OTTERS AND KAPUSNIYAK: REDEEMING CYBERSPACE

This blogger has long maintained that the main purpose of the internet, as shown by usage statistics, is to disseminate cute kitten pictures, pornography, and recipes. Which is an assertion easily put to the test. Just enter anything into your search bar, and see what comes up.

Within mere moments, you are looking at a smorgasbord of smut, Hello Kitty, and Russian cabbage recipes hosted by someone named Olga, whose only clothing appears to be a Hello Kitty Bra & Pantie set.
She's a very large woman. Possibly because of all that cabbage.
Paranoid too. Her favourite blogs make this clear.
Both Susan Duclos and Pamela G.
Seriously weird.


Naturally, having said that, you would expect me to be one man standing against a veritable storm-tide of dreck, cute, and naked.
Resilient in the face of cabbage.
Resolute.

Which I am. I manfully resist all temptation.
I am immune.

Well, actually I'm just mighty picky about temptation. If Olga were one hundred and forty pounds lighter, fifteen years younger, and had a face that radiated a brilliant snarky intelligence, or any intelligence at all, I'd probably visit her cabbage and pornography site on a regular basis. Instead of once every six months, when I have a yen for Kitty bras and kapusniyak.

Yep. Cute pictures. Hefty filth. And cabbage.
That's the internet completely.
Appalling.


So, without further ado, here's an animal photo I could not resist.


EEEEEEEEEEEP!


[I do not know who took the picture. I copied it from Benyamin Blatt's page, who got it from Art Jonak. So I can't source it, or give proper credit where it's due. But whoever took the photo has charming animal friends.]



KAPUSNIYAK
Cabbage soup from the New Frontier, which is a place that Lithuanians, Poles, and Ruthenians fought over, in, and on. For several centuries. Food is fuel, food is a fortress, food is the soul.


Half pound sauerkraut (kislaya kapusta), slightly drained.
Half of a head of white cabbage, finely shredded.
One onion, chopped.
Two carrots, peeled and diced.
Two stalks celery, diced.
Two potatoes, peeled and diced.
One pound pork ribs.
Half a pound smoked sausage, chopped.
Six to eight cups clear stock.
Three TBS tomato paste.
Three cloves garlic, minced.
Two Tsp sugar.
Two Tsp paprika.

Two to four TBS finely minced parsley.
And plenty of cilantro, if you live in SF.
Otherwise it's optional.


Brown the ribs and smoked sausage in some rendered fat, and remove to a plate. Then sauté the onion, celery, and carrot in the pot, with the garlic, till nicely gilded and fragrant. Stir in the tomato paste, and add everything else except the parsley and cilantro. Bring to a boil, lower the flame, and simmer for about an hour and a half, two hours.

Remove the pork ribs from the soup with cooking tongs, and strip the meat from the bones. Discard the bones, chop the meat and return it to the soup. Add a few grinds of pepper, and serve in individual bowls with the parsley and cilantro strewn over.
Serves four.


Have some chili peppers and a bowl of sour cream (smetana) on the table for them as wants, along with a fresh loaf of crusty bread.


NOTE: I always add caraway seeds (kimil) to cabbage dishes (kroitn, kapusti) when preparing such. But that may not be your thing.
[½ teaspoon for this recipe.]



If you want, you can imagine eating this with an otter and her whelp also sitting at the table with you. They probably have smaller bowls.
Please don't think of Hello Kitty, however.
Hello Kitty is just nasty.



FURTHER NOTE: Four years ago was when I last made kapusniyak. That was when Savage Kitten and this blogger still had a relationship thing going on. No, cabbage soup was NOT why it ended.

I haven't made cabbage soup since then.

There is no connection between cabbage soup and relationships, even though a very large Slavic woman named Olga fondly thinks so. Any link between cabbage soup and matters of the heart is purely imaginary, slightly depraved even. However, if it pleases you to dream about those two things on the same page, by all means go for it.
Food, ALWAYS, is a fit subject for sensuality.
Eating together is something fun.
Even cabbage soup.

It's very good.



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