Borscht with Mushrooms and Dried Prunes

Wash dried porcini mushrooms under cold running water, place them into a deep pot, add an onion cut in halves, add cold water and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to low and let the broth simmer for 2 ½ hours. Add salt when the broth is almost done. Strain the broth, wash mushrooms again and cut them finely.
Cut the beetroot into strips and place it into a pot. Add salt, 2 tablespoons of broth, tomato puree, white vinegar and stew that on medium heat for 30 minutes. Meanwhile, shred carrots and cut onions and parsley root nicely. Add butter to a skillet and add your shredded vegetables until onions become translucent. Take another skillet and fry your all purpose flour until it turns golden. Place flour to a skillet with onions and cook for 5 minutes.
Bring your mushroom broth to a boil, add finely shredded green cabbage and cubed potatoes. Cook for 10 minutes. Then add washed and cut mushrooms, washed dried prunes (take out all pits, if any), peppercorns, bay leaves, stewed beetroot and fried vegetables. Add salt and cook for another 10 minutes.
Serve with finely chopped green parsley.

You will need:

For broth:   

• Water – 10 cups
• Dried porcini mushrooms – 1 oz
• 1 yellow onion
• Salt – ½ teaspoon

For borscht:       

• Beetroot – 10 oz
• Fresh Green Cabbage – 10 oz
• 4 medium potatoes
• 1 carrot
• 1 parsley root
• 2 yellow onions
• Чорнослив – 120 г
• Tomato puree – 4 tablespoons
• Butter – 2 tablespoons
• All purpose flour – 2 tablespoons
• White vinegar – 1 tablespoon
• 4-5 peppercorns
• 2 bay leaves
• Salt – to taste

To serve:         

• Chopped parsley

Options:

1. You can use fresh mushrooms insted of dried ones. Just take around 10 oz of white mushrooms, wash them thoroughly and place into salty water for 3 hours. Cut bigger sized mushrooms into halves, don’t cut small mushrooms. Boil mushrooms in salty water. Cook porcini mushrooms for 40 minutes and white mushrooms for 15 minutes. When the broth is done, take the mushrooms out, wash them and cut finely. Strian the broth.
2. When stewing the beetroon you can add apple cider vinegar or even a tiny pinch of citric acid instead of white vinegar. Or you can use beetroot brew instead of broth and vinegar.
3. If you’re fasting, substitute butter for vegetable oil.
4. You can cook this borscht without flour.
5. For more authenticity, you can boil dried prunes before adding them to borscht. Take 1 cup of water, add 1 tablespoon of sugar and mix well. Transfer water into a small pot and boil for 20 minutes. You can add prunes along with theis broth into the borscht.
6. You can add 2-3 cloves of garlic if you want, too. Just mince it and add it to the pot with borscht before turning the heat off.

This borscht is also known as Borscht with Prunes and Mushrooms; Lenten Mushroom Borscht with Prunes or Borscht with Prunes.