Khychyny

People who visited the ski resorts of the Caucasus often bring with them a recipe for chechins - thin cakes stuffed with cheese, potatoes, cottage cheese, meat. This is one of the national dishes of the Karachay-Balkarian cuisine. Here, these unique flat cakes can bake almost all housewives, this dish is on the menu of almost every cafe. Not all tourists who return home with a cherished recipe manage to cook tasty and beautiful Khychins at home. In fact, it is not necessary to have perfect mastery of cooking, it is enough to know the subtleties of technology and not to violate it during the preparation of Balkarian flatbreads.

Cooking Features

The composition of khichin includes available products, their preparation does not take much time and effort, but does not tolerate haste. In order to cook tasty khichins at home, you need to know and take into account a few points:

There are few variations of the test for hychyns. The main ingredients are airan, salt and flour. Dairy product can be replaced by any other similar - yogurt, kefir. Sometimes a little soda or mineral water is added to the dough. There are no eggs, butter or similar ingredients in its composition.
By consistency, the finished dough should resemble the dumpling dough, but be slightly softer. After kneading before rolling it should be allowed to rest for 15-20 minutes. To prevent it from winding up, it is covered with a towel or cling film.
The ingredients that make up the filling should be ready for use by the time of connection with the dough or do not require long-term heat treatment, since the cakes are fried fairly quickly.
The dough for khichin is divided into several parts, rolled into balls, crushed, receiving a cake. Put the stuffing in the center. The edges of the dough are collected on top, the filling is, as it were, closed in the bag. This “bag” is slightly flattened and rolled out without the use of force. If you press hard on the rolling pin, the dough will burst, the products will be spoiled. At first, the cake will roll slowly, then softer and softer.
Fry the tortillas in a hot, hot frying pan. When baking, they can inflate. This is a sign that you did everything right by rolling the dough into a cake and not breaking it. Swollen dough pierced with a knife, it falls.
Finished khichiny smeared with melted butter. Savings in this case would be inappropriate.

Khychyny fold in a pile, cut crosswise into 4 pieces, sometimes cut like a cake into 6-8 pieces. They serve hot eggs, although after cooling they remain tasty.

Khychins with cheese and herbs

Composition:

kefir (preferably fat) - 0, 25 l;
wheat flour - 0, 4 kg;
salt - a large shchipot;
baking powder for dough - 5 g;
soft cheese (feta or similar) - 0, 2 kg;
fresh dill - 50 g;
fresh cilantro or parsley - 50 g;
butter - 60 g.

Method of preparation:

Crumble the cheese with a fork or knife.
Wash the greens, let it dry. Finely chop with a knife, mix with cheese. If you have a unsalted variety, salt to taste and mix again.
Melt the butter over low heat or in a microwave.
Sift flour. Mix with baking powder.
In kefir, add salt, mix.
While adding flour, knead the dough. First, you can knead with a spoon or fork (the last option is more convenient), then knead the dough manually.
Divide the dough into 6 approximately equal parts. Roll each part into a ball, wrap with cling film and leave for 20-30 minutes to make the dough “rested”.
After a specified time, mash one of the pieces of dough, turning it into a palm-sized cake. In the center, put a tablespoon of filling. Seal the edges of the dough over the filling.
Roll out the dough with the filling into a thin flat cake with a diameter not larger than the size of the frying pan on which you plan to fry hot eggs.
Fry the cake on both sides until it is browned. Put on the dish.
Using a cooking brush, brush the hychyne with oil.
Also form and fry the remaining khichins, generously coating them with oil.

When khychins are saturated with oil, they will become softer and more tender. Then it will be time to take a sample from the dish. Soft cheese in this recipe can be replaced by cottage cheese.

Khychins with cheese and potatoes

Composition:

airan - 0, 25 l;
flour - 0, 35 kg;
salt - a pinch;
cheese - 0, 2 kg;
potatoes - 0, 2 kg;
fresh greens - 50 g;
butter - 50 g.

Method of preparation:

In airan add a pinch of salt, add sifted flour, knead the dough, a little softer than on the dumplings. Divide into 8-10 pieces, roll each into a ball.
Boil the potatoes in a uniform, cool, peel. Crank through a meat grinder or chop on a grater.
Finely rub the cheese, combine with the potatoes.
Add finely chopped greens to the cheese and potato mass, mix thoroughly. Form from the resulting mixture 8-10 balls - by the number of pieces of dough. The balls of the filling will make a little more balls of dough, but it should be so.
Mash a ball of dough to make a cake. In the center, put the ball filling. Pull up the edges of the cake up and pinch it, hiding the filling inside.
Roll the cake into a layer 3-4 mm thick, fry in a frying pan, dry or greased with a thin layer of vegetable oil. Lubricate with oil.
Similarly, roll out the remaining pieces of dough with the filling, browse on both sides.

Serving such khichins is recommended hot, but with icy airan. Cheese in the recipe can be replaced with any pickled cheese.

Khychiny with meat

Composition:

kefir - 0, 5 kg;
meat (pork, beef, chicken) - 0, 7 kg;
wheat flour - 0, 7 kg;
onions - 0, 2 kg;
fresh greens - 100 g;
garlic (optional) - 2 cloves;
salt, ground black pepper - to taste;
butter - how much will leave.

Method of preparation:

Mix the kefir with salt (half a teaspoonful of salt will suffice). Adding sifted flour to kefir, knead the dough, which resembles dumplings in consistency. Roll into a bowl, cover with a towel and leave for at least 30 minutes.
Wash meat. Pat dry with a napkin. Twice through a meat grinder.
Free onion from the husk, cut into large slices, chop with a meat grinder, combine with minced meat. Add the chopped greens.
Salted and pepper minced, knead it and repel.
Separate from the dough a piece the size of an average onion. Roll in a small tortilla.
Place mince in the center of the tortilla, pinch the edges of the dough to make a ball with minced meat inside.
Lay the bonded side down on a floured board. Roll out into a thin layer of round shape.
Put in a hot frying pan. Brown on one side without covering the pan with a lid.
Reduce the intensity of the flame, turn the cake over, cover the pan with a lid. Bake until done.
In the same way, cook khichins from the remaining dough and minced meat.

Do not forget to oil the hykhyns. If the stuffing was made from fatty meat, the oil can be used in minimal amounts.

Khychiny in sour milk with liver

Composition:

sour milk - 0, 25 l;
flour - 0, 3-0, 35 kg;
salt - to taste;
veal liver - 0, 3 kg;
onions - 0, 2 kg;
ground paprika - to taste;
butter - 30 g for roasting onions, 50 g for lubricating hychyns.

Method of preparation:

Mix sour milk with a pinch of salt and, adding flour to it, knead the dough.
Boil beef liver for 15-20 minutes, cool, cut into small pieces and scroll through a meat grinder.
Onion, freeing from the husk, cut into small cubes.
Melt butter in a pan, fry the onion in it.
Connect the onions with the liver, add the paprika and salt to them, mix.
From the cooked dough, form 6 small lozenges. Spread the filling over them.
After pinching the edges of the cakes, roll them into sheets no thicker than 5 mm.
Fry the cakes in a dry or greased skillet.

It is recommended to serve such khichins with sour cream or unsweetened yogurt, after mixing them with greens and seasonings.

Khychins with Adyghe cheese and nuts

Composition:

matsoni - 0, 2 l;
mineral water - 100 ml;
soda - 5 g;
flour - 0, 7 kg;
walnut kernels - 50 g;
cilantro - 50 g;
Adyghe cheese - 0, 35 kg;
butter - 80 g.

Method of preparation:

Mix matsoni with mineral water, whisk with a whisk until a homogeneous composition is obtained.
Add soda to the yoghurt, mix.
Sift flour. Pour it into the yoghurt pieces in pieces and stir, knead the dough. Set it aside for half an hour, covered with a towel, prepare the filling.
Grind the nuts with a coffee grinder.
Greens, washed and dried, finely chop with a knife.
Chop the cheese with a knife or chop with a fork to the state of the crumbs. Combine with nuts and herbs, mix well.
Divide the dough into 6-8 pieces, make a palm-sized cake from each part.
Spread cottage cheese and nut filling on cakes.
Fasten the edges of the scone over the filling.
Having turned the balls seam down, press them with a palm, then roll them.
Fry the tortillas in a dry frying pan.

Shifting fried chicken eggs on a dish, grease them with oil. Serve with yoghurt sauce with garlic and herbs.

Khychyn is the national dish of the Karachay-Balkarian people. They were greeted with dear guests. Today, the recipe for this dish is known far beyond the Caucasus. To make these tortillas stuffed with potatoes, cheese or meat is easy at home, if you know the features of cooking this dish.