Recipe from "This Is Camino"
Adapted by Tamar Adler
- Total Time
- 1 hour 30 minutes, plus chilling
- Rating
- 4(34)
- Notes
- Read community notes
This recipe — invented by Camino’s Russell Moore because he couldn’t bring himself to discard the salty, pickly liquid left over from sauerkraut — is often on Camino’s menu in the winter. He tells me it is an especially good one to make at home, because so many of us have old jars of sauerkraut cowering in the backs of our refrigerators. If my own refrigerator is any gauge, he is correct. —Tamar Adler
Featured in: The Taste of Serendipity
Learn: How to Make Soup
or to save this recipe.
Print Options
Include recipe photo
Advertisem*nt
Ingredients
Yield:4 to 6 servings
- 4 or 5large beets (about 1¾ pounds)
- Salt to taste
- 1large fennel bulb, or 2 or 3 smaller bulbs
- 1large yellow onion
- 8 or 9cloves garlic
- ½pound green or savoy cabbage
- Olive oil
- 1½cups sauerkraut, preferably red sauerkraut, because it looks better
- 1cup sauerkraut liquid
- Red-wine vinegar
- A handful of mushroom butts, tied in cheesecloth or a coffee filter (optional)
- Crème fraîche
- 1small piece fresh horseradish, peeled
- Black pepper
Ingredient Substitution Guide
Preparation
Step
1
Preheat the oven to 375. Wash the beets, and trim only their stem ends, leaving a little of the stems attached. Crowd beets in a single layer in a roasting pan, season lightly with salt and pour in about an inch of water (less if the beets are small, more if they’re large). Cover tightly with aluminum foil, and roast until a skewer slides easily through the beets, about an hour.
Step
2
When the beets are cool enough to handle, peel. Trim away any fibrous root ends, and cut into ½-inch cubes. Clean the fennel, keeping tough outers for another purpose. Dice the fennel and onion into pieces slightly smaller than the beet cubes. Slice the garlic. Slice the cabbage to about the size of the sauerkraut.
Step
3
Set a large pot over medium heat, pour in enough oil to cover its bottom and cook the fennel and onion with a small pinch of salt until they soften. Add the sliced cabbage and garlic, and cook for 2-3 minutes. Add the beets, sauerkraut and ½ cup of the sauerkraut liquid, then enough water to barely cover. Add a small splash of vinegar and the mushroom butts (if you’re using them). Bring the soup to a boil, then lower the heat and simmer for 5 minutes. Chill the soup.
Step
4
Taste the soup, and add remaining sauerkraut juice to season instead of salt. Serve with a spoonful of crème fraîche, a little grated horseradish and a few grinds of black pepper.
Ratings
4
out of 5
34
user ratings
Your rating
or to rate this recipe.
Have you cooked this?
or to mark this recipe as cooked.
Private Notes
Leave a Private Note on this recipe and see it here.
Cooking Notes
Alice
I plan to make this soup, and was thinking if using "live" sauerkraut I would add it and at least half its juice when the soup is fairly cool, in order to preserve the healthy probiotics.
CWN
Made the soup as is, except for two things. We pureed the sauteed vegetables (without the raw cabbage or sauerkraut) into soup with some additional water before chilling. It gave it body.We then added the sliced raw cabbage and sauerkraut to the bowl before serving with toasted caraway seeds for garnish. We loved it. The uncooked cabbage and sauerkraut added a lot of texture and flavor. It was bright and refreshing and unique and visually stunning.
megan
I definitely want to eat this as a warm winter soup. I bet it could be good cold. I make cold beet soup in the summer. I’m too cheap to buy fennel. Star anise fennel seeds ??
san
I am guessing that red sauerkraut means red cabbage or Rotkohl. Having lived in Germany I don’t remember ever seeing red sauerkraut, but lots and lots of pickled red cabbage, a.k.a. Rotkohl.
Marsha Stern
I googled "mushroom butt" and, as I would have expected, found a lot of images of mushrooms that look like human buttocks. So, what, in this context, is a mushroom butt?
Elisabeth
I've never seen such a thing as red sauerkraut. In Germany you have sauerkraut which is made from white cabbage, or pickled red cabbage which is called 'Blaukraut'. It tastes much sweeter and is not as heavily fermented.
BigGuy
Using canned beets and sauerkraut and substituting celery and anise seeds for the fennel will take much less time and 80% less money. Rinse the sauerkraut twice. Fry chopped onion with the celery in oil until translucent. Add the chopped garlic and chopped cabbage and the anise. Then add the washed and drained sauerkraut. Add the beet liquid from the cans. Take the drained beets from the can and jullienne. Add the beets, heat thru for five minutes and then cool.
BigGuy
1 T of mustard seeds or 1 t of hot pepper flakes in the soup would add a lot of flavor.
Stef
How did adding the sauerkraut when soup is cool work out?
Alice
I plan to make this soup, and was thinking if using "live" sauerkraut I would add it and at least half its juice when the soup is fairly cool, in order to preserve the healthy probiotics.
GG
Flavor was great but I did not have enough soup---maybe I will add more water next time. Horseradish was wonderful burst!
Jackie
Wonderful vegetarian soup. The horseradish makes the flavor pop. Don't skip it.
Ellelein
By the way, I followed the recipe to the letter and it made a huge quantity of soup, at least 12 servings. Perhaps my sauerkraut was bland, but I found I had to add salt and some sugar to the recipe to perk it up. It hasn't finished cooling yet, so perhaps the horseradish will give it the jolt it needs. At this point, I'm not enchanted.
Loofah
I just made this....before I added that last amount of sauerkraut juice, I would have agreed with you. But that last bit--I added extra as I too found the soup not liquid enough-- my instinct was to taste it and add salt but added more sauerkraut juice instead and it made all the difference. Really great recipe!
Ellelein
Can I freeze what we don't eat?
Tamar Adler
I assume you have. Also, one can always freeze anything. If it doesn't taste good upon thawing, you will have discovered an exception to the rule.
jane
Could this wonderful-sounding soup be served hot?
Private notes are only visible to you.
