Carpathian Mushroom Soup

The thing with mushrooms is that sometimes they have to be prepared in special ways. For this Carpathian mushroom soup the Porcini mushrooms should be dried. This gives them a fantastic nutty flavor. You can buy them dried at the store, or do it yourself. Luckily Alona’s grandmother cleaned and dried them all for us by using her burners and a drying rack.

Now the trick with using dry mushrooms is you have to reconstitute them. Seems counterproductive, no? But trust me, that’s just what has to be done. Take the mushrooms and place them in 4 quarts of warm (not hot) water. Let sit for at least 8 hours, or overnight. When I make this soup I start soaking them right after breakfast so the soup is ready by dinner. I have another recipe for a Galician mushroom soup where you just pour boiling water over them and let them sit for an hour so that method can also work as well if you are in a rush.

Whatever you do, do not throw out the soaking liquid. This is actually the delicious mushroom stock in which we will make our soup. When you have soaked the mushrooms, you can remove the mushrooms for the stock, cut them to bite size pieces and set them aside.

Other ingredients for this recipe are an onion (peeled and halved), one large carrot (finely chopped), one large potato (finely chopped), and 6-8 champignons, sliced. If there is an ingredients you don’t particularly like, you can of course leave it out. In fact, I would even recommend subbing the champignons for king oyster mushrooms.

Add the carrots and mushrooms and sauté them a bit. Then, when the carrots have softened and the mushrooms have released some of their water, about 10 minutes, add in a tablespoon of flour to absorb the excess fat. I would also recommend adding a pinch of salt and some black pepper at this stage.

Once the flour is mostly cooked off you can ladle in the mushroom stock until about two inches from the top of the pot. Bring everything to a boil, and then add in the onion and potato along with the reconstituted dry Porcini. Also add in half a cup of small dry pasta. Some people would say this is not traditional, but every restaurant in the Carpathians I’ve eaten this soup at adds a bit of pasta. I picked up some mini orecchiette since they are the perfect size for a soup spoon. Put the lid on the pot, reduce the heat to a simmer, and cook for a further 10 minutes.

When 10 minutes are up turn off the heat and test the potato and pasta for done-ness. Season the soup with salt and pepper to taste, then ladle into bowls and serve. Enjoy this classic Carpathian Mushroom Soup with a side of pickled cucumbers or a few shots of horilka.