Specific Soups and Stews: Borscht

Borscht was originally a soup from Ukraine based on cow parsnips, a plant belonging to the carrot family. Like many other foods, borscht evolved: beetroot became its defining ingredient. The first located American recipe for borscht, or “Polish soup,” was published in 1895. Today, hundreds of different types of borscht are available in Ukraine alone. In America borscht was initially an ethnic food particularly associated with Jewish immigrants. So associated were Jewish immigrants with borscht that during the 1930s the area in the Catskill Mountains that was home to many Jewish-owned resorts was referred to as the “Borscht Belt.”