The first spring warmth brings the long-awaited greens to the table, and we are happy to cook nettle and sorrel soups. These vitamin first courses are very tasty, dietary, and healthy. Nettles and sorrel can be used to prepare salads with vegetables and sunflower oil; stewed with oxal and nettle leaves, you can stuff pies, after adding boiled eggs; very good cold sorrel soup, the recipe of which requires the addition of sour cream.
Sorrel is a unique, unpretentious, useful plant. Having prepared sorrel soup, the recipe of which also involves the use of nettles, you simultaneously get a tasty and healthy dish. After all, nettle contains a lot of vitamin C, manganese, iron, chlorophyll, organic acids, tannins, trace elements. It has anti-inflammatory, hematopoietic and hemostatic effects. For cooking use young shoots and leaves collected in early spring and early summer, and for harvesting for medicinal purposes they collect dioica nettle from July to September. And sorrel contains vitamins A, C, PP, E, B1 and B2, many useful trace elements, including potassium, magnesium, copper, zinc, fluorine and others. In other words, the first dish of sorrel and nettle not only serves to satisfy hunger, but, first of all, to replenish the body with a supply of useful substances. And considering that sorrel and nettle appear much earlier than the rest of the greens, soup with sorrel, the recipe of which can become a multivitamin complex, is recommended for everyone who lacks vitamins and minerals.
The first mention of sorrel is found in the French chronicles of the 12th century. That is, this plant deserves respect at least because of its solid age, although in Russia for a very long time the sorrel was not recognized as edible and only the last two centuries brought it well-deserved popularity: sorrel as a leaf culture began to be grown in gardens and household plots.
If you are preparing oxal soup, the recipe of which was presented to you by your grandmother, remember that in large quantities it is contraindicated for people suffering from urolithiasis and gout, since the content of oxalic acid in it provokes the formation of stones. Sorrel can be used raw, in salads, then its medicinal properties have even greater power. Sorrel is used for anemia and scurvy, it promotes the absorption of iron, and this property significantly increases blood hemoglobin. Large doses of sorrel act as a laxative, and small doses as a fixing agent. It improves digestion and stimulates the secretion of gastric juice in gastritis with low acidity. Sorrel juice in small doses acts as a choleretic.
Thus, a simple sorrel soup, the recipe of which is unusually simple (potatoes, carrots, onions, sorrel, boiled eggs, sour cream) and the cooking time of which is no more than 15 minutes, can be an excellent multivitamin and the best substitute for a pharmacy vitamin preparation.
If you want sorrel on your table throughout the year, do not be lazy, freeze the leaves in a plastic bag. Then, even in the midst of winter frosts, you can cook your homemade fragrant, tasty and healthy sorrel soup. The prescription of sorrel for future use is also simple, and requires only the presence of salt. In order to preserve the sorrel, it must be finely chopped, grated with salt, and when it gives juice, put it in jars, cover with lids and sterilize. Half-liter cans of sorrel need to be sterilized 15-20 minutes from the moment of boiling water. After that, quickly roll up the covers and turn over, leave for air cooling.