Ciorbă de Burtă – Romanian Tripe Soup with Sour Cream and Garlic

Use raw tripe thoroughly cleaned by the seller and ready for cooking. Unfold it and cut into palm-sized pieces. Put in a pot of about 6 l capacity with the beef shank, peppercorns, bay leaf and 8 g salt. Pour in 3000 ml cold water. Bring to a boil and skim the foam from the surface; discard the foam.

Lower the heat and simmer with the lid slightly ajar for about 3–4 hours, keeping the liquid gently bubbling. After about 2 hours, add the onion and celery root cut into large pieces. If needed, add small portions of warmed water from the measured reserve to keep the tripe and meat submerged. Do not add reserve water when it is not needed. The tripe should be tender and easy to cut with a fork, and the meat should come away from the bone. If the tripe is still tough, continue simmering.

Lift the tripe and beef shank onto a large plate. Strain all the stock through a sieve into a clean pot; discard the onion, celery root, bay leaf and peppercorns. Skim off and discard only the excess surface fat. Once the meat and tripe have cooled slightly and are comfortable to handle, cut the tripe into strips about 1 cm wide and 4–5 cm long. Remove the meat and soft cartilage from the shank, discard the bones and divide the edible pieces into smaller portions. Return all the tripe and edible shank pieces to all the strained stock.

Toward the end of the stock cooking time, finely grate the carrot. Heat the oil in a small skillet and sauté the carrot over medium-low heat for about 5 minutes, stirring, until soft and the oil is colored; do not brown it deeply. Add all the carrot and oil to the strained stock with the tripe and meat. Bring to a gentle boil and cook for about 5 minutes. Crush the garlic to a paste and add to the soup, stir, then remove the pot from the heat.

In a large stable bowl, whisk the sour cream with the 4 egg yolks until smooth. Do this toward the end of cooking rather than leaving the mixture on the counter for several hours. Wait about 3 minutes after taking the pot off the heat. Take about 500 ml hot broth from it and add to the bowl in small portions, whisking constantly. Once the mixture is hot, pour it in a thin stream back into the pot, stirring the soup. All the borrowed broth returns to the soup; it is not an extra portion of liquid.

Set the pot over low heat and warm for about 3–4 minutes, stirring gently, until the whole soup is hot and visibly steaming. Do not bring it to a rolling boil. Remove from the heat and stir in 30 ml wine vinegar. Taste and, if needed, add some or all of the remaining 10 ml vinegar and up to 4 g salt; do not add unused seasoning. The soup should be creamy, garlicky and pleasantly sour. Divide into 8 servings and serve immediately, hot.