Fish soup with Rasstegai

How to cook fish soup:
1.) Take 600 grammes of perch, ruff or other small freshwater fish, clean it, but don't remove the scales, and wash it. Put it in a pot with cold water and bring slowly to the boil. Skim off the froth, add 20 grammes of parsley roots, 40 grammes of onion and 20 grammes of celery, and simmer for 40-50 minutes. Strain the slock.

2.)Add 8 peeled medium-sized potatoes, 2-3 onions and 4 pieces of a large fish, such as burbot, pike perch or sterlet, and simmer for another 20-30 minutes, skim­ming off the froth as it forms, but leaving the tiny glob­ules of fat. Ten to fifteen minutes before the soup is cooked season with whole peppercorns and bay leaves.

3.)Before serving, put a piece of cooked fish and finely chopped parsley and dill in each plate.

Fish soup is traditionally served with rasstegai. These are little open pies with a filling; their name comes from the Russian word rasstyognuty meaning 'unfastened*. The filling can be made either from fish and rice, minced meat and eggs, or from mushrooms.

How to cook Rasstegai:
1.)First of all you need a yeast dough. When it is ready, divide il into small portions. Roll out these small balls of dough and place a spoonful of the stuffing in the centre. If you are using a fish stuffing, you may put small pieces of salmon or other cooked fish on the top.
2.)Pinch up the edges of the dough around the filling to make round or oval pies, leaving the centre uncovered.
3.) Put the rasstegai on a baking tray greased with butter and leave in a warm place for the dough to rise. As soon as they are ready, brush with egg yolk and bake in the oven.

For a fish stuffing, take 250 grammes of fresh-water fish fillets and bake in the oven or steam for 15-20 minutes. Chop the fish not too finely. Heat some flour with melted butter, and add the juice from the cooked fish and 100 grammes of finely chopped onion, and cook slowly for 10-15 minutes, until you have a sauce the consistency of thick sour cream. Mix the fish, cooked rice to taste, finely chopped parsley and dill, and pepper and salt with the sauce, and stuffing is ready.

Baked sturgeon with mushrooms

The sturgeon is a large silvery fish of the family Aci-penseridae. It is one of the most delicious fish, and is considered a delicacy.

Sturgeon can be found in various places : in the Black, Azov and Bai­lie seas, in the Siberian rivers, and in lakes Baikal and Zaisan, but the greatest number are caught in the Caspian Sea.

Sturgeon has graced Russian tables since ancient times. Sturgeon in aspic and smoked sturgeon make marvellous hors d'ocuvres with a fine and delicate taste.

The famous black caviare, in its soft and pressed varieties, comes from sturgeon and related species. The belly of sturgeon (smoked or dry-cured) is known in Russia as tyosha.

Sturgeon is used to make fish soup and fish solyanka; it is eaten boiled, coated in bread­crumbs and fried, roasted in pastry or on a spit. But various baked dishes have always been the pride of Russian cookery, and this is especially true of baked sturgeon.

Russians are fond of saying that appetite comes with eating. Even if you are not hungry, you will realise how true this saying is when you try baked sturgeon.
How to cook a baked sturgeon:

1.)Clean and wash a sturgeon and cut into pieces. Salt and pepper it, coat it in flour and fry it gently with some butter.

2.)Gently fry 200 grammes of fresh ceps, field mushrooms or button mushrooms, as well as one onion, cut into rings.

3.)Put the fish in a large baking dish, and surround with circles of fried potato, the mushrooms and onion and pour over a strained sour cream sauce.

For the sauce: heat the sour cream, and when it is boiling, add a teaspoonful of flour mixed with the same amount of butter, stir it well, simmer for 1-2 minutes and season with salt.

4.)Sprinkle the fish, covered with the sauce, with grat­ed cheese, pour over some melted butter and bake in a preheated hot oven for 10 minutes.

5.)To serve, garnish with finely chopped parsley.