Kapusta: Vegetable-Forward Recipes from Eastern Europe

by Alissa Timoshkina

"Come for the food and stay for the stories – every curious cook will take a leaf out of this book." – Yotam Ottolenghi

"A rare cookbook that engages our thinking and delights our senses." – Olia Hercules

"This book is just as warm and inviting and shines a fresh light on the world of Eastern European food." – Zuza Zak

A culinary journey across Eastern Europe, Kapusta celebrates the humble vegetables that have shaped some of the most vibrant culinary traditions in the world.

Focusing on five key vegetables to the region – cabbage, beetroot, potato, carrot and mushrooms – it honours a philosophy of cooking that has affordability, seasonality, sustainability and, above all, great flavour at its heart. With chapters on dumplings and pickles and ferments as well, you’ll find a diversity of dishes which exemplify the Eastern European culinary DNA.
Recipes are accompanied by beautiful photography and include a range of both meat-based and vegetarian dishes such as A Cabbage Strudel, both Vegan and Beef Borsch, Potato Babka, Pierogi, a Tzimmes Carrot Cake, Bulgarian Mushroom and Walnut Pâté, and a range of sauerkrauts.
Kapusta bursts with original recipes and shines a spotlight on the whole kaleidoscope of little-known culinary cultures and history from across the extensive region.

Genres: Cookbooks, Cooking, Food, Nonfiction

217 pages, Kindle Edition

Published February 20, 2025

Reviews

[Miss✧Pickypants ᓚᘏᗢ · Rating 4 out of 5]

Loved the illustrations in this cookbook focused on 5 ingredients (cabbage, potatoes, carrots, beets & mushrooms) used in Eastern European cuisine. There are also chapters on dumplings and pickled stuff. Recipes are well-researched and mostly authentic, but there are a few that don't hail from the olde country yet still fit within the overall construct of the book. Tasteful photos are included for most dishes.

Enjoyed learning about how many of the recipes are found in multiple places, each calling it their own with particular steps or ingredients. Its clear the author put in the effort researching the origins of dishes and it was a bit of bummer to see a few formatting errors/typos in this lovely book. Whoever was tasked with proof-reading dropped the ball (the worst one was in the instructions on page 87 "larg For the pie e"). Despite the minor errors, anyone who enjoys these ingredients will appreciate learning new methods to use them in very tasty ways.

[Nadia · Rating 5 out of 5]

An absolute stunner of a cookbook featuring vegetable forward recipes from Eastern Europe, an ode to the humble cabbage (the title of the book means cabbage in several Slavic languages), as well as other powerhouse veggies like the beet (my absolute favorite veggie of all time)! Gorgeously illustrated pages filled with delicious recipes

[K · Rating 5 out of 5]

Kapusta is a cookbook full of recipes and stories about vegetable-centric recipes from Eastern Europe and nearby lands. For those of us who do not like to cook, some of the recipes are refreshingly simple and do not involve a thousand steps and ingredients! Thank you!

[Madalena]

have worked through several of these recipes and they are all very good and it’s clear the recipes have been tested, the instructions are clear and easy to follow and very reproducible. probably my favorite part of this cookbook is that all of the ingredients are very accessible and it will never have you buying something that isn’t used quite frequently in other recipes. Very homestyle, comforting food, highly recommend

[Alice · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ein bodenständiges Kochbuch, mit Rezepten, die leicht nachzumachen sind. Dazu kommen schöne Malereien, gute Fotos und eine Einführung in jedes Rezept, sowie eine Osteuropa-Landkarte. Es ist liebevoll aufgemacht und ich habe mir sehr viele Rezepte markiert 😊

[Kate]

Love cookbooks by Olia Hercules. Made the Polish kapusniak soup and stuffed peppers.