The remedy for the summer’s heat came to me from the Baltic countries: an earthy, slightly sour, chilled red beet soup. Sophie from Café Goldfisch introduced me to it, hers in a striking baby pink shade, mine a bit more on the magenta side. Anyway, as long as you use the traditional main ingredients red beet, gherkins, dill, spring onions and kefir (yoghurt, sour cream…) you can’t go wrong.

Baltic beet soup
(yields 4)

ca. 600g red beets
750ml vegetable broth (or water)
salt
4 eggs
250g gherkins
4 spring onions
1 bunch dill
1l Kefir (buttermilk, Sweden milk, yoghurt…to your liking)
freshly ground black pepper
1 tablespoon white wine vinegar (to your liking)

Peel and chop the beets, cook them in the broth for about 20 minutes until soft. Let beets and broth cool completely.

In the meantime boil eggs until hard and set them aside.

Chop the gherkins, spring onions and the dill (leave some tips to decorate) and add to the beets. Blend to a gentle, velvety soup. Stir in the Kefir and enjoy the arising pinkness!

Serve with quarters of hard-boiled egg , a sprig of dill and -if you like- some hot boiled potatoes on a separate plate.