni and Cheese (you can add in some steamed broccoli, or any other of your favorite vegetables), Tuna Fish Salad, Egg Salad, Shrimp Scampi, any other fish which may be fried or broiled, pasta with steamed veggies, pasta with tomato sauce, pizza, PBJ, etc.

With so many different choices, the few meatless days during the 40 days of lent, pass by so quickly, that before you know it, you are back to the old meat cooking routine.

Sometimes  I actually miss a meatless meal, so I whip one up for a change, just to add a new twist to my meal planning.

As always, please share your favorite meatless meal idea with all of us.

Once my garden produces an abundance of fresh herbs and vegetables, the time is right to cook Botvinka.  Soups are very popular in Eastern Europe, and are the first course of a lunch of dinner meal, just like tossed salads in the US.

The name for this soup derives from the description of the tops (botvinka (in Polish)- leaves and stalks) of very young red beet plants, which are the major ingredient in this soup.  This dish is full of  goodness of fresh, young, green leafy vegetables, and because they are so tender, they require very short cooking time.

I prepared this recipe in a vegetarian style, but you can use chicken, or beef, broth as the base, if you prefer it that way.

Ingredients:

• 10 cups of water
• 2 Tbs. salt
• 3 bay leaves
• ½ cup onion, chopped
• 2 Tbs. canola oil
• 2 medium potatoes, coarsely grated
• 2 carrots, coarsely grated
• 2 Tbs. butter
• 2 garlic cloves
• 1 cup chives, chopped
• 2/3 cup Dill Weed, chopped
• 1 cup red beet stems, chopped
• 2 cups red beet leaves, chopped
• ¼ cup fresh Parsley, chopped
• 1 Tbs. Maggie Seasoning
• 2 Tbs. Tomato Paste
• ¼ cup sweet cream (half and half, heavy cream, or whole milk)
• ¼ cup Sour Cream or Oikos Organic Greek Plain Yogurt
• 3 Tbs. Balsamic Vinegar
• ½ tsp. black pepper

Directions:

1. Fill a soup pot with 10 cups of water, add salt and bay leave and start cooking.
2. Chop up the onions and sauté for 2 minutes in canola oil.
3. Chop the garlic and add to onions, and sauté another minute.
4. Add onions and garlic to soup stock.
5. Prepare all your vegetables:
6. Rinse and pat dry all vegetables.
7. Remove any damaged leaves and stalks.  Cut off thins roots from any beets attached to stalks.
8. Coarsely shred potatoes and carrots.
9. Chop the red beet leaves (botvinka), chives, dill, and parsley. Set aside.
10. Add potatoes and carrots to soup stock, bring to boil and cook for 10 minutes
11. Add all remaining vegetables, and cook another 2 minutes.
12. Mix tomato paste with cream/milk until smooth, and add to the soup.
13. Bring to boil, and cook for 1minute.
14. Add pepper, Maggie Seasoning, and Balsamic Vinegar.
15. Cook for a minute and turn off the heat.
16. Put  sour cream in a cup, and add some  hot soup stock (2 Tbs.) at a time, and keep on mixing it until it looks smooth, not lumpy.
17. Add to the pot of soup.  DO NOT boil again, because the sour cream with curdle.

You can serve with chopped dill, and a spoonful of sour cream as a garnish.