Cooking with Vodka

Totally Baked Beans

Some of you may know that I'm originally from Beantown, a nickname Boston has held since the eighteenth century when Puritan colonists adapted a Native American recipe of slowly cooking beans inside deerskins with maple sugar and bear fat.  This evolved into the recipe of baked beans with salt pork and molasses that came to be known as Boston Baked Beans.  Now imagine if those Native Americans had vodka...

Russia's most popular vodka remedy: "Erofeitch"

Promoted as a cure-all for everything from stomach cramps to depression, insomnia and hang-over, "Erofeitch" is a particularly strong infusion – usually made with 90 proof vodka.  I’m not sure it cures anything.  But it will probably make you forget what was bothering you.

Legend has it that Erofeitch was named by Czarina Ekaterina II – who was famous for her promiscuity.  One of her lovers, Alexei, got very ill.  And despite all of Ekaterina’s efforts, no one in her court could find a cure for his sickness.  The cure came from a barber, named Erofeitch, who had traveled to China where he learned how to make herb-infused drinks.  He managed to cure Alexei with this vodka herb concoction and was generously awarded by Ekaterina.   Since then, any strong herb-infused vodka has come to be known by his name.

Vodka Remedies

By now you should be convinced that vodka belongs in the kitchen cupboard as well as in the liquor cabinet.  Maybe there’s also room for a bottle in your medicine kit?

In ancient times, Russian villagers – famous for their superstitious nature – would attempt to bribe measles and other infirmities by placing a bottle of vodka and food offerings at their front door along with a plea for the illness to pass.  Later, vodka was combined with herbs and other ingredients to disinfect, cleanse or treat a variety of ailments. 

Today, plain and flavored vodkas are still considered to be very much a cure-all by modern Russians.  From time to time I'll post some of the recipes that have been shared with me by babushkas over the years.  I can’t say with any certainty that any of them will cure what ails you.  But, like chicken soup, they also can’t do you very much harm.  Stay tuned.

Vodka, Broccoli & Cheddar Soup

  

I know not everyone loves broccoli as much as I do.  But give this hearty soup a try one cold evening with a crusty loaf of bread and these much maligned little cancer-fighting buds might surprise you.  Of course, a little vodka makes everything (and everyone) more attractive.

Obscure Vodka Fact #7

By the middle of the 17th century, the production of grain spirits in Russia became the prerogative of the nobility.  Every nobleman produced his own brand of vodka.  As a result, a great variety of Russian vodkas appeared by the 18th century.  (And a great many Russian noblemen began waking up on the floor.)