📷 photo by young shanahan, CC BY 2.0) · Kosice Kapustnica (Sauerkraut Soup · via Wikimedia Commons

Soup · Slovakia · Kosice

Kosice Kapustnica (Sauerkraut Soup) 🥬

Name: Kosice Kapustnica (Sauerkraut Soup)
Prep time: 36 min
Cook time: 54 min
Total time: 90 min
Yield: 2-4 servings
Cuisine: Slovak
Ingredients: 700 g sauerkraut, rinsed once if very sour, coarse-chopped; 30 g dried porcini or forest mushrooms, soaked 30 min in 300 ml water; 250 g smoked pork ribs or klobása (Slovak long sausage), sliced; 1 onion; chopped; 2 tbsp lard or oil; 1 tsp sweet paprika; 3 allspice berries; 2 bay leaves; 6 pitted prunes; 1 tbsp grain mustard (optional, eastern style); 1.5 L stock or water + mushroom soaking water; 2 tbsp flour or potato starch to finish (optional); salt; pepper; crusty bread to serve

The soup Slovakia saves for Christmas Eve tables and cold eastern mornings alike: sour cabbage cooked down with smoked meat, dried mushrooms and prunes until the pot tastes of smoke, cellar and orchard at once. In Kosice, gate of the Zemplín region, kapustnica leans darker and wilder than western versions — more mushrooms from the Volovské hills, often a spoon of local pepper, and slices of klobása swimming in it. Families argue about everything in this soup except one point: it must rest a day, and the reheated second day is the true one.

Zemplín Slovak ⏱ 90 min Medium

Method

1

Soak the dried mushrooms in warm water 30 min; squeeze, chop, keep the dark soaking water.
2

In a heavy pot, sweat the onion in lard, add the smoked meat slices and brown lightly; stir in paprika for ten seconds only.
3

Add sauerkraut, mushrooms, bay, allspice, prunes and stock; cover and simmer low 45–60 min until the cabbage loses its raw bite.
4

Pour in the strained mushroom water; taste — it should be sharp, smoky, faintly sweet from fruit. Adjust with mustard if using.
5

For a thicker soup, whisk flour with a ladle of hot liquid and stir in, simmer 5 min more. The real rule: cool overnight, reheat gently on day two, serve with bread.

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Kosice Kapustnica (Sauerkraut Soup) 🥬

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