A new front opens in the Russia-Ukraine conflict: Borscht

The town is named Borshchiv, which means “belonging to borscht.” It is just one of a dozen cities and villages in Ukraine named for borscht.

Given this clear commitment to borscht, Ukrainians wonder why the soup is commonly assumed to be Russian, a national dish of their arch-enemy. Now a Ukrainian chef supported by the Ministry of Culture 

and Parliament is trying to set the record straight with an application to the United Nations’ cultural body, UNESCO, to list borscht as an intangible part of Ukraine’s cultural heritage.

“They can think whatever they like, but borscht is a Ukrainian soup,” said Olha Habro, a grandmother and well-practiced maker of borscht in Borshchiv. Like the food fight between the Arabs and Israelis over 

who owns hummus, the dispute sadly divides two neighboring cultures over traditions that might have united them. Borscht is enjoyed in both Ukraine and Russia.

This conflict, though, comes with a twist. Even some Russian culinary historians and authoritative Soviet-era reference books on food place the origin of borscht in Ukraine. But after the Soviet Union broke up, 

Russia seemed to stake more of its own claim to the soup. A year ago, the Russian government posted in English on its Twitter account a recipe proclaiming that “borscht is one of Russia’s most famous and 

beloved dishes.”

For the chef, Ievgen Klopotenko, it was the last straw. He had already been upset, he said, when friends told him that stores and restaurants in Europe and the United States market borscht as a Russian soup. “A 

lot of things were taken away from Ukraine, but they will not take our borscht,” he said, adding, “I understood we have to defend what is ours.”

He went to battle, creating a non-governmental organization to assert Ukraine’s sovereignty over borscht. The group spent months painstakingly gathering evidence that the dish originated in Ukraine and planned 

cultural events celebrating it, including taking a giant cauldron around to cook borscht at festivals.

Ukraine plans to submit the UNESCO application in March. Parliament has passed a resolution in support. To win recognition from the UN cultural body, the Ukrainians do not have to show that borscht is 

exclusive to their country, only that it is tightly entwined with their culture in such things as wedding and funeral traditions. And they must show that the soup is consumed widely. Town names also count.

The borscht dispute highlights deeper grievances between Ukraine and Russia. Ukrainians see the Russian government, in addition to pursuing a military intervention in their country, as trying to appropriate the 

entire cultural heritage of the eastern Slavic world for Moscow, on such issues as leadership in the Orthodox Church and historical claims to Crimea. Last month Russia seemed to back down — a rarity these 

days — on any claim of a direct sphere of influence over the soup. “Borscht is a national food of many countries, including Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, Poland, Romania, Moldova and Lithuania,” the Russian 

Embassy in Washington posted on Twitter. “Choose your favourite.”

Anton A. Alyoshin, head chef at Clever, a culinary school in Moscow, said ,“By the culinary canon, borscht is a Ukrainian tradition,” surrendering without a fight. “If we talk about shchi, a similar dish, it is more 

Russian.” He clarified that borscht “is a dish with a tremendously long history” that has been made in Russia for generations, and said that he and countless other Russian cooks enjoy stewing pots of borscht.

“To be honest, borscht is a Slavic national dish: It is Russian and Ukrainian,” he said. “The roots are the same, but politics interfered.”