Roast Meat and Herring Soufflé

This is a mixture of minced cooked meats and herring, blended with eggs to make a pudding not unlike a heavy soufflé. As so often happens in cross-lingual borrowings, the German Vorschmack (“foretaste” or “foreboding”) has come to mean “appetizer” in this Russian dish. Forshmak is substantial enough to serve for a luncheon, but I prefer it as a zakuska, baked in a hollowed-out French loaf as in the Variation below.