Gaby
Forshmak traces its roots to East Prussia. In Germany it was an appetizer of fried herring baked with potatoes, onions, peppers, and sour cream. In Sweden, Finland, and Poland the dish often included beef, lamb, chicken, or mushrooms alongside the herring. Across Europe, cooks combined herring with pasta, cheese, sour cream, milk, potatoes, cabbage, beets, turnips, artichokes, mustard, mayonnaise, or tomato paste. Traditionally in Prussia and Sweden it was served hot; in Odessa the dish evolved into a cold appetizer made from chopped herring. Historically it was considered a poor man’s dish: cooks used cheap, ‘rusty’ herring and margarine instead of butter. Still, the mix of salted fish with eggs, apples, white bread, and onions made for a respectable appetizer, usually served with rye bread. Odessa-style forshmak is a tasty dish crafted by thrifty housewives.
Ingredients: 1 lightly salted herring; 1 onion; 2 apples; 70 g wheat bread; 50 g milk; 4 eggs; 50 g butter; ½ tsp sugar; ½ tsp 9% vinegar; green onions for garnish; ground black pepper to taste.
Clean the herring, rinse it, and if it is too salty, soak it in milk for two hours. Fillet the fish, cut it into pieces, and pass it through a meat grinder.
Pass the hard-boiled eggs and peeled apples through a meat grinder or chop them finely.
Finely chop the peeled onion, sprinkle it with sugar, and drizzle it with vinegar.
Soak the white bread in milk and mash it with a fork.
Combine all the ingredients in a bowl, add the butter, pepper, and vinegar, and mix again.
Transfer the forshmak to a serving bowl and garnish with chopped green onions or other herbs.
Life Hack
Soak the salted fish in milk or in tea to remove any unpleasant bitterness from the forshmak.
