Making Borcht for the First Time

Borscht is a Ukrainian/Russian and Eastern European very filling soup and a local staple. (Please forgive my botching the strange spelling of this word.)

In difficult times, I have made do with practically anything. I made some of this borscht?yesterday and it was fantastic! I had beets, radishes, onion, celery and sour cream, most on hand from a local loving food bank. Also potatoes and some many spices. Amazingly, I had a bit of meat also from the food bank. Stupid me, I could have gotten foodstamps and now will go through that long process.

God bless the food banks for filling in when times are so hard.

I imagine some purists will vote me down on this, as celery should not be included? I had what was available was what I was going to use what was on hand. Sour cream or any heavy dairy is a big plus, but must be added at the very end. Amazingly, the food bank I frequented came through on this as well. (Plus milk and yogurt are my favorite breakfast with a bowl of cereal.)

In my failed marriage, my ex-husband did most of the cooking and housework. This was not a happy situation for me because I worked in Telecom and was subject to being laid off. I survived five layoffs, while my ex-husband refused to work for five and one half years.

He did do all the shopping, so I had no idea what would be available in the house for days he became "unavailable". This meant drunk in the basement or across town at his mother's house, kids in tow.The kids were safe there and ex-Mom-in-Law reigned in my ex the same way she had reigned in her (deceased) husband.

While working in Telecom, I did a gig on eBay selling stuff. In 1999, those years were flush from eBay. I photographed each item (all different) ordered packaging, packed the items, estimated shipping and put invoice in the package all taped up. Each Wednesday night and Saturday were spent at this activity. I chose seven and ten day auctions so that the auction would close on Saturday.

I took cash, checks and money-orders. I told the ones with checks that there would be no shipment until the check had cleared. Bad idea, especially now, because of the outrageous bank charges for bounced checks.

My ex's contribution was walking the dog to the post office two blocks away and mailing off the packages. Despite stating an interest in developing a "retirement income", he was not interested in doing eBay or frankly anything but being a house husband.

Afterward, I posted positive or negative feedback to the appropriate eBay account. I was burned twice in this time with bounced checks (and fees). I decided I did not want to work these two jobs any longer and quit.

Of course, I did finally get laid off from Telecom in Sept 2002. I was discouraged that ex had not worked for five and one half years. Anyway, I again tried the eBay business.

The response was pathetic! eBay had raised all their prices, listing fees and closing fees. If you listed and did not sell, you were still out the listing fee. The closing fee was a percentage that kept going up constantly.

Wow, this is a far cry from the borscht I was talking about previously. My situation is such that I use whatever I can from the food bank, the same way I used whatever was available that my ex husband had bought when he was passed out drunk in the basement.