Varenye

Preparation

The making of varenye requires a careful balance between cooking, or sometimes steeping in the hot sugar mixture for just enough time to allow the flavor to be extracted from the fruit, and sugar to penetrate the fruit, and cooking too long that fruit will break down and liquefy. Some fruits with tough skins require cooking for many hours, while others are suitable for making "five-minute varenye" (Russian: варенье-пятиминутка, varenye-pyatiminutka). For the latter, dry sugar is spread over raw fruit in layers and left for several hours to steep into the fruit. The resulting mixture is then heated for just about five minutes.

The most popular types of varenye are made from locally available berries and fruits, such as sour cherries, strawberries, raspberries, apricots and apples. In general, virtually any kind of fruit, as well as some culinary vegetables, nuts, pine cones, and rose petals are used.

Usage

Varenye is enjoyed as a dessert and condiment, in particular as a topping for pancakes (bliny, oladyi, syrniki), as a filling for pies (pirogi and pirozhki), dumplings (vareniki), cakes and cookies, and as a sweetener for tea. It is also used as a spread on bread, though due to its liquid consistency it is not well suited for that. Finally, it is eaten on its own as a sweet.

Etymology, translations, and cultural references

Varenye is an old Slavic word which is used in East Slavic languages in a more general sense to refer to any type of sweet fruit preserve. The word has common etymological roots with the words denoting cooking, boiling, brewing, or stewing (Russian: варить, Belarusian: варыць, Ukrainian: варити).

In literary translations, especially of children's books, into Russian, the term is often used to replace less-common loanwords, such as jam, confiture or marmalade. Examples are the translations of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, Harry Potter, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, and the animated movies about Karlsson-on-the-roof.

The same is true when translating from Russian. For instance, the making of raspberry varenie is described in Leo Tolstoy's novel Anna Karenina (VI-2). In her classic translation, Constance Garnett refers to the activity as "jam-making".

In the popular Soviet children's book A tale about a war secret, about the boy Nipper-Pipper, and his word of honour by Arkady Gaidar the antihero Little Baddun betrays his friends for "a barrel of varenye and a basket of biscuits" (Russian: бочка варенья и корзина печенья; again, in English translation jam is used instead of varenye). This phrase became an idiomatic expression for betrayal or selling out in Russian, similar to thirty pieces of silver.

Related specialties

The more general usage of the term varenye in Russian includes a number of related local specialties.

Raw varenye

In the preparation of "raw varenye" (Russian: сырое варенье, syroye varenye) the heating is omitted completely. The recipes usually include grating of raw berries or other fruits and mixing them with sugar.

Dry varenye

In pre-revolutionary Russia, "dry varenye" (Russian: сухое варенье, sukhoe varenye) referred to a local variety of candied fruits (fruit confit) obtained by extracting fruits from varenye syrup and drying them. Kiev (today the capital of Ukraine) was particularly famous for this delicacy.

Similar products

Similar confections are also made in Transcaucasia and in some regions of Central and South Asia, where they are called murabba.