Shurpa from pork - classical Slavic food?

In Asian cuisine, such a dish as shurpa, is fundamental. This is a filling soup, which includes a lot of ingredients. The centuries-old history of the joint residence of the Eastern Slavs and Tatars in the largest ancient empire, the Golden Horde, left its imprint on the gastronomic preferences of Russians, naturally incorporating shurpa into the list of national dishes, while making appropriate changes in its composition and method of preparation.

Traditional shurpa is prepared from fat mutton, fried with a lot of different vegetables and fruits. Naturally, there was no question of any pork in this originally Muslim dish. But as soon as this soup became known to the Slavs, they naturally included in its composition as the main ingredient fat pork, and now the pork shurpa can be considered a completely Slavic dish, known under a variety of names: chorpa, shorpo, sorpa in us and in Moldova, and chorba in the Balkans.

The main distinguishing features of shurpa can be given several. First of all, this soup should be very fat, thanks to the meat used in this case. Characteristic for shurpa is a large amount of greenery and a variety of spices, giving it a peculiar sharp taste. A remarkable feature of this soup is the fact that, in addition to the usual vegetables in this case, the inclusion in the shurpa of various fruits, and in significant quantities. For example, it can be apples, apricots, dried apricots or plums.

Shurpa from pork is prepared from pork loin, with obligatory ribs in this case. Count on that, even in this case, you will have to add about 100 grams of fat for fat content, which must be finely chopped and fried with a loin on low heat. In advance, you need to prepare medium-sized beets and three or four onions, which, preferably, chop up in advance. Traditionally prepared pork shurpa requires using a thick-walled cast-iron cossack for this purpose, but this condition is just to be observed, if the action takes place in nature, over the fire of a fire, at home it is quite possible to do with a cast-iron mattress.

We start with the fact that on one teaspoon of sunflower oil fry the sliced lard, to the state of well-fried squash, and, adding the fire, we begin to fry the chopped meat until the appearance of a golden crust. At the time of its appearance, we throw in the boiling fat large chopped onions and beets, without forgetting as often as possible to mix all the loaded ingredients. At this stage, after the beet has acquired a brown hue, it will be appropriate to throw and prepared for shurpa fruit - two or three cut as large as beets, apples, plums or quince fruit. In the spring off-season use a well washed apricot. Without fruit, the scoop of pork recipe will be incomplete.

Now it is necessary to reduce the fire, and proceed to a slow half-hour stewing, covering the lapwing with a lid. Periodically stirring, as always happens, when we prepare the first dishes from pork, we clean potatoes and cut greens, which can include the usual parsley, dill and coriander in a considerable amount (not less than 300 gr). Favorable also is the presence, according to taste, of red pepper and other spices. At the end of half an hour, top up the dish with a liter of water, and after boiling, cook for another hour, throwing potatoes and herbs there 20 minutes before the pork shurpa is supposedly ready. The process can be accelerated, if after boiling water, fill the cutlet with chopped potatoes and greens and put it all in a preheated oven to 220 ° C for 15-17 minutes. After that, the oven is turned off and the shurpa is allowed to "go" for 5-7 minutes.

The ancient food of the gods is ready to serve!