🇨🇿 Czechia
PrdelačkaCzech pork blood soup
A dark Czech soup made at the pig slaughter feast (zabijačka) from the cooking broth, pork blood, barley or groats, and garlic and marjoram.
Origin and history
Prdelačka is the dark soup of the Czech home pig slaughter (zabijačka), traditionally held in winter and around the Masopust carnival. The Czech Academy of Sciences' ethnographic encyclopedia lists a white ovar soup and a dark soup with blood among the dishes of the slaughter feast, alongside ovar with horseradish, jitrnice and jelita. The dark one is the cooking broth with pork blood, barley, garlic and marjoram.
Make it at home
- Makes
- 6 servings
- Total time
- 3 h
- Hands-on
- 40 min
Ingredients
- 1.5 kg3.3 lb pork for ovar: a piece of pig's head, pork belly (bůček), knuckle or shoulder on the bone, to make the broth; or use 2.5 L / 2 1/2 qt of good unsalted pork broth
- 3 L3 qt water, for the broth
- for the broth: 1 onion, 5 allspice berries, 5 peppercorns, 1 bay leaf, salt
- 150 g3/4 cup pearl barley (kroupy), rinsed
- 400–500 ml1 2/3–2 cups fresh pork blood, from a butcher, usually stabilised with salt or citrate
- 100 g3.5 oz smoked or fresh bacon (slanina), cut into small cubes
- 50 g1/4 cup pork lard (sádlo)
- 1 large (about 150 g)1 large (about 5 oz) onion, finely chopped
- 4–6 cloves garlic, crushed or grated
- 2 tbsp dried marjoram (majoránka), rubbed between the palms
- 1 (optional) jelito (Czech blood sausage) or jitrnice (liver sausage), skin removed
- salt and ground black pepper, to taste
- rye bread, to serve
Method
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1. For the broth (ovar), put the pork in a large pot with the water, onion, allspice, peppercorns, bay leaf and a little salt, bring slowly to the boil and skim.
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2. Simmer gently, half covered, for about 2 hours, until the meat is tender and comes off the bone.
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3. Meanwhile cook the barley in a separate pan of water for 40–50 minutes until soft, then drain and rinse it a couple of times so it does not cloud the soup.
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4. Lift out the meat and strain the broth; you need about 2.5 L (2 1/2 qt). Cut some of the meat into small pieces for the soup and keep the rest to eat with horseradish and bread.
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5. Whisk the blood well and pass it through a sieve to remove any clots.
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6. Bring the broth back to a simmer and pour in the blood in a thin stream, stirring all the time; keep stirring at a gentle simmer for 5 minutes, until the soup turns dark brown and the blood sets into fine, soft flakes.
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7. In a frying pan, render the bacon in the lard until the cubes are golden, add the onion and fry until golden brown.
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8. Add the fried bacon and onion with their fat, the barley, the diced meat and, if using, the crumbled sausage filling to the soup.
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9. Stir in the garlic and marjoram, season with salt and pepper and simmer for 5 more minutes; the soup should taste strongly of garlic and marjoram.
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10. Serve hot with rye bread.
Notes
- At a home zabijačka two soups are made from the same cauldron: a light soup (ovarová or bílá polévka) in the morning, from the broth the head and offal were cooked in, and later the dark one, prdelačka, when blood, barley and spices go in and burst jelita and jitrnice darken it further. It was also called bouřka ('the storm').
- If you cannot get fresh blood, a version without it can be made by squeezing two or three jelita (blood sausages) into the broth; it is less dark and less smooth but has the same flavour.
- Do not let the soup boil hard after the blood goes in, or the flakes become tough and grainy.
- Some households add diced boiled potatoes, and some use rice instead of barley. Garlic and marjoram are never missing.
- Barley keeps swelling: if you plan to keep the soup, store the barley separately and add it when reheating. Eat it within a day or two.
Adapted from Prdelačka (černá zabijačková polévka), Czech home recipe, Seznam Zprávy: Od čumáčku po ocásek, jak si český venkov užíval zabijačky, and Novinky.cz: Zabijačkové hody doma v kuchyni.
At the festivals
Served at 1 festival in Czechia.
Earlier editions
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October 17, 2026
🇨🇿 Prague, Czechia
Polívkování