Zupa ogórkowa: Polish dill pickle soup with potatoes and dill
A pickle soup in which the sour cucumbers are grated and briefly stewed in butter, and go into the pot only once the potatoes are tender. The order matters: the pickles' acid stops potatoes softening. Finished with sour cream and a lot of dill.
Your own work in that: 20 min.
- Stock 30 min
- Pickles 10 min
- Potatoes 15 min
- Cream and dill 10 min
Step by step
0 / 6 done
Make the stock
Cover the chicken, vegetables and spices with water, bring to the boil, skim, and simmer 30 minutes, until the meat is tender and no longer pink at the bone. Lift out the meat and vegetables; slice the carrot and keep it.
Ingredients: 1 pcs chicken wing or leg · 1800 ml water · 2 pcs carrots · 1 pcs parsley root · 1 pcs celeriac, a piece · 1 pcs onion · 1 pcs bay leaf · 3 pcs allspice berries · 1 tsp salt
A light stock, 30 minutes
Cook the potatoes
Cut the potatoes into 1.5 cm dice, add to the stock with the carrot and cook 15 minutes, until fully tender. No pickles yet: in a sour stock the potatoes would stay hard.
TipThe one rule of this soup worth knowing: potatoes to tenderness first, acid after.
Potatoes softening in stock that isn't sour yet
Grate the pickles
Grate the pickles on the coarse side of a box grater, skin and all. Keep the juice.
Ingredients: 500 g potatoes · 5 pcs sour brine-pickled cucumbers · 150 ml pickle brine · 30 g butter · 150 g sour cream, 18 % · 1 tbsp plain flour · 1 bunch dill · ½ tsp black pepper
Coarse grater, skin on
Stew in butter
Melt the butter in a pan, add the grated pickles with their juice and stew 5 minutes, stirring. Pour in the brine from the jar. Stewing mellows the raw sourness and brings out the aroma.
Pickles in butter, brine from the jar
Combine and finish with cream
Tip the pickles into the soup and bring to the boil. Mix the sour cream with the flour, temper with a few spoons of hot soup and pour into the pot. Cook 2 minutes, stirring. Season with pepper and, if needed, salt or more brine.
TipToo mild? More brine. Too sour? A spoon of cream and a pinch of sugar.
Sour cream with flour, tempered
Serve with dill
Take off the heat and add the chopped dill. A lot: it is what makes the soup. With bread, or with the chicken from the stock.
Dill at the end, generously
Before you start
Which pickles?
Brine-fermented, not vinegar pickles. The best are the very sour ones from the bottom of the jar, too soft to eat, perfect for soup.
With rice or barley
Instead of potatoes, 100 g rice or pearl barley, cooked separately and added at the end.
Next day
Better after a night in the fridge. Reheat slowly, don't boil, so the cream doesn't split.
Nutrition
per 100 gStep photos are computer-generated from the recipe.
