A resident of Simferopol shared the secrets of making dry soups for fighters

Getting into the mud, sitting in a damp trench, a pot of steaming homemade borscht, smelling of garlic, is not a fantasy of the fighters participating in a special operation, but a reality. It is enough to have boiling water on hand and a set from “Masha’s mother” of dried vegetables, spices and meat.

– Onions should be dried to a crunch and a light caramel color at 60-70 degrees – 4-8 hours, cabbage – 6-8 hours, peppers – 10-12 hours, legumes – 4-5 hours, tomatoes – 8-10 hours, from one kilogram of tomatoes yields 80 grams of dry mix,” says Maria Varlamova with knowledge of the matter. – Still for “dry borscht” you need garlic, herbs and white roots – celery, parsley, parsnips.

The yard of Mary’s old house is lined with sacks of vegetables. The hostess says that it all started right here, under the grape bush. Kind people gave her two gas stoves. In the ovens, she began to dry vegetables for “dry borscht”. Now, in her house in the old part of Simferopol, six dryers are buzzing around the clock like a swarm of bees.

Every week, they and like-minded people send 1,600 portions of dry soups of five types to soldiers on the front line. Boxes with homemade food are labeled: “Soups and cereals from Masha’s mother.”

We find out that Maria is from Kharkov region, but has been living in Simferopol for the last 20 years. By profession, she is a fashion designer. “For the Soul” was engaged in the rental of carnival costumes. Being a passionate person, she became interested in astrology. And gradually the hobby turned into a profession. Now Maria leads her own trainings on practical astrology.

– I tried myself in different areas, I was interested in many things. For many years she went as a cook on archaeological expeditions. What could be more tempting than to “dive” deep into the centuries? The conditions, at times, were quite extreme, they dug, including in the snow in Koktebel. The expedition members were all the time “on the shovel”, I tried to feed them satisfyingly and tasty.

— How did you come up with the idea to cook “dry borscht” for the fighters?

– I was engaged in tourism in my youth, we went to the mountains. And for long trips, they dried cabbage and carrots right in the sun. Then the expression “sublimated products” no one knew yet. Grandmother drove us with a twig so that we would not occupy the oven. It was not clear to her why it was necessary to dry vegetables, transfer gas.

At the age of 19, Maria moved to Krivoy Rog, and then to the Crimea, where she continued to improve her culinary skills: she prepared greens and spices for the winter, made jams and homemade marshmallows.

When a special military operation began, she and volunteers collected humanitarian aid for the fighters – medicines and basic necessities. When the first vegetables appeared on the market, the idea of ​​“dry borscht” came up by itself. The servicemen had pots, they could make a fire and boil water. And pouring a dry mixture of vegetables and meat with boiling water – you could get a real rich homemade borscht.

We raised money with friends. Everyone worked, and I had a free schedule. I started buying vegetables at the Privoz market in Simferopol. All of them underwent heat treatment with us, and then we dried them, first in the oven, then we managed to buy dryers. The meat was twisted in a meat grinder, fried in a frying pan and then also placed in drying units. And only then, with ready-made ingredients, they gathered at my house and packaged the dry mix in bags. And “dry borscht” left “for the ribbon”, to our defenders. Adjika and jam were also packed in boxes.

Gradually, as Maria says, the assortment expanded.

– In addition to “dry borscht”, we began to cook buckwheat soup with mushrooms, there was no longer a core, but buckwheat flakes. As well as pea soup with smoked meats, soup with vermicelli. There were two types of rice soups in the assortment – either stew or canned fish could be added to the pot.

Dry soups were also sent to field hospitals, where the ingredients were already calculated for a 5-liter pan.

— How did the “brand” “Mama Masha” appear?

– I was called that before, because all my friends were younger than me. And now all the dryers are half my age. Someone once said “our mother Masha”, the rest picked it up. This is how we decided to name our non-commercial project. In addition, Masha is an archetype, an original Slavic name associated with our history.

Maria says that they have a whole team working for them.

– There are 25 dryers with me, there are people who promote the project on the Internet, conduct chats. I am a technologist, we have a treasurer Lena Petrashova. Everything is strict with her, every penny counts. We have to line up for her, the control is such that “mom do not cry.”

— How do you distribute your dry soups and cereals?

– We strive, first of all, to provide for the guys on the front line. Those who came from afar, to whom relatives cannot pass something edible. We also send parcels with our preparations to Berkut fighters, scout guys who are sitting under a camouflage net, who have the most dangerous job. We have several volunteers who, risking their lives, make their way to the very front line. Through them we keep in touch with the fighters. The guys give us words of gratitude, they say: “We ate borscht and felt like we were at home.” They call me “Mommy”. Everyone especially likes borscht. It is ordered the most.

Word of mouth has done its job. Residents of other cities of the peninsula learned about the initiative of “Mother Masha”, and they also began to dry vegetables for soups going to the front line. Maria Varlamova managed to unite hundreds of volunteers throughout the Crimea, and then Russia.

“Activists from the glorious city of Sevastopol were the first to join us. They gathered people and began to make preparations. Now vegetables for soldiers are dried in many cities of the Crimea, as well as in Voronezh, Krasnodar, in the villages and towns of the Stavropol Territory … Quite often crackers are poured into a separate bag for borscht. And the package includes drawings and letters from schoolchildren.

Maria says that many people across the front line already know about their homemade, “mother’s” food.

– Guys from Donetsk, Makeevka, Lugansk are calling. They say that our borscht is indistinguishable from those made from fresh vegetables. It’s true, they retain the same taste, and the color is even more saturated and bright. We make sure to take a sample from each batch, we guarantee the quality. We continue to dry and cook without interruption in order to envelop the children in the cold trenches with homely warmth. Some of our girls have two household dryers at home, some have three. Then we gather at my house and pack it all up. We want to expand production, but for this we need a separate room. Ideally, where the dining room used to be, where there are sinks, cutting tables, sockets to which you can connect dryers.

– Does the administration of Simferopol somehow help?

No, we do everything ourselves. We need both food and finance. But our group is still small. Few officials know about us. We have only recently begun to help with vegetables, and before that the girls bought all the ingredients with their own money. I have six dryers at home, last month I ran into electricity for 10 thousand rubles, but I still can’t pay for it. I hope that now a little more donations will come and the treasurer will give me some amount. And the funds that were collected were used to purchase a professional dryer, which costs 25,000 rubles. Another powerful professional dryer was leased to us by one of the restaurants in the city. It costs 90 thousand rubles, they gave it to us for free. The same restaurant helps us with groceries. Now two food production facilities are ready to hand over combi steamers to us, in which cabbage can be processed before drying.

Recently, from the town of Krasnoperekopsk, which is located in the southern part of the Perekop Isthmus, they sent two bags of each type of vegetable for borscht for “Masha’s mother” and her friends.

“They promised to bring two more bags of rice,” says Maria. – In Voronezh, there was a man who offered to buy a large batch of tomato powder – a lot of it is needed for borscht. We want to distribute this volume by groups in different cities where dry soups are made.

None of Maria’s relatives fights. The 32-year-old son has a reservation, he is a high-class IT specialist. And she doesn’t have her own housing, she rents a small house in the old city area. But “Mama Masha” has a big heart and inexhaustible enthusiasm. The motto of their group: “Everything for the front, everything for victory!”.

With activist friends, they process tens of kilograms of fresh vegetables a week. Maria has developed recipes not only for dry soups and cereals, but also healthy, nutritious bars, which include sesame, flaxseed, bran, sea salt, honey and dried fruits – raisins, dried apricots, prunes, dates and dried berries. And now she is going to brew the monastery balsam.

— The administration of Krasnoperekopsk wants to give us freshly prepared vegetable oil. From this cold-pressed oil from unroasted seeds, beeswax, propolis and boiled egg yolks, I will prepare monastery balm according to an old recipe. This ointment, which heals any wound, is used for frostbite. It will be useful to our fighters with weathered faces and chicks on their hands. I will warm up all the ingredients in a certain sequence and pour them into glass jars, which will go along with dry soups and cereals to the front line.