Recipe: Detailed recipe for Fergana pilaf from Stalik Khankishiev. Uzbek pilaf recipe from Stalik Khankishiev

Every cook should know how Fergana pilaf is prepared. This is a classic, it gives a complete picture of Uzbek pilaf, because he collected the basic principles of preparing Central Asian dishes. Fragrant, ruddy to red-brown, fatty and at the same time easily digestible Fergana-style pilaf cannot but be liked. This is the most common option, which is offered in every teahouse in Uzbekistan and in every Moscow market where Uzbeks cook. Really, it’s worth studying the issue thoroughly!

Classic recipe

Classic preparation of the dish implies that the products used are selected as closely as possible to suit the Uzbek recipe.

Important! Pilaf is prepared not in a frying pan or pan with a thick bottom, but in a cast-iron cauldron with a lid and, if possible, over an open fire (although it is possible on the stove).

So, the features of Fergana pilaf:

the best meat is fatty lamb. If the meat has a layer of lard, then use a third less oil than normal. Beef is also acceptable; veal is worse in pilaf (Uzbeks traditionally prepare pilaf from mature meat). They also put pork, but this is not the Uzbek version at all;
fats - fat rendered from fat tail, and any clarified vegetable oil. Authentic cotton is only exotic. For most people, its taste is unusual and can be unpleasant. But adding a little sesame pilaf will be beneficial;
carrots should be ripe, juicy, but not young. Ideally, an orange and yellow root vegetable, Uzbek;
Pilaf is prepared from Fergana rice grown in the Fergana Valley. This is a classic devzira, reddish-colored, unpeeled rice. If you don't have it, a simple round Krasnodar one will do;
any onion, onion;
the only spices for Fergana pilaf are cumin, saffron or turmeric extreme case. Plus whole heads of garlic and definitely a whole pepper pod.

Tip: You should not buy bags of ready-made store-bought spices for pilaf. The composition includes a variety of seasonings that are not entirely suitable for pilaf. It is better to buy spices separately, and if in ready mixture, then the Uzbeks have it on the market.

Product weight - 1.5 kg good meat take the same amount of rice, 1 kg of carrots, 0.5 kg of onions, 450 g of fat. Spices about 50 g.

Fergana pilaf is prepared like this.

Wash and soak the rice well.
The meat is usually not cut too large.
We cut the onion randomly, there will be practically none left in the pilaf, but the carrots - into beautiful cubes or strips.
Heat a cauldron, pour oil into it and wait until a faint smoke appears. Add the onion rings and fry over high heat, stirring until the onion is well fried. The color of the pilaf and its taste depend on its roasting. But you shouldn’t overcook it, so as not to impart the taste of overcooked onions to the dish.
Place the meat in the fried onion and, stirring from time to time, fry for a quarter of an hour over high heat until crusty.
Add salt (a total of 2 tablespoons of salt will be needed for the pilaf), stir, add the carrots and fry again for about 10 minutes.
Add spices, pour in boiling water to just cover the vegetables, turn the heat to low and simmer the zirvak for another 30 minutes, until the meat is half cooked. If it is young, then 15 minutes is enough; if it is mature, it needs to be cooked longer.
Before adding rice, put two or three heads of garlic in the husks, pepper, try the zirvak again for salt - it should be strongly salted, even over-salted, so that the rice takes up excess salt.
Use a slotted spoon to add rice and smooth it out. Pour boiling water one and a half centimeters over the rice. All at a sufficient boil.
Cook, covered, until the liquid has evaporated to where the rice begins. At this point, the half-cooked rice will be steamed. The liquid remains in the zirvak, and the pilaf will arrive on it. The heat must be reduced to a minimum and, having collected the pilaf in a slide toward the center, cover it with a bowl slightly smaller than the diameter of the cauldron. Cover the top with a lid and leave on low heat for another 10-15 minutes.
Turn off the heat and leave the pilaf covered for another quarter of an hour. To prevent moisture from getting back into the pilaf, you can remove the bowl and cover the cauldron with a dry towel and close the lid.
Serve on a flat dish, garnished with whole heads of garlic and peppers removed from the pilaf. It is recommended to additionally prepare a salad of onions and tomatoes.

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With barberry

Often, some products are added to Fergana pilaf, which do not significantly affect the taste of the dish, they simply give shades. These are, for example, raisins or barberries. To add or not is a matter of taste. Barberry adds a little sourness to the pilaf, but in general it is not recommended to put a lot of it - so, a small handful at the time of adding other spices to the zirvak. Everything else is prepared in the classic way.

How to cook with raisins

Raisins are also placed solely as an additional decoration, for everyone.

For this type we will prepare:

1 kg each of carrots, rice and meat (you can have lamb, beef, chicken);
0.5 kg of onion;
0.3 l vegetable oil;
salt 2 tbsp. l., including 1 liter for soaking, half a spoon for zirvak and another half for rice during cooking;
spices - 2 tsp. cumin, 0.5 tsp. ground black pepper, turmeric 2 tsp, barberry optional - 1 tsp;
water.

This is how we prepare pilaf with raisins.

Soak the washed rice in salted water.
Heat the oil in a cauldron.
Fry the meat cut into pieces until golden brown and remove. Place onion half rings in a cauldron and fry until beautifully tanned.
Add carrot sticks and fry until their volume reduces.
Pour in half the spices, salt, pour in cold water to cover the contents of the cauldron, this is zirvak. Leave to simmer for an hour, covered, over low heat.
Meanwhile, drain the rice, rinse again and let dry a little in a colander. Prepare boiling water.
Add raisins, barberries, if desired, to the zirvak, spread the rice with a slotted spoon and pour boiling water to 2 cm or a little higher. Add turmeric. Turn the heat up to maximum so that the rice gurgles - this is necessary to absorb liquid.
As soon as the water leaves the surface, reduce the heat, place under a lid, wrapped in a towel, and cook for 5 minutes.
Open, make holes in the rice to the bottom with the end of a long spoon or the handle of a slotted spoon. Close again for 5 minutes. Ultimately, the simmering time is approximately 25 minutes.

Fergana style pilaf from Stalik Khankishiev

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Everything that Stalik Khankishiev cooks has its own peculiarity, a characteristic feature. So the pilaf in his performance has tangible Uzbek notes. For example, he advises to still find at least a piece of fat tail and use lamb fat together with vegetable oil. The second condition is that there should be a lot of carrots, about as much as rice. But you can have less meat. Usually they take a kilogram of meat and carrots, 1.2 kg of rice, and two large heads of onions, fat, fat tail or mixed with vegetable fat, 350 ml.

The only spices are cumin and saffron, plus generous heads of garlic and pepper. Everything is as in the classic version.

Cooking according to Stalik.

In a cauldron, throw finely chopped fat tail and heat until cracklings are formed. We remove them, salt them and eat them with onions and enjoyment. If there is no fat tail, just pour 350 g of oil and heat it up.
Place onion half rings in the oil and fry until very hot.
Place pieces of meat along the edges. Let it brown.
Add salt and cumin and mix.
Add carrots, then more salt and cumin. Add barberry and add a head of garlic and pepper. Now Stalik’s secret: it would be good to take half yellow and red carrots. Fill the bottom, yellow, with water, salt it, and leave the top, sweet, red, sweet. Half the water is enough for the bottom to be fried in oil, simmered, and the top to be steamed.
We lay in the rice and fill it with water to barely cover it, it’s well soaked, it’s better to add it later if it’s not enough. Cook at a high boil until it gurgles, periodically lifting the rice in a heap so that the mass, sticky at the edges from the starch, sinks to the bottom and does not mix with the rice.
The water has boiled, is the rice almost ready? Place on low heat and close with a lid. Another thirty minutes and the pilaf can be served!

Fergana pilaf from Stalik Khankishiev 1 kg of lamb pulp 3 – 4 slices from the back with ribs (can be replaced with good beef or veal) 300 – 350 g fat tail fat 1 kg of dev-jeera rice (can be replaced with other good medium-grain rice) 1 kg of red carrots 2 - 3 medium onions 2 - 3 heads of garlic 1 - 3 capsicums (either red or green) Jeera, salt, barberry if desired First, cut carrots: it is better to choose ripe, red, fairly large ones, rather than too juicy and watery young ones. Please note: you cannot grate carrots, even the largest ones, and you cannot chop them in a food processor. You just need to cut: take a well-sharpened knife, a comfortable spacious board, be patient and cut everything into long strips 3 by 3 millimeters. Let's prepare the meat: cut it into one and a half centimeter cubes, put the bone aside, and if there are slices from the back with ribs, then divide them one rib at a time and also put them aside. By the way, about carrots... Very often in the recipes of “knowledgeable” people you can read that for real Uzbek pilaf you need a special, yellow carrot. Indeed, such carrots are quite widespread in Uzbekistan. And it usually costs two to three times less than normal red carrots. By the way, and often mentioned cottonseed oil costs much less than fat tail fat or olive oil. Eating these cheap products in pilaf does not actually improve it at all, but it does save some money. Honestly, I hope none of our readers are interested in how to save money on food at the expense of its quality... If you prefer pure pulp - without ribs and bones, you can use any marrow bones left over after cutting the meat. Let's sort through the rice and rinse it thoroughly until perfectly clean water flows from it. Then soak it in large quantities warm (but not hot) water. As we remember, a lot depends on the time of soaking rice! Heat the cauldron very well. We keep the fire at maximum. There’s no need to worry about it burning: when you need to turn it down, I’ll tell you! Place the lard, cut into half-centimeter cubes, into a cauldron and melt the fat, and remove the golden browned pieces with a slotted spoon. We drink a glass of vodka, snacking on it with toasted drinks. If pilaf is cooked in oil, then pour in the oil and heat it well until it smokes blue. After this, put one whole peeled onion in the oil and fry it until black - this will remove extraneous odors. By the way, about lamb... Lamb properly cut by a good butcher - despite the fact that the slaughter of the animal was also carried out by a skilled professional - does not require rinsing with water at all. So try to avoid this. If there is small debris on a whole piece of meat (for example, from a cutting board) or small fragments of bones, then it is better to wipe the entire piece with a dry cloth and only then proceed to fine cutting. Now, into very hot oil (or into fat rendered from lard), carefully, so as not to get burned by the oil splashes, place the lamb bone and back slices. The ribs fry very quickly: turn them over once or twice, for five or six minutes, and they become a beautiful, golden brown color. The seeds should also acquire a golden color. Remove the meat from the cauldron and set it aside. Once again we wait for the oil to heat up and put the onion cut into rings into the cauldron. Gently fry it, stirring occasionally, until red-golden in color. All the water that was in the onion must evaporate, otherwise the meat that is waiting in line will be stewed rather than fried. We still don't turn down the fire! Speaking of oil... There is a rather risky, but effective and quick way removing odor from oil. When the oil begins to smoke, some cooks, to save time, instead of frying the onion, sprinkle a tablespoon of water over the surface of the oil. The water instantly boils, jets of steam shoot up from the cauldron, carrying along with it unnecessary odors. But, we repeat, this is a dangerous method - splashes of oil can seriously burn the cook himself. And if you cook indoors, it’s scary to think what will happen to the kitchen walls! Now let’s put the lamb pulp into the cauldron and fry the meat, stirring occasionally, along with the onion. After waiting for a beautiful crust to appear on the meat cubes, add the carrots in an even layer. After two or three minutes, mix it over the entire area of the cauldron with meat and onions - carefully so as not to break the carrot slices. Fry it, stirring, for 10 - 15 minutes, towards the end of frying, reduce the heat to medium, add some of the cumin. The carrots should become soft and give off a “pilaf smell.” If there is no smell, then you need to fry further. Speaking of salt... If you realize with horror that you have over-salted the zirvak, put one or two peeled potatoes in it. Firstly, this will correct the situation with salt, and secondly, the potatoes will also turn out very tasty, and you will eat them with pleasure later. By the way, about home supplies... Freshly brewed zirvak, by the way, is well stored for quite a long time (in the refrigerator, of course). You can take up the pilaf and prepare a little more zirvak than you need for one time, pour some of it, cool it, and put it in the refrigerator. And a few days later, when welcoming unexpected guests, quickly heat up and add rice, getting ready-made pilaf in less than an hour! Pour in boiling water so that everything is covered with water by a centimeter and a half. We lower the whole heads of garlic, previously peeled from the outer husks and roots, and whole, without damage, Bell pepper . By the way, about rice... Be careful: the water from the rice must be drained immediately before placing it in the cauldron. Soaked rice, left without water, dries out quite quickly, and the whole thing comes apart in rings, cracks and bursts. The result will be disappointing: pilaf made from cheap cut rice, although at the beginning you used a purebred, expensive variety. Speaking of water... There is a proven way to find out whether there is still water at the bottom of the cauldron, under a layer of pilaf: you just need to pat the surface of the rice with a slotted spoon. If there is still water left, a slurping, squelching sound will be heard. And if there is no water, the sound will be dull and elastic. We return the back slices or the bone that was fried at the beginning to the cauldron. After everything boils, you need to reduce the heat to “just above the very minimum.” Everything should boil in an open cauldron for about forty minutes, no less. The water should gradually boil away, and the remaining broth should become transparent and acquire a rich red-brown color. Having achieved the desired color and consistency, turn up the heat again to maximum and add salt. If you cooked with a bone, remove it; you won’t need it anymore. What we got is called zirvak. Now carefully drain the water from the soaked rice, lower it evenly into the cauldron with a slotted spoon, leveling it over the surface, and pour about a liter of boiling water over everything - carefully so as not to damage the layer of rice. We add fire to “supermaximum” - it is necessary that it boils as soon as possible and over the entire surface. For this, you can even break the rules and cover it with a lid for a minute! If only it boils, so that the oil floats to the top, and then, in the process of cooking the rice and evaporating the water, it sinks down again, enveloping each grain - then there will be pilaf, and not a sticky porridge with meat! Under no circumstances do we mix the rice with the lower layers of carrots and meat, only level the surface of the rice if necessary, and regulate the uniform boiling by moving the rice from where it boils less or does not boil at all to where there is active seething, and level again . By the way, about pepper... If in your bustle you forgot to put dry pepper pods on time, then there is a clever way to correct this mistake. Just before closing the pilaf, when there is no water left in the rice, cut off the tails of the peppers, shake out all the seeds from them and insert the sharp end into the rice. Carefully pour a little boiling water into the peppers themselves. And close the pilaf with a lid, as usual. The peppers will turn out well baked and very tasty, without giving too much heat to the pilaf itself. When the water completely disappears from the surface, try the rice. It, having noticeably increased in volume, should not crunch on the teeth. That is, the rice is almost ready, but there should be no water left in the cauldron at all. Use a slotted spoon to remove it from the edge and see: is there only oil there, or is there something squelching at the bottom, raising steam? By the way, about fat content... It is very rare, but sometimes it happens that there is too much oil in pilaf. In this case, you need to take a stale flatbread (or churek, or maybe even lavash), spread it into thin plates and place them at the very bottom of the cauldron. These pieces will absorb all the excess oil, leaving only as much as needed. If there is too much water left, make holes in the rice layer so that it boils out more intensely from below; you can even use a slotted spoon to move the rice layer around the edges. If, on the contrary, it is dry below, but the rice is still crispy, add a little boiling water (literally a quarter of a glass; if it turns out to be not enough, it is better to add it later). However, if everything was done correctly, then there is no need for these actions. Having felt that everything is going “as it should” and the remaining water is about to evaporate, we reduce the heat to medium-low, wait until the water has completely boiled away, and then reduce the heat to minimum. Now sprinkle the rice with lightly ground cumin and close the cauldron with the tightest lid. If you do not have a lid that would cover the cauldron perfectly, cover it big dish(it doesn’t matter if there is a small gap left at the edges), and then with a lid. We wait 20 - 25 minutes and open. Be careful – the first jets of steam are very hot! Loosen the rice and find the pepper pods and garlic. Carefully, so that they do not break, transfer them to a separate plate. Mix everything thoroughly, shaking the rice. If we come across lobes of the back, we’ll catch them too and set them aside for now. Place pilaf on a round large dish pile, place the heads of garlic at the very top, decorate everything with pepper pods and back slices. And - they carried it!!! Pilaf is eaten with spoons. It is even more correct, having a certain dexterity, to eat with his hands. But not with a fork! Eating pilaf with a fork is an insult to the cook: the fact is that a well-made pilaf should be crumbly, this is one of the most important criteria for its quality. Well as it is crumbly pilaf with a fork? It will crumble! You can only taste good pilaf with a fork... Moreover: everything will exactly correspond to oriental etiquette if you eat pilaf straight from that big common dish, in which it is filed. A goth who likes it spicy breaks off a piece of pepper and squeezes the contents directly onto the rice in front of him. The garlic turns out unexpectedly tasty; it is broken into cloves when it has cooled slightly, and the contents of the cloves are also squeezed onto the rice: this baked pulp will support your appetite when for the first time it seems that you are already full. After pilaf we no longer drink any alcoholic drinks or soft drinks. Only hot tea. Green, of course! And now about what other pilafs and dishes similar to pilaf are there. People inexperienced in cooking will say: “Well, what’s there? Pilaf is pilaf! Meat, onions, carrots and rice - what new can be invented here? Don’t subtract or add, no matter how you cook, everything will turn out the same!” Can you guess how wrong people are with such a simplistic approach? There are very few notes in the scale, but how many different melodies can be composed from them! And, of course, anyone who is more or less familiar with cooking is well aware that completely different dishes can be prepared from the same products. I do not pretend to be a complete overview of this truly endless series culinary masterpieces, but I would like to focus on those options that seem most interesting to me. By the way, about “ripening”... If we cook in a wide cauldron over an open fire, then at the very last stage, reducing the heat to the very minimum is easiest by removing the still burning wood from under the cauldron and collecting the remaining coals under the center of the bottom. Usually, such coals are enough for the pilaf to ripen as required, but at the same time, if the cauldron is filled with more than half its volume, there is a danger that the rice located near the edges will cool down too much. In this case, it makes sense to collect the rice in a mound and cover it not with a flat dish, but always with a convex bowl or large salad bowl. Speaking of drinking. They start drinking vodka for the second time while waiting for pilaf, having a snack light fruits, a salad of thinly sliced onions and tomatoes, as well as hot flatbreads and various meat delicacies. Libations stop shortly before the pilaf is brought out. This rule is strict, and it does not tolerate exceptions. Tested by time, tested on yourself. By the way, about Coca-Cola... And this is also time-tested and tested on myself, but this time with deep sadness. Lamb fat solidifies at a temperature of 36 degrees Celsius, which is exactly the temperature healthy person. But if cold liquids are endlessly poured into this healthy person, the matter will inevitably end with the lamb fat congealing on the walls of his digestive tract. Three or four days of terrible pain in the stomach and a green complexion are guaranteed. Better let the tea be green! Speaking of overeating... If one of your guests overeats on pilaf (and this can easily happen!) and it becomes difficult for him to breathe, then along with green tea, the unfortunate person should be given thinly chopped and washed onions, sprinkled with vinegar. And the next day let him drink strong black tea with big amount sugar and doesn’t have breakfast. Among traditional options, which will be discussed below, I want to talk about those pilafs that I myself invented. Pilaf is a special dish, it provokes innovation, you want to try the unknown, do something differently, bring in something of your own. However, there are also laws here. Do you know what I was finally and irrevocably convinced of? Any improvisation should be based on a solid knowledge of the harmony of taste and aroma; its basis should be a good, confident knowledge of the classics. If you begin to fantasize immoderately and frivolously, fuss and get ahead of yourself, you will invariably get yourself into a lot of trouble. IN best case scenario, if you're lucky, it turns out that you simply invented a bicycle that has long been known to everyone. Therefore, even if it already seems to you that you are on good terms with pilaf, do not rush further. And if you are ready for serious “research” and experiments - here’s my hand to you - let’s walk this path together, for it is thorny and complicated, but it leads us to our cherished goals! Seriously, I am absolutely sure that you need to start learning how to cook Uzbek pilaf with the Fergana-style pilaf recipe, but the next step in learning Central Asian cooking should certainly be Samarkand pilaf. As I already said, in culinary terms, Uzbekistan is a country that can be divided into several different regions. Ancient Khorezm, brilliant Tashkent, most fertile Fergana, magnificent Bukhara, exotic Surkhandarya and, of course, the sweetest, most fragrant of Uzbek cities – Samarkand. Believe me, I'm telling the truth! Everything in Samarkand is special - the air itself, the water, the people, the history. And Samarkand cuisine is also special, it is truly unique... And how could this city, as they quite rightly write in guidebooks, “an ancient crossroads of trade routes, a meeting place of various ancient and rich cultures,” could not become a haven for the most talented chefs? Could it be that Samarkand did not give birth to something amazing in culinary terms? Of course not! And will it be a revelation for you if I say that the main culinary heritage of Samarkand is Samarkand pilaf? Will it be too oily? No. Not too much. We OFTEN hear: “Oh, this Eastern cuisine“It’s too fatty for us, it’s too high in calories, and we can’t risk our beautiful figures like that!” Let's talk about this with numbers in hand. Let’s take, for example, the pilaf we just reviewed – is it suitable? Has everyone seen how fat he looks? Does everyone remember how much lard goes into preparing it? In fact, 350 grams of fat tail fat, from which 300 grams of fat is rendered, is not at all excessive for pilaf prepared from one kilogram of good rice. Remember - put 300 grams of fat on one scale. And that same kilogram of rice, containing only about 70 grams of proteins, but about 900 grams of carbohydrates, increases its weight to 3.5 kilograms during cooking. Let's remember and put 3500 grams on the other side of the scale. Pilaf usually also contains a kilogram of meat and two hundred to three hundred grams of ribs, of which, so be it, I agree, there is 150 grams of hidden fat - let’s put it on the first, “harmful” side of the scale. But after cooking, there will be 800 grams left, at least in principle. healthy meat? This will undoubtedly go into the second, “correct” bowl. Well, and also onions, carrots, garlic - let there be another 800 grams left in the pilaf for the second bowl. The total fat in the pilaf will be 450 grams. And everything else - 5 kilograms and 100 grams. Total weight pilaf – 5 kilograms 550 grams. It turns out that its fat content does not exceed 10%! This is slightly less fat than a milk sausage, and only slightly more fat than white bread. Do you know what the percentage of fat is in the “low-fat” sausage? The so-called “hidden fat” that is not even visible to the eye? Well, stir 30% fat into the minced meat - no problem! But there is also one that is in the form of pieces of bacon and will go on a separate bill. In total, a sandwich made from an equal weight piece of sausage and bread will contain from 20 to 30% fat. A cheese sandwich seems like a pretty modest snack. There, by the way, there is the same 20 - 30% fat - but how easy and pleasant at first glance! What if it’s with butter, huh? All 50 - 60% will run. And it would be nice to break it all down with some sweeter tea. In a word, I am sure that if pilaf can harm someone’s figure, it is by no means because it is too fatty. The problem, most likely, lies in the fact that it is too tasty, and we greatly overestimate the amount of food necessary for our life. So eat deliciously, but in moderation, and don’t ruin your life with diets and all sorts of restrictions, because there is no greater evil for a person than eating in irritation and thinking about how harmful it is! By the way, it’s very interesting: but if you give birth to a child and immediately give it to nutritionists for proper and healthy feeding, will they make sure that this little person lives at least 100 - 120 years? And how long do nutritionists themselves live?

This is for everyone famous dish They cook it everywhere and everyone believes that their method of cooking is correct. Today we will tell you how to cook delicious Fergana pilaf and take it as a basis step by step recipe from Stalik Khankishiev, it seems to us that this is the ideal way. Having mastered the preparation of this delicious oriental dish at home you will have another reason to invite guests and treat them to a culinary masterpiece.

Real Fergana style pilaf is cooked in a cauldron over a fire. Not everyone has the opportunity to cook smoky dishes and most have to confine themselves to the kitchen and stove. Of course, you can cook Uzbek Fergana pilaf using a saucepan or frying pan, but if you want to make it truly tasty and proper, get a good cauldron.

Real Fergana pilaf is cooked with fat tail lard (fat from the back of a sheep's tail), but if you don't like this product or have nowhere to buy it, then cook with vegetable oil.

How to cook Fergana pilaf

To prepare real Uzbek Fergana pilaf we need lamb, fat tail fat, dev-zera rice, onions, carrots and spices. Remember that the taste of pilaf is determined by three things: high-quality water, oil in which the ingredients are fried and rice.

Ingredients:

Lamb (fillet) - 1 kg.
Lamb ribs - 3 pcs.
Fat tail fat - 300 gr.
Dev-zera rice - 1 kg.
Carrots - 1 kg.
Onion - 3 pcs.
Garlic - 2 heads
Capsicum - 2 pcs.

Step 1.

Let's start cooking Fergana pilaf by preparing one of the main ingredients of this dish - carrots. For pilaf, you need to use only ripe, not too juicy and not young carrots. We cut it into long strips, no use of a grater or food processor.

Step 2.

Cut the lamb loin with fat into medium-sized pieces, lightly pound the ribs and add salt.

Step 3.

Cut the fat tail into cubes.

Step 4.

Peel the onions and cut into half rings.

Step 5.

Take the rice and rinse thoroughly cold water. Clear water will be a signal that the rice has been washed well. Now pour warm water over the rice and set aside.

Step 6.

Let's start preparing real, festive Fergana pilaf by frying fat tail fat. Place the previously cut pieces into a hot cauldron. According to Stalik’s advice, there is no need to stir; the lard only needs to be turned once. When frying is finished, carefully remove it using a slotted spoon.

Step 7

There should be more than enough fat and dip the separated lamb ribs. Fry them over high heat for 6 minutes and remove with a slotted spoon.

Step 8

Place the chopped onion in a cauldron and fry until golden brown, stirring occasionally.

Step 10

We continue preparing the Fergana pilaf and at this stage add the carrots, spread them in an even layer and fry for 3 minutes. Stir and continue cooking for about 12 minutes. Add cumin seasoning, pour in warm water, it should cover the contents of the cauldron by 1.5 cm.

Step 11

It's time to put in the fried ribs, whole garlic and pepper. We wait until the water boils and reduce the heat to almost a minimum. Cook for about 60 minutes, the water will gradually boil away and acquire a pleasant red-brownish color, at this time add salt and increase the heat to maximum. The resulting mixture is called zirvak, and in it we will continue to cook Fergana-style pilaf, namely rice.

Step 12

We take out the ribs again and place them on a plate with the lard. These ingredients will no longer participate in the preparation of pilaf.

Drain the rice and place in an even layer in the cauldron. Carefully add boiling water, it should completely cover the rice, but do not overdo it, it is better to add more as you go. We wait for it to boil and turn off the heat again to low.

Step 13

Cook the rice until cooked, the finished rice expands well in size and does not crunch on the teeth. If necessary, add water a little at a time or increase the heat. At this stage it is very important not to stir anything.

Step 14

After the rice is cooked, turn off the stove, add more cumin and cover the cauldron with a lid. In about 20 minutes, the Uzbek Fergana pilaf will be completely ready; carefully remove the garlic and pepper from it and place it on plates.

Uzbek pilaf from Stalik. Detailed, clear, beautiful and VERY tasty.

It is unlikely that anyone will be able to name the exact number of dishes united by one common name “Uzbek pilaf”. The pilaf that is prepared in Bukhara and that prepared, say, in Andijan or Tashkent are completely different in the method of preparation, in appearance and in terms of taste. Moreover, even two neighbors' pilaf can look completely different, even if they use the same products. At the same time, everyone believes that it is he who cooks " correct pilaf" In this case, we are no exception; moreover,

we will tell you more correctly about how to prepare it!

First, we cut red, ripe, not young carrots. Let's not rub it on coarse grater, we will not chop it with a food processor, but rather we will cut it - take a well-sharpened knife, a board, be patient and cut it into long strips 0.3 X 0.3 cm. Note that carrots are the Soul of Uzbek pilaf! There are many varieties of this red-sided Soul, but two requirements are mandatory: it should not be too juicy, like the early one, spring carrots. If you don’t have a nice carrot at hand, don’t be sad or upset, you just have a great reason to give up making pilaf!

This is roughly how we cut carrots

All the oil has been thoroughly rendered from these roasts, they are dry and light, pleasantly crispy. The perfect snack!

lard) lower the slices from the back. Be careful - it may splash and burn! They fry very quickly - turn them over once or twice, for about five or six minutes, and they become a beautiful, golden brown color! And if you cook with a bone, the bone should acquire a golden color. Remove them from the cauldron and set them aside.

Whether it’s ribs, almost naked bones from a shank or a lamb shank, or even “sugar” bones from a hip joint, this is how they should be fried!

This is how we fry it, over high heat.

the pepper is dry and hard, then right now. 9) It doesn’t matter whether you like garlic and pepper or not, you still need to put them in. We also omit the slices from the back, or the bone that was fried at the beginning. After everything boils, you need to reduce the heat to “just above the very minimum.” Everything should boil in an open cauldron for about forty minutes, no less. The water should gradually boil away, and the remaining broth should become transparent and have a rich red-brown color. Add heat to “maximum” and add salt. Approximately

A tablespoon with a heap of salt usually goes away, but it’s better to try - the broth should be slightly salted, some of the salt will be absorbed by Fig. 10) If you cooked with a bone, take it out, you won’t need it anymore. So we have the environment in which the rice will “swim”. It is called zirvak.

And cook over low heat, at a gentle simmer.

at all. Use a slotted spoon to move it away from the edge and look - is there only oil there, or is water also steaming? 13) And if the rice is still crunchy, then add a little more water (50 grams, otherwise you can easily ruin everything). If you do pour water, you need to make holes in the layer of rice so that the water boils away more intensely; you can use a slotted spoon to move the layer of rice around the edges so that it boils away faster. But all this is “resuscitation.” - if everything was done correctly, then there is no need for it. That's when you feel that everything is going “as it should.” and the remaining water is about to evaporate, reduce the heat to “medium-low”, wait for the water to completely boil away and reduce the heat to the smallest.

There is nothing complicated here! We see the rice, we can taste it, we have the opportunity to add water or, conversely, turn up the heat so that it boils away faster. But the rice should look like this before closing.

It’s better, of course, to remove leftover rice and other foods from the table :)))

2) Very often in the recipes of “knowledgeable” people you can read that for real Uzbek pilaf you need special, yellow carrots. Indeed, such carrots are quite widespread in Uzbekistan. And it usually costs two to three times less than red carrots, just as the often mentioned cottonseed oil costs less than fat tail or olive oil. The use of these cheap products in pilaf does not improve it, but it allows you to save some money - I hope none of our readers

Interested in ways to save on food?

3) Zira is a spice that grows in Central Asia, India and Iran. Externally very similar to cumin, which often leads to confusion in many cookbooks- especially translated ones. Jeera, called jeera in Indian and cumin in English, is mainly used for meat dishes, while cumin is mostly used in baking. Need I say how different they are in taste and aroma? There are black and yellow cumin. The latter comes to us from Iran and India, often in ground form and is sold in any

supermarket. Uzbek pilafs use small, black cumin, which grows wild in the mountains of Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. You can, of course, use Indian cumin in Uzbek pilaf - large and pure - but you should keep in mind that these two types of cumin differ in taste and aroma in the same way as, say, apples can differ: ranetki and antonovka.

4) Where is the barberry? Should real Uzbek pilaf contain barberry? - many of our readers may ask us. Put it down if you want. It would be correct to put it when cooking zirvak. But, honestly, it’s not about barberry!

5) Properly slaughtered and dressed by a good butcher, lamb does not require rinsing - try to avoid this. If there is small debris on a whole piece of meat (for example, from a cutting board) or small fragments of bones, then it is better to wipe the entire piece with a dry cloth and only then proceed to fine cutting.

6) If you cook outdoors, then do not be lazy to lay out a fireplace for the cauldron - large stones and clay are suitable for this. The cauldron should be recessed into the hearth by 2/3 of its depth, there should be a place in front where you will put firewood, and holes for exit

smoke should be located behind the fireplace, in its upper part. Then you can always arrange the firewood so that a cauldron of any shape heats up equally on all sides.

nice, yellow-golden fries, turn the whole lump over (and the pieces of lard stick together in a lump!) and let the other side of the lard reach the same color. Then remove the roast from the cauldron and use it for its intended purpose.

What does this method provide?

Firstly, with constant stirring, the pieces of lard themselves fry and darken much faster, thereby changing the color of the oil remaining in the cauldron and giving it a somewhat burnt taste.

Secondly, if the lard is not touched during rendering, it releases much more oil than with constant stirring, perhaps up to 85% of the weight of the lard itself. And after this, the frying turns out to be light on the stomach and pleasantly crispy on the teeth - in

just right for a snack!

8) We saw a rather dangerous, but effective and fast, other way to get rid of the smell of oil. At the moment when the oil begins to smoke, some cooks, in order to save time, instead of frying the onion, sprinkled a tablespoon of water into the oil. The water immediately boiled, streams of steam rose from the cauldron, carrying with them unnecessary odors. But, we repeat, this is a dangerous method - splashes of oil can seriously burn the cook himself, not to mention the completely dirty kitchen.

9) If you forgot to put dry pepper pods now, then there is a clever way to correct this mistake much later. Just before closing the pilaf, when there is no water left in the rice, you need to cut off the tails of the peppers, shake out all the seeds from it and insert the sharp end into the rice. Carefully pour a little boiling water into the peppers themselves. The peppers will turn out well cooked and very tasty, without affecting the spiciness of the pilaf itself.

10) If you still have too much salt, then put one or two potatoes in the zirvak - firstly, they can also be eaten and they will turn out tasty, and secondly, this will correct the situation with salt.

11) Zirvak can be stored well for quite a long time (in the refrigerator, of course). When preparing pilaf, you can prepare a little more zirvak, pour some of it, cool it, store it in the refrigerator, and a few days later, when meeting unexpected guests, quickly heat it up and add rice, getting ready-made pilaf in less than an hour!

12) The water from the rice must be drained immediately before placing it in the cauldron. Soaked rice, left without water, dries out quite quickly, and the whole thing comes apart in rings, cracks and bursts. The result will be rice pilaf, even if we

They used very expensive and decent rice.

13) To find out if there is still water in the pilaf, you can tap the rice with a slotted spoon: if there is water, you will hear a slurping, squelching sound. And if there is no water, the sound will be dull and elastic. And it’s also very rare, but sometimes it still happens - there is too much oil in the pilaf. In this case, you need to take a stale flatbread (or churek, or maybe even lavash), spread the flatbread or churek into thin plates and place these plates at the very bottom of the cauldron. These pieces will absorb all the excess oil, leaving what you need.

14) If we cook in a wide cauldron over an open fire, then we can reduce the fire to the very minimum by removing the still burning wood from under the cauldron and collecting the remaining coals under the center of the cauldron. Usually such coals are enough for the pilaf to cook completely, but

Moreover, if there is a lot of rice in the cauldron, there is a danger that the rice located near the edges of the cauldron will cool down too much. In this case, it makes sense to collect the rice in a mound and cover it not with a flat dish, but always with a convex cup.

15) They begin to drink vodka for the second time while waiting for pilaf, snacking on light fruits, a salad of thinly sliced onions and tomatoes with hot flatbreads and thinly sliced meat snacks. The meal usually takes place without bread - rice is enough

replaces. Libations stop shortly before the meal. Time-tested, tested

16) And this too is time-tested and sadly experienced. Lamb lard solidifies at a temperature of 36 degrees, which is just right for healthy human body. But if you endlessly pour cold liquids into this body, this will inevitably lead to lamb fat congealing on the walls of your body. I'm sorry. digestive tract. Three or four days of terrible pain in the stomach and green color faces are guaranteed. It would be better if the tea was green!

17) If someone eats too much pilaf (and this can easily happen!) and it becomes difficult for him to breathe, then along with green tea he should be given thinly chopped and washed onion, sprinkled with vinegar. And the next day, let him drink strong black tea with a lot of sugar and not have breakfast.

And now another text about numbers. Well, relatively new photos!

Is it interesting to give a recipe for something actually prepared with grams?

You could have squeezed and strained a little more, and there would have been 50 left.

And for 1 hour 20 minutes. In the last 20 minutes I added salt with two tablespoons of coarse salt, scooping the salt up.

Our home remedy is a bowl of rice. Some may measure with glasses, some with a cup, and some with a beaker.

But it turned out that our standard quantity - five bowls - is exactly a kilogram!

They soaked it for two hours. After soaking, the same rice began to weigh 2 kilograms! Okay, not two.

1 kg 960 grams. But this good rice, keep in mind! That's why I went crazy with lard!

They poured it in, it boiled away, and this is what the rice looked like. It would be interesting, of course, to take it out of the pilaf now and weigh it again!

But you can't! It's time to close.

They will interfere with uniform boiling, therefore. But now I'll put them on top of the rice. And I’ll close the pilaf. For 30 minutes.

The fact that then it needs to be mixed and served, as in the second picture, I think, does not need to be explained to anyone.

What to serve with it? I’m in a good mood, a bottle of vodka is steaming and this salad.

I can’t stop myself from showing you one of the latest photos of Fergana pilaf

Bukhara pilaf with raisins

Ingredients:

1 kg rice
250–300 g different oils and fats
2 medium onions
600 g medium carrots
1 cup raisins.

Cooking method.
Prepare a mixture of oils. We calcinate those oils or fats that need it, for example fat from tail fat or cottonseed oil. After this, reducing the heat, add other oils. Then put the onion, cut into rings, into the oil. As soon as it starts to turn red, quickly remove it from the oil. We wait until all the moisture remaining after the onion has evaporated from the oil. Add carrots, cut into thin strips. When the carrots are fried, add hot water, bring to a boil and reduce heat. That's it - the base for the pilaf is ready. Now she needs to cook for a sufficient time - 20-30 minutes.
After that, add salt, add raisins, you can also add dried apricots and prunes. Add rice, fill it with water, turn up the heat. And remember: the closer the moment of complete evaporation of water, the lower the fire. After making sure that the rice is almost ready, reduce the heat to low and cover with a lid. Usually 25–30 minutes is enough, but the most delicious and aromatic rice is obtained if it has stood for 45–50 minutes.
Serve the finished pilaf on a large round dish. You can mix it, or you can leave it in layers - rice at the bottom, and carrots with raisins on top.

Fergana pilaf

Ingredients (for 8-liter container):

1 kg lamb pulp
3–4 loin wedges with ribs (can be replaced with beef or veal)
300–350 g fat tail fat (or butter)
1 kg rice
1 kg red carrots
2–3 medium onions
2–3 heads of garlic
1–3 capsicums
salt
cumin
barberry.

Cooking method.
We cut the carrots into strips approximately 3 by 3 mm, the meat into 1.5-centimeter cubes, and set the ribs aside. We sort through the rice and wash it thoroughly. Soak in large quantities warm water. Heat the pilaf dish over high heat. Dip the diced lard into it and melt the fat. If oil is used, heat it until it smokes blue. After this, lower the whole onion head and fry it until black – this will remove extraneous odors. Then fry the ribs in oil until golden brown. We take them out and set them aside.
Place the onion cut into rings into the heated oil and fry it until red-golden. Then add the lamb pulp and fry it with onions. As soon as a nice crust appears on the meat cubes, add a layer of carrots. Fry for 10–15 minutes, reduce the heat to medium, add some of the cumin. Pour in boiling water so that everything is covered with water by a centimeter and a half. We lower the whole heads of garlic and capsicum, peeled from the husks and roots. We return the ribs that were fried at the beginning. After everything boils, turn down the heat. Let it simmer for 40 minutes.
Then add heat to maximum and add salt. Drain the water from the rice and pour in a liter of boiling water. Leave on the stove until the remaining water is about to evaporate, reduce the heat to medium, and when the water completely disappears, to a minimum. Sprinkle the rice with the remaining cumin and cover with a lid. We wait 20–25 minutes, open it. We take out the pepper pods, garlic, ribs - they are served separately. Mix the pilaf, place it on a large dish and serve.

Steam pilaf "Al-Maghrib"

Ingredients:

1 broiler chicken weighing 1.2–1.4 kg
1 kg basmati rice n 800 g carrots
300 g onion
150 g ghee
100 g Asian chickpeas
50 g prunes
spices (cloves – 2 pcs., cinnamon – 1 stick, turmeric, rosemary – 1 tsp each, sumac, sweet red pepper – half a teaspoon, hot red pepper – a quarter teaspoon).

Cooking method.
Divide the chicken into pieces, cut the carrots into cubes, and dice the onion. Heat in a cauldron over high heat melted butter, omit the cloves and immediately the onion. Stirring continuously, fry the onion until transparent, add pieces of cinnamon, add turmeric. Stir until the turmeric dissolves, add the carrots. Then almost immediately rosemary. As soon as the carrots begin to brown, pour boiling water over them. Add all the other spices and salt. We regulate the spiciness with pepper, and the sourness with sumac.
We lower the pre-soaked peas, boiled until half cooked, and lay the chicken pieces on top.
Place well-soaked and washed rice, boiled until half cooked in highly salted water, in a colander. We place a colander on top of the cauldron, wrap it with towels and cover with a lid. As soon as it warms up, reduce the heat. Leave for 40 minutes. If after this there is little water left and the rice is not ready, add a little boiling water. If there is a lot of water and the rice is almost cooked, turn up the heat and remove the towels to let the steam escape. By the time the rice is ready, there should be no water left at all.
Before serving, place rice on the dish, then carrots, peas, and chicken pieces on top.