Turkish Egg Noodle nimbuls(Erişte)

Making Turkish egg noodles, erişte--originally a Persian term meaning strips--is usually or was a good reason for gathering for the neighborhood women. A group of women would come together at someone's house. Some would make the dough, some would knead it, and some would roll it into rounds, while others would cut the noodles, lay them on tables, or mix them. And other would make tea and serve the working group with food or just keep company. Noodles are usually made late summer or early fall so that they would dry easily, but nothing's written in stone as long as you can dry them you can make them anytime.


























makes ~ 2 pounds of Turkish egg noodles

5 eggs
1/2 liter milk
1 kilo / 2.2 lb flour
1 cup semolina
1 tsp salt



























-Beat eggs well.
-Add milk and salt and beat again.
-Put the flour, semolina, and salt in a big bowl. Make a pool in the middle by pushing flour to the sides. Pour egg and milk mixture into this pool.
-Start bringing flour to eggy mixture and kneading. Knead until you have a firm enough that it wouldn't stick to your hands yet soft enough so that you can roll it.
-Divide the dough into 5-6 equal parts. Cover them with a clean kitchen towel and let rest for half an hour.




























-Sprinkle flour on the counter or your work space.
-With a rolling pin roll each dough out into circles, about 22-23 inch / 55-60 cm in diameter and 0.1 inch / 2 mm thick.



























-Lay these dough sheets on a clean table cloth in a room away from direct sunlight and let dry.



























-They should be dry enough so that when you cut it with a knife it wouldn't stick yet not too dry so that it would break. ~8 to 12 hours.



























-First cut each circle into 1.5 icnhes / 3-4 cm wide strips.



























-As you can see they don't have to be perfect.




























-Now stack 3 or 4 of those strips, and cut them horizontally into matchstick forms.




























-Lay noodles back on table cloth to really dry for another day or two. Make sure they don't stick to each other. Separate them with your hands.



























-After cutting matchstick shape noodles, you will have odd shape leftover noodles at the ends of the strips. Save them and dry them as well to use in soups.





























Now, how to make Turkish egg noodles. Simple. The ratio of noodles to water is 1 to 2, similar to rice.

serves 2 people

2 cups of egg noodles
4 cups of water
1 tsp salt
2-3 tbsp butter ( my personal preference) or olive oil
crumbled Turkish or Bulgarian white cheese or Greek feta
ground walnuts

-Boil 4 cups of water with salt and butter/oil.
-Once it boils, add noodles and cook on low-medium with the lid slightly ajar until noodles soak all the water.
-In my family, noodles are served with crumbled white cheese and ground walnut on top, but you can certainly be creative.
Bon appetit!

Red Lentil Kofte / Mercimek Köftesi nimbuls

This vegetarian kofte is one of the most popular appetizers of Turkish cuisine.




























1 cup red lentil
1/2 cup fine bulgur
1/2 cup olive oil
2 cups of water
1 medium onion, very finely chopped
1 tsp cumin
1 tbsp tomato paste + 1 tbsp red pepper paste (if you cannot find red pepper paste you can use 2 tbsp tomato paste)
~1 tsp salt
juice of half or 1 lemon (depends on how you like it: sour or not so sour)
1/3 bunch parsley, finely chopped
1/2 bunch green onion, finely chopped
curly leaf lettuce



























-Wash lentils and boil them in 2 cups of water until the water is almost gone.
-Once you turn it off, add bulgur and salt. Mix once and cover to let the bulgur expand. Let it cool off.
-Heat oil in a pan and add the onion (not the green one!) and cook until soft.
-Add tomato paste and cook for another 1-2 minutes.
-Add cumin and stir once you turn it off.
-Add this to the lentils which should be cool by now.
-Add lemon juice and half of finely chopped parsley and green onion (we're saving the rest of parsley and green onions to garnish) to the lentils. Mix all well.
-Take walnut size pieces and give them kofte shape in your hands. Keep a little bowl of water close by to wet your  hand frequently during this process since the kofte mixture will get stuck on your hands.
-You can either place lettuce leaves on a serving plate and put koftes on top as in the picture, or serve koftes and lettuce leaves separately, or skip lettuce leaves completely; however, they reallly go well together.

Eggplant Papucaki nimbuls(Patlıcan Papucaki)

This is a typical Aegean dish that you can find on both Turkish and Greek sides of the Aegean Sea. As much as the dish itself, I love its pronunciation: pa-bu-ja-ki. Given the suffix -aki the name sounds definitely Greek, however "papuc" or "papuç" is a Persian word "paposh" (پاپٯش) that is used in Turkish and means shoe or slipper. So maybe these little shoes are not "typical"Aegean after all, who knows?

I have eaten two different versions of papucaki. One was made by boiling the eggplants and then stuffing them and the other one featured roasted eggplants, which was more appealing to my taste.


4 small(er) eggplants, Italian eggplants are perfect for papucaki
2-3 green peppers or 1 bell pepper, finely chopped
3-4 green onions, chopped
2-3 tomatoes, diced or grated
juice of 1/2 lemon
2-3 tbsp olive oil
~1 cup grated mozzarella or feta cheese
2 egg
4 bay leaves
salt and pepper


-Place eggplants on a baking sheet, poke holes in them and roast in the oven at 400F until they collapse and the flesh is all the way soft, ~40-45 minutes.
-Once they cool down, cut a rectangle piece on top as in the picture and scoop out the flesh.
-Dice the roasted eggplant flesh and mix them with lemon juice in a bowl.
-In a pan heat olive oil and add onion and peppers. Stir until soft.
-Add diced eggplant flesh and cook for 2 minutes.
-Add tomatoes, salt, black pepper, and bay leaves and cook until tomato juice cooks off.
-Beat eggs in a bowl and stir them in the tomato mix and stuff the eggplants with this. [I usually skip egg part]
-Cover the tops with grated cheese.
-Place stuffed eggplants in an oven dish and bake in a preheated oven at 400F for 15-20 minutes.
serve immediately.

Zucchini Fritters nimbuls(Mücver)

Although I gave different versions of mücver recipes so far, I haven't posted "the" mücver recipe. In Turkey mücver is usually made after stuffing zucchinis, using the carvings. But it is a delicious dish on its own featuring all the fresh herbes of summer.

















5-6 small firm zucchinis, grated or left over zucchini carvings from stuffed zucchinis (makes ~4 cups)
3 eggs
1/3 cup chopped flat leaf parsley
1/3 cup chopped fresh dill
2-3 tbsp or 1/4 cup chopped fresh mint (depending on how much you like mint)
3-4 green onions, finely chopped
1 cup white cheese/feta
1 tbsp paprika
salt
black pepper
~1 1/2 cup flour
1/2 cup olive oil for frying

-Put grated zucchini in a colander. Sprinkle with salt and let drain for 10 minutes. Squeeze and place in a bowl.
-Mix well all the ingredients except for flour and frying oil.
-Add flour in slowly and mix well.
-Heat oil in a frying pan. On medium drop scoops of mücver mixture in hot oil. Make sure they don't touch.
-Fry them on each side until golden brown, 4-5 minutes.
-Drain excessive oil by placing fritters on paper towels.
-Serve with plain yogurt or garlicy yogurt sauce. For garlicy yogurt sauce beat every 1 cup of yogurt with 1 clove of minced garlic.

Stuffed Zucchinis with Ground Meat nimbuls(Etli Kabak Dolması)

I was surprised to see that I haven't posted this recipe before, since it's one of my favorite summer time dolma dishes. Now that zucchinis are everywhere, especially round zucchinis that are perfect for stuffing, it's time to stuff zucchinis.




























makes 12 zucchini dolmas

12 round zucchinis or 6 thickish zuchinis
~1 lb ground meat (preferably beef)
2 onions, finely chopped
1/2 cup rice
1/4 cup olive oil
salt
1-2 tsp black pepper
1 cup finely chopped flat leaf parsley
1/2 cup chopped fresh dill
2 tomatoes, grated
2 tomatoes, sliced
1 1/2 cup hot water

-If you're using globe zucchinis, wash them, cut tops off, and carve out each carefully. If you're using regular zucchinis, wash them, cut them in half and carve out each half carefully. Save the carvings for dishes such as Baked Zucchini Fritters or Baked Vegetable Fritters
-Slightly salt inside of all and set aside.
-In a bowl mix well ground meat, onion, rice, olive oil, parsley, dill, salt, black pepper, and 1 grated tomato.
-Loosely stuff each zucchini with the stuffing half inch to the top and place them in wide pot.
-Cover the tops with a tomato slice. (You can place the globe zucchini tops on tomato slices if you wish)
-Mix 1-2 cup of hot water with the remaining grated tomato and pour on top.
-Let it boil first, then cook on low for 50 minutes to 1 hour.

It goes well with yogurt.

Baked Vegetable Fritters nimbuls(Fırında Sebzeli Mücver)

Mücver is usually made with zucchini and then fried, however it is way lighter to bake it in these hot and humid summer days. This is a modified recipe that uses not only zucchini but also potato and carrot. If you have other vegetables in mind like spinach, leek, etc., you can add them, too.




























1 zucchini, grated
1 potato, grated
1 carrot, grated
3 spring green onions, chopped
1 green or red pepper, finely chopped
1/3 cup flat leaf parsley, chopped
1/3 cup fresh dill, chopped
1/4 cup fresh mint or basil, chopped
2 eggs
1/2 or 1/3 cup white cheese or feta, crumbled
1/3 cup, pitted 'real' black olives, chopped
2-3 tbsp olive oil
1/3 - 1/2 cup flour
2 tsp baking powder
sesame or nigella seeds




























-Heat oil in a pan. Add first pepper, then carrot, then potato, and finally zucchini. Sautee until wilted, but not totally cooked.
-Transfer this mix in a bowl and let it cool down.
-Add green onion, parsley, dill, mint, eggs, cheese, olives, baking powder, and flour.
-Pour the mixture in a greased oven safe dish. Make sure the mix is not thicker than 1.5 inches in the dish.
-Sprinkle sesame or nigella seeds on top. You can also decorate it with sliced canned olives.
-Bake in a preheated oven at 400F for ~1 hour or until it gets golden brown on top or on the sides. Check with a clean knife or a wooden toothpick/skewer.

You can serve baked vegetable fritters as a side dish with dinner, with afternoon tea, or for breakfast.

Purslane with Tomato nimbuls(Domatesli Semizotu)

Purslane season is officially on! For those who have purslane growing in their yards or who can find it at the farmer's markets, flea markets, or Mexican grocery stores, here is another purslane recipe. Purslane with tomato is another version of Purslane with Rice. Mid summer when farmers markets are flooded by ripe tomatoes, you just cannot help but cook anything with tomatoes. So when we crave a sour taste, we make Purslane with Rice, which is cooked with lemon juice, and when we can get enough tomatoes, we make purslane with tomato, which is juicier and good for soaking crusty bread. Fresh purslane, ripe tomatoes and garlic were what we got from the farmer's market this week.

See more purslane recipes














1 bunch or 1 lb purslane (verdolaga in Spanish), washed and chopped into 1 inch pieces
1 small onion, finely diced
2 cloves of garlic, sliced or minced
2 tomatoes, grated or petite diced (or 1 can petite diced tomato)
1/4 cup rice (soaked in hot water for 15-20 minutes)
2-3 tbsp olive oil
1/2 tsp sugar
salt
black pepper
1 cup hot water

-Heat olive oil on medium heat and saute onions.
-Add purslane, tomato, rice (that you soaked and rinsed), salt, sugar, pepper. Stir for a couple of minutes.
-Pour in water.
-Cook on low covered for 15-20 minutes until rice is cooked.
-Serve warm or cold.

Savory Spinach and Feta Cake nimbuls(Ispanaklı ve Beyaz Peynirli Kek)

In several previous posts I have mentioned the importance of afternoon tea time in Turkey and the snacks that we would have with our tea. This cake is a total green deliciousness that my mom used to make for our lazy afternoon tea hours. Years later during another tea gathering with her friends she learned a recipe for sweet spinach cake (I know it sounds weird, but it doesn't taste anything like spinach. Spinach is there just to make it green and distract the ladies from gossip by causing curiosity for the source of its color), and unfortunately stopped making this one. I never cared much about sweet cakes, so this one is definitely my most favorite green cake.

As you can see from the ingredients, it is a very flexible cake. You can add more herbs or take out the ones you don't like; use feta or grated mozzarella or cheddar; use crushed pepper flakes and make it spicy or very spicy. It's all up to you. Because of the spinach puree and the amount of flour this is a moist, spongy cake, not a dry one.



























serves 6-8 people

1 lb spinach
2 cups flour
1 cup oil (olive, canola, or vegetable; I used half olive and half canola)
3 eggs
1/3 cup Turkish white cheese or feta cheese, crumbled
1/3 cup black olives, sliced (you can use canned olives but they won't bring any flavor to your cake)
1 green bell pepper or 2 green chili peppers, fınely chopped
2-3 green onions, finely chopped
1/2 cup fresh dill, chopped
1/2 cup flat leaf parsley, chopped
1 tsp oregano leaves
1-2 tsp salt (depending on how salt the cheese is)
2 tsp baking powder


























-Put washed spinach in a food processor with a couple of tbsp of olive oil and make into a puree. You should have approximately 2 cups of spinach puree.
-Beat 3 eggs with salt in a mixing bowl until it doubles in volume.
-Add remaining oil, spinach puree, dill, parsley, peppers, green onion, sliced olives, and cheese to eggs and mix with a spoon.
-Add flour and baking powder to this mixture and mix.
-Grease a baking pan, any shape you prefer, with butter. Pour the mixture and bake in a preheated oven at 350-360F for 45-50 minutes. Baking time might vary with different shapes and ovens. Check with a knife or wooden skewer/toothpick.

Wıth all its greenness this is my contribution to Weekend Herb Blogging that was started by Kalyn of Kalyn's Kitchen and is now organized by Haalo of Cook (almost) Anything At Least Once, and is hosted this week by Katie of Eat This.

Strawberry Jam nimbuls(Çilek Reçeli)

In the farmers' markets in Turkey strawberries are sold in two different piles on the same stand. One pile is for small strawberries which are sold for "jam" (reçellik) and bigger strawberries, the ones for the table (yemelik), would be in the other pile. I haven't seen this at the American farmers' markets, but you can always go to a strawberry farm and pick up your "jam" strawberries. That is exactly what we did. Last weekend we were at the Washington Farms in Athens and picked up gallons of delicious strawberries for jam and the table.


























This easy and guaranteed strawberry jam recipe is from my mom.

If you are planning to keep the jam in the fridge, the ratio of stawberry to sugar is 1 to 1. If you will use 1 lb of strawberries, you need 1 lb of sugar or 1 kilo of sugar for 1 kilo of strawberries. However, if you intend to make multiple jars of strawberry jam and to preserve them in your pantry, than the ratio of strawberry to sugar should be 1 to ~1.2.


























5 cups of strawberries make ~3 cups of jam, ~18 oz jar

2 lbs small strawberries (if you start with big ones, slice them into two or three pieces), washed and stemmed
2 lbs of sugar
juice of 1/2 lemon
2 tbsp water

-Place the strawberries in a pot and add 2 tbsp water and cook on medium. Once it starts boiling, start the timer for 10 minutes.
-After 10 minutes of boiling, add sugar and stir gently. Once it starts boiling again, turn it between low-medium and set the timer this time for 25 minutes.
-Stir infrequently and carefully skim any foam with a slotted spoon.
-At the 23rd minute add lemon juice.
-Turn it off and pour in a clean glass jar. Close the lid and let it cool. Store in the refrigerator.

Bowl Kebap nimbuls(Tas Kebabı)

Bowl kebap is one of my mom's specialties. Although I have been very picky about red meat dishes all my life, bowl kebap is something that I never said no. I have been craving it recently and noticed that I had never made it here. Almost four weeks ago I was on the phone with my mom getting the details of her recipe. The same day one thing let to another and I ended up buying plane tickets to Turkey and a couple of days later I was there having bowl kebap for dinner with my parents. My trip was not for bowl kebap, of course, but I definitely asked my mom to make it a couple of times in two weeks before I flew back. After green plums (something I cannot find here) of which I ate one pound a day, bowl kebap was the food of my short trip to Turkey.



Bowl kebap is a very simple recipe. Preparation time is approximately 15 minutes, but you need to cook the meat over an hour for tenderness and deliciousness. Since you cook this dish in a bowl that sits in a pot, make sure you have the right utensils before you start chopping.


































 serves 4-5 people

1-1.1 or 1.2 lb stew beef or lamb
2-3 potatoes, peeled and diced
2-3 onions, diced
1 tsp or more black ground pepper
1 tsp salt
2-3 tbsp tomato or red pepper paste
3 tbsp olive oil or 2 tbsp olive oil + 1 tbsp butter
2 cups of boiling water































-For this dish find a bowl that is resistant to heat and would hold all the ingredients. Next find a pot that the bowl would fit upside down, as in the pictures.
-Place potatoes at the bottom of the bowl.
-In a different bowl mix meat, onion, salt, pepper, olive oil, and tomato or red pepper paste with your hands. Make sure meat gets coated with all.
-Add the meat mix to the bowl, on top of the potatoes.
-Place butter on top.
-Put the pot on top of the bowl. Securing both the pot and the bowl with your hands, turn the pot upside down so that the bowl will be sitting in it upside down.
-Since this is how we will be cooking the bowl kebap and we don't want the bowl to move, place a heavy container on top to seal or stabilize it: a pitcher, teapot or a pot filled with water.
-Pour 2 cups of boiling water in the pot, between the bowl and the pot.
-Start cooking on high. Once you see bubbles on the sides of the bowl, turn it down to low and cook between 75 to 90 minutes.
-When you turn it off, you need to move the pitcher, teapot or whatever you placed on top, and slowly remove the bowl leaving the ingredients in the pot to mix with the water which has turned in to delicious juice now. If you do not remove the bowl when it's still hot, it will be sealed to the pot and almost impossible to move.
-Serve bowl kebap with any kind of rice, although white is my favorite, and/or bread.

Spinach with Eggs nimbuls(Yumurtalı Ispanak)

For many reasons I am not cooking lately and when I cook I am craving comfort food; I try to choose the ones that are easy, delicious, and definitely nutritious. Back in the day, one of my housemates was an egg-freak lazy cook and made this dish annoying number of times. Mainly because of that I'd never made spinach with eggs in years. Today, when I realize I was running out of my options for easy and nutritious comfort foods, I remembered it.

In Turkey spinach with eggs is usually made with ground meat, however thanks to my boarding school cafeteria I learned to dislike ground meat and try to avoid it as much as possible. Fortunately, this is a very flexible dish; you can make it vegetarian or with ground meat or use beef franks, TVP, or any ground meat substitute you prefer.


























serves 1 person
1/2 lb spinach, fresh or frozen
1 small onion, finely chopped
2 eggs
2 tbsp butter or olive oil
1/4 lb ground meat OR 1 beef frank, thinly sliced OR 1/8 cup TVP, soaked in hot water and rinsed OR simply skip this ingredient
1 tsp red pepper flakes
salt and pepper



























-Heat butter on low-medium in a skillet that has a lid.
-Add onion, red pepper flakes, and ground meat, beef frank, TVP if you are using any.
-Stir until ground meat is cooked. If you are having a plain one with no meat, stir until onion is cooked.
-Add spinach and sauté until spinach is tender and changes color.
-Season with salt and black pepper.
-Prepare two holes on the spinach bed for eggs.
-Break eggs into these holes.
-Put the lid on and cook until eggs are cooked.
-Serve with crunchy bread. Spinach with eggs is also very good with Tabasco or any spicy sauce on top.

Garbanzo Bean Pilaf nimbuls(Nohutlu Pilav)

Now a highly common and popular street food, garbanzo bean pilaf (nohutlu pilav), was a special dish served during the reign of Mehmet the Conqueror by Grand Vizier Mahmut Paşa to his guests. Mahmut Paşa's pilaf had both real, edible garbanzo beans and garbanzo beans made out of gold! Mahmut Paşa called the golden ones his "diş kirası," which literary translates as "tooth money." But don't think it was a compensation for broken teeth! In the past it was a tradition of wealthy families to give a feast for the poor and the wealthy alike during the month of Ramadan. The family would give a small gift to everyone who attended the fast breaking dinner (iftar) for kind-of renting their teeth to their hosts for the night. Apparently Mahmut Paşa offered the gift in the food in stead of handing it out.

Nowadays in Turkey you can eat this rich and tasty pilaf, usually along with pieces of chicken, at small sloppy restaurants during the day and on the street late at night, post-bar hours, and with no "tooth money."

1 cups rice
1/2 cup garbanzo beans (soaked over night and boiled the next day until cooked or use can garbanzo beans)
1 medium onion, finely chopped
2-3 tbsp butter (traditionally sheep's tail fat is used for this recipe, but we settle down for butter now)
2 cups of water
salt and pepper


























-Heat butter in a non-stick pot.
-Add onion and stir until soft.
-Add rice and garbanzo beans. Stir for a couple of minutes.
-Add water, salt, and pepper.
-Let it boil first and then turn it to low heat. Cover and cook until the water is absorbed. Do not stir the rice while cooking.
-Turn it off and cover the top of the pot with a clean kitchen towel or paper towel. Place lid on tightly. Let sit for ~10 minutes.
-Fluff and serve it as a main dish or as a side with meat.

Turkish Zuppa Inglese nimbuls(Supangle)

The chocolate pudding that we call in Turkey "supangle," or "sup" in short, comes from French soupe Anglaise, which comes from Italian zuppa Inglese, which probably is derived from British trifle. Despite the inherited name, the dessert itself bears no resemblance to either zuppa Inglese or trifle, other than the first layer of cake. Therefore, I will label this rich, absolutely delicious chocolate pudding that you can find in every single patisserie in Turkey as traditional Turkish.



























makes 8 medium size bowls or glasses
1 litre milk
7/8 cup sugar
3/4 cup flour
1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1/4 cup butter
3/4 cup dark chocolate or chocolate chips
left over cake or lady fingers or tea, cocoa, etc. biscuits or cookies


























-Mix cold milk, sugar, flour, and cocoa powder, and start cooking stirring constantly.
-Once it starts boiling, take it off the stove.
-Add butter and chocolate. Stir well.
-Cover the bottom of bowls or glasses with which you will serve the pudding with a layer of cake, cookie, or biscuit, and wet them with a splash of milk.
-Pour the pudding into the bowls.
-Decorate the tops with ground pistachio, shredded coconut, ground walnuts or almonds.
-Serve cold.

The popular way to have a "sup" in Turkey is with a scoop of ice cream on top.

note: See the cracks on the surface of the pudding in the pictures? That's because I forgot what a patisserie chef told me once and pour the pudding into the bowls when it was still hot. However, if you let the pudding cool down in the pot, stirring it frequently, and then pour it into the bowls, there would not be any cracks on the surface.

Bulgur with Green Lentils and Walnuts nimbuls(Cevizli Bat)

Bulgur with Green Lentils and Walnuts is a traditional recipe from a Central Anatolian city, Tokat. In Tokat's local cusine dishes with grape leaves have an important role, and this recipe is a good example. Bulgur with Green Lentils and Walnuts is a bit like kisir, but has a nuttier taste with walnuts and lentils.



























1 cup fine bulgur
1 cup hot water
1 cup cooked green lentils (~1/2 cup dry green lentils would make 1 cup cooked lentils)
1/2 cup chopped walnuts
2-3 green onions, finely chopped
1/3 cup chopped parsley
1/4 cup chopped fresh dill
1 green pepper or 1/2 green bell pepper, finely chopped
2 tbsp tomato paste
1 tsp or less red pepper flakes
1 tbsp finely chopped fresh basil or 1 tsp dried basil flakes
1 tsp dry mint flakes
1 tsp or less black pepper
salt
optional a couple of cherry tomatoes

grape leaves (if unavailable, lettuce would do)

-Put bulgur in a bowl and add hot water. Stir once, cover with a thick towel and wait until bulgur soaks all the water.
-If you have fresh grape leaves, boil some water and cook grape leaves for 2-3 minutes. Set aside and let cool.
-Add tomato paste to bulgur and mix it well with the back of a spoon or your hands until paste is homogeneously distributed.
-Add lentils.
-Add green onion, parsley, dill, tomatoes, green pepper, basil, mint, red pepper flakes, black pepper, walnut, and salt.
-Serve bulgur with lentils with grape leaves or lettuce. Put some in the middle of a leave, make a roll or a bundle and enjoy.

note: Although the traditional recipe doesn't ask for it, I love adding lemon to bulgur and lentils.

Stuffed Cabbage Leaves with Ground Meat nimbuls(Etli Lahana Sarması)

Stuffed cabbage leaves come directly from the kitchens of the Ottoman palace. There are different versions of this dish: with ground meat, with olive oil aka vegetarian one, with chestnuts, with bulgur, with mussels, etc. Although stuffed cabbage leaves are, I must say, absolutely delicious with chestnuts and mussels, meaty one is still my favorite. The reason why I haven't posted it so far is that they're usually gone before I can take a picture. These are actually the last three of the last batch I made. It might seem hard to deal with cabbage leaves, yet they are very forgiving. So don't be scared to try.




























1 medium (leaning towards big) cabbage [Pick one that is not rock hard, but kind of soft when press on top, they're easier for taking the leaves out)
1/2 lb ground meat (beef - ~80% lean)
1/2 cup short grain rice
2 medium onions, very finely chopped
1/3 cup chopped parsley
1/3 cup chopped dill
1 heaping tbsp tomato paste
1 tsp or 1/2 tbsp black pepper
1 tsp olive oil
1-2 tbsp butter
juice of half lemon
salt




























-Put ground beef, onion, rice, tomato paste, parsley, dill, black pepper, olive oil, and salt in bowl and mix well.
-Cut the 1 1/2-2 inches from the bottom/stem of the cabbage. Carefully try to take the leaves out one by one. [Check this site out for step by step how-to pictures]
-Boil some water with salt in a big pot.
-Boil the cabbage leaves 4 0r 5 at a time depending on how big a pot you are using for ~5 minutes flipping them over once. Take them out and place on a tray or a flat plate to cool down.
-Once the leaves cool down. Place one on a flat surface. Cut the big vein of the leaf out; it might be too stringy for rolling. If you have a very big leaf, cut it into two.
-Line the bottom of a pot with the cut out veins and the very outer leaves.
-Add 1 1/2 to 2 tbsp of rice and ground meat filling to one cabbage leaf, closer tot the bottom. Fold sides of cabbage over the filling. Roll it up starting from the stem end, it looks something like this. Repeat the same for the remaining leaves.
-Place rolled cabbage leaves in the pot lined with cut out veins and leaves in an orderly fashion.
-Chop butter in small pieces and scatter it on top. Pour lemon juice and hot water to cover the stuffed cabbage.
-Place a flat-ish plate on top of stuffed grape leaves so that they won't move around.
-Let it boil first on medium. Then cover and cook on low for 30-35 minutes.