What kind of pilaf recipes can you find on the “world wide web” open spaces!
This is pilaf with Georgian spicy herbs, but in the best Uzbek traditions, performed by Estonian cooks, and “Uzbek-style” pilaf with pork (!) From unknown authors who are not familiar with not only Uzbek traditions, but also Muslim principles .
Plov with fish, with vegetables and dried fruits, water with quince or fresh tomatoes, with beans or mushrooms: everything is what your heart desires.
But we must admit that if the technology of cooking rice is observed, then any of these dishes has the right to be called pilaf, and it is not customary to argue about tastes.
Another fact is interesting, but which is worth paying attention to - dishes for preparing one of the most ancient dishes on the planet.
After all, it is clear that at the dawn of civilization there were no multicookers, microwave, and other advanced household appliances. There was a time when even the fire of fire and meat roasted on a spit was considered an achievement of humanity. The most interesting thing is that people until now have not abandoned the habit of gathering around a campfire and baking potatoes, frying kebabs, cooking fish soup directly on the lake or cooking pilaf in a large cauldron. Why?
Just compare the pilaf cooked in the old way and the one that “prepared itself” in the slow cooker, and no real gourmet can remain indifferent to the taste of the fire.
Pilaf in a cauldron on a fire - the basic technological principles
Whatever products are part of the pilaf, one of its most important ingredients is always the same - boiled crumbly rice.
There are two main ways of cooking pilau. The first method involves staging the ingredients in a cauldron. First, the butter is warmed up, the vegetables are stewed, fried or passive, then meat, fish or vegetables, mushrooms, then rice is added and, covered with broth or water, the dish is cooked until ready. This method is more common in Central Asian cuisine.
The second cooking option is more ancient, and originates somewhere at the origin of the formation of the Persian Kingdom, and maybe even earlier. But the second method, which provides for the separate preparation of the constituent components of the pilaf with their subsequent combination in a cauldron or even directly in a dish, is also quite common in modern world cooking. The last important question: why is it better to cook pilaf in a cauldron? The answer is simple and obvious. The thick walls and bottom of cast-iron cookware are well warmed and hold the desired temperature until the end of cooking pilau. Iran and some other countries in the Middle East still maintain the tradition of making cauldrons of copper. It is believed that copper cookware has a particularly beneficial effect on the food prepared in it, and this opinion is justified from a medical point of view.
For example, it is known that this element plays an important role in blood formation, enzymatic processes. In contact with food, copper cookware under the influence of high temperature reacts and enriches it with useful properties. Agree that with all its modern advantages, the multicooker made of stainless steel or other alloys does not have such superiority.
As for the choice between a stove, oven, oven or open fire (fire), it is rather a question relating to the category of ease of preparation. Of course, food cooked in the closed space of the oven retains more beneficial properties than on the stove, due to the fact that vitamins from it evaporate to an open space to a lesser extent, and the limited access of air to a lesser extent oxidizes products.
Cooking on a campfire is a tribute to an ancient tradition that gathers a clan around the fire, which has almost magical power and attracts the eye of the person. Although, on the other hand, how else can wedding plov be prepared in another way, for example, in some village or kishlak, where everything comes to the noble and obligatory feast, from young to old? So you have to choose a bigger cauldron to have enough for everyone. But in these cases, as a rule, only men cook pilaf, because the cauldron has very impressive dimensions, and you should be able to make a fire properly.
First, give the fire to burn. If you cook pilaf on a fire, then wait for the firewood to glow with heat, not letting out tongues of flame. For cooking pilaf, the heat should last for an hour and a half. But, by the way, here too, time is calculated depending on the volume of the cauldron, which is suspended from the handle or installed on stones or a grate above hot coals. The charm of pilaf, like any food cooked on a fire, lies in a special, slightly smoked flavor. The last nuance of cooking pilaf in a cauldron on the fire is the choice of firewood. It is necessary to give preference to the hardwood of fruit trees so that the smell of pilaf is even more inimitable. Any recipe of pilaf cooked on a campfire will have a unique and completely new taste, different from that prepared in the same way on a regular stove, and even more so in a slow cooker or microwave.
Recipe 1. Pilaf in a cauldron with veal and mushrooms
Ingredients:
Meat (pulp), non-fat 700 g
White mushrooms 1.4 kg
Pepper, ground and peas (sweet and black)
Carrots 500g
3-4 bay leaves
Rice, long, unpolished 600 g
Onion 0.5 kg
Dill
Oil, melted and olive (for frying)
Turmeric
Salt
Cooking:
Prepare vegetables, mushrooms and meat by washing them. Remove the foil from the veal, cut it into pieces of medium size. Sort through the mushrooms, boil and drain the water. The broth after boiling white mushrooms can be used to prepare any dishes, but the mushrooms must be carefully selected and washed beforehand. Clean carrots and onions cut into strips.
Heat olive oil in a cauldron and pass carrots and onions in it. Put the meat when the onion becomes transparent. Season with spices and place the mushrooms. For mushrooms, add melted butter. Give the meat and boletus reddened, put prepared rice on them and cover all the ingredients with mushroom broth, in which you first add salt, turmeric, bay leaves and pepper (bring to a boil, and then pour into the pilaf). Cover the kettle with a lid and simmer until ready. Put the chopped dill in 2-3 minutes before the end of cooking rice. If desired, you can add a few cloves of garlic, cut into thin plastics.
Recipe 2. Festive pilaf in a cauldron on a fire, in Persian
Ingredients:
Pistachios 30g
Almond chips 60 g
Cashew 70 g
Dried barberries 50 g
Onions 200g
Butter, melted 160 g
Orange 400 g
Tea rose (petals) 10 g
Zira 20 g
Saffron 2 g
“Basmanti” 500 g
Raisin dark and light - 100 g
Carrots 0.5 kg
Turmeric 30g
Sugar 200 g
Water 1.7 l
Salt
Cooking:
Wash rice and fill with cold water. Fry the nuts and cook a crumb of medium size. Wash the oranges and peel, cutting them into 4 or 8 cloves. The inner side of the orange peel, clean as much as possible from the white skin, then cut the peel with zest into thin strips. Cut the peeled carrots into the same straw and chop the onion. Wash the raisins. Boil water (200-300 ml) and add saffron, salt and turmeric to it. In the rest of the water, put the sugar, chopped orange peel and carrots, cook until the sugar has dissolved, and let it stand under the lid for about fifteen minutes. In a cauldron, melt butter, throw in it onions, zira, barberry and raisins. Cook on low heat for up to five minutes, add orange-carrot carrots, prepared rice and pour in hot water. After the rice is cooked, place the pilaf on the dish, sprinkle it with the ground rose tea leaves and cooked nut crumb on top. Pilaf is served hot.
Recipe 3. Pilaf in a cauldron with beer - German cuisine
His, original for Oriental cuisine, the vision of pilaf is offered by German cooks. That is, pilaf with pork can often be found in resort towns. Moreover, Muslim cooks often cook such pilaf, but we only have to combine pork with beer for cooking kebabs. In Germany, these products are an integral part of the national cuisine. It is safe to say that pork in beer is very tasty.
Ingredients:
Pork neck 1.0 kg
Steamed rice 400 g
Onions 300g
Garlic 50g
Lemon peel (fresh) 20-30 g
Pomegranate 1 pc.
Hot red pepper, fresh - to taste
Thyme 20g
1.5 l light beer
Parsley 120 g
Pepper, ground (mixture)
Salt
Refined oil (for frying) 50-70 g
Cooking:
Rinse the rice and put it in the water for soaking while preparing the remaining ingredients. The meat, also washed, put in the marinade of beer, pepper, garlic, salt and thyme. Hold for a couple of hours. Hot pepper pre-free from seeds and cut finely. Add it carefully, so as not to overdo it.
Heat a cast-iron cauldron or gooseneck. Pour in the oil and, as soon as it boils, put the pieces of meat, but so far without the marinade. It is advisable to dry the meat a little with a napkin so that it becomes flush faster when frying. Add the onions and sweat lightly, then you can season the meat with spices and lemon zest. Put the rice on top and pour the marinade in which the meat lay. If the marinade is not enough, you can add more beer or hot water to cover all the rice with liquid. Cover and roast until done. Add chopped dill and parsley. When serving, sprinkle the dish with fresh pomegranate seeds.
Recipe 4. Festive pilaf in a cauldron on the stake with lamb and dried fruits in Georgian style
Ingredients:
Mutton 2.4 kg
Onion 1.2 kg
Rice, 1.5 kg long
Carrots 1.0 kg
Prunes 200 g
Dried apricots 400 g
Garlic 300g
Raisin 250 g
Refined oil 150 ml
Mix of Georgian spices (hops-suneli, utsho-suneli)
Cooking:
Prepare the rice by wetting it in water. Remove the film on the meat, wash, dry and divide it into 12 portions. Pour hot water over the dried fruits, cut dried apricots and prunes in long bars. Clean carrots and onions cut into strips. Peel the garlic from the top layer of the husk, wash and cut off the rhizomes.
In a cauldron, heat up the oil before smoking. Two medium carrots and two onions cut into four pieces and put in boiling oil, fry them to brownish. Remove vegetables with a slotted spoon and place the roast meat. When it is reddened, add the onions and carrots, cut into strips. After 10 minutes, add herbs, dried fruit and hot water to cover the meat. Simmer for 20 minutes under the lid. After opening the lid, lay a thin layer of rice on the vegetables. Put whole garlic heads on top of the rice, add boiling water to cover the rice with liquid. Spoon a few holes so that the liquid from the bottom is free to evaporate. Layers do not mix. Try zirvak to taste and adjust it, salt it. Cover the pilaf with the lid and simmer until rice is cooked.
Recipe 5. Quick pilaf in a cauldron with sausage, broccoli and cauliflower
Ingredients:
Smoked boiled sausage, with lard 900 g
Onion 0.6 kg
Wild rice 400 g
Broccoli 250g
Cauliflower 300 g
Adjika, Georgian 100 g
Parsley 100
Broth (meat or vegetable)
Carrots 600g
Butter, melted and vegetable (for frying) 50 g
Cooking:
Prepare the rice, keeping it in water. Onions, sausage and carrots cut into half rings. Broccoli and cauliflower inflorescences cut along, in half. Heat the oil in the cauldron to a boil, and alternately dip carrots, sausage, chopped cabbage blossoms, and onions in it. Put the rice, boiled until half ready, into the cauldron, spreading it evenly over the entire surface, pour in the broth to cover the cauldron contents, add the adjika and simmer the pilaf under the lid closed. Five minutes before readiness, place the chopped parsley in the cauldron.
Recipe 6. Pilaf in a cauldron on a fire - Estonian cuisine
In their own way and in a rather original way, imagine the process of cooking pilaf cooks in Estonia. With a similar Asian and Middle Eastern cooking technology, pilaf in Estonian has a peculiar addition of citruses and tomatoes. Even the addition of Mediterranean favorites, oregano, instead of traditional Eastern spices, creates some intrigue. But, nevertheless, this dish is also pilau, given that it has a common component for any kind of pilaf - boiled crumbly rice.
Ingredients:
Oil, purified 150 ml
Lamb (young meat) 1.2 kg
Long, steamed rice 500 g
Black pepper 40g
Onions 400g
Peel and lemon juice 1 pc.
Tomato puree 150 g
Oregano 50g
Salt
Chopped Parsley 70 g
Chicken broth 1.2 l
Cooking:
Wash the washed rice with cold water, soak for about two hours while preparing the remaining ingredients. Free meat from films and cut into cubes of medium size.
In hot oil, fry the lamb until crusted, add onions, sprinkle with salt and pepper. Continue frying until the onion is transparent. Do not mix: the meat should remain below. In a hot chicken broth, dissolve tomato puree, add oregano, zest and juice. Pour the mixture into the cauldron with meat and simmer slowly for about half an hour, cover the dishes with a lid. Put the prepared rice on the onion layer, if necessary, top the hot broth on top so that the rice is covered with liquid for 2 cm. When the broth is almost boiled away, remove the cauldron from the heat and let it stand for a while so that the rice absorbs the remaining broth. Spread the pilaf layers, in reverse order, so that the meat was on top. Sprinkle it with chopped parsley.
Recipe 7. Pilaf in a cauldron of chicken with quince - Arabic cuisine
Useful advice and at the same time a fundamental difference in the preparation of pilaf in the Arab and Central Asian cuisine: the first to heat the oil in the process of cooking pilaf is not onions, but carrots. The Middle East’s “cookers” believe that carrots cleanse the oil from harmful substances, which, as is well known, form carcinogens during frying. With this method of cooking pilaf carrots containing carotenoids, soluble in oil and identical to the natural dye, gives the rice a beautiful bright yellow color, decorating the dish. High sugar content in the root creates a pleasant caramel flavor. By the way, if it happens that during the cooking process it turned out that the carrots are not sweet enough or juicy, add some sugar during its cooking: it contributes to the release of carrot juice and caramelization when heated. Ingredients:
Chicken thighs 1.5 kg
600 g rice
Quince 1.0 kg (net)
Onion 0.5 kg
Refined oil 180 ml
Caraway
Pepper
Carrots 700g
Salt
Cooking:
Wash treated chicken thighs and remove excess water. In Arabian cuisine, Indian basmanti rice is preferred for cooking pilaf. You can replace it with other varieties of fine long-grain, white rice. Wash the cereal several times in cold water and soak it in a bowl of very cold water, preferably not less than an hour.
In a cauldron, heat the oil before smoking begins and throw 200 g of coarsely chopped carrots into it. Fry until browning, remove the slices with a skimmer and put the rest of the carrot into sliced butter. Next, after five minutes, place the onion, chopped into rings. As soon as the onion becomes slightly transparent, put chicken meat on the bone on it, season with spices, lightly fry and add hot water to cover the meat, cover the cauldron. Simmer the meat for about half an hour, covering it with peeled quince slices. Put the rice on the meat. If necessary, add a little more water and bring the rice to the finished consistency.
Remove the cauldron from the heat and let the pilaf brew under a closed lid so that the rice absorbs the remaining moisture. Pilaf is laid out on a platter in the traditional way: first - rice; On it are onions, carrots and quince, and on top are pieces of meat.
Pilaf in a cauldron - useful tips and tricks
- When cooking rice in the pilaf, the grains must remain sufficiently hard, because they swell and reach the desired consistency, when the pilaf is removed from the heat and covered with a lid: the rice absorbs the remaining water at this time. Do not forget that the pilaf should be crumbly, without liquid.
- Carrots in the pilaf, as well as other additional ingredients, should be visible after cooking, as a decoration of the dish. Therefore, cut it is not too small and beautiful. The same can be said about meat. Although meat in the pillow can be both small and large, but it should be exactly visible.
