There are so many recipes for this wonderful soup (eaten hot or cold). This one came from my Polish grandmother and was passed down to me by my mother. It’s a simple one.

Ready

• 6 beetroots (thoroughly cleaned, topped and tailed)
• 1Tbsp brown sugar
• 1 egg
• 1 lemon
• 1 to 1.5 litres of water (about 32-48 oz)
• salt and pepper

Set

• Large saucepan
• Mixing bowl

Go

1. Fill your pan with the water and cook about five or six medium sized beets, with the skin on. When they are ready (you should be able to pass a knife through with comparative ease), remove from the pan. Let them cool a little before taking off their skin (very easy this way, and you also lose less of the beet as you inevitably would when they’re raw). You will have a reddish, rather tasteless fluid. This is what you do to make it gorgeous.
2. First, remove some of the fluid into a bowl and allow it to cool.
3. Beat an egg with a fork (ferociously so that it is without any lumps) and add it to the cooled fluid in the bowl, with the juice of one lemon.
4. Meantime, add salt, pepper and roughly a tablespoonful of brown sugar to the liquid in the pan.
5. Then put the egg and lemon mixture back into the pan and slowly and gently stir it over a low flame. Stir all the time or it might curdle, and don’t let it boil.
6. When it’s hot, taste it and add more of the condiments, sugar or lemon, according to your taste.
7. Cut up the beetroots into cubes (or slices, depending on your fancy) and add to the soup. They will be absorbed into the liquid and enhance the taste.
8. Eat either hot or cold. If you eat it hot, it’s quite nice to put some cubed boiled potatoes in. If cold, add some soured cream.