A story about cooking gefilte fish. It would seem, well, what is there - a fish for itself and a stuffed fish, but you never know what? I foresee screams and groans in the comments, I foresee those offended and slamming the door, as in reality I see those writing: “But in our house it was cooked quite differently.”
There are few Jews, but there are many gefilte fish recipes. There are many recipes, even more connoisseurs, and there is nowhere to try well-cooked fish - no one wants to mess around. But everywhere they say: “Ah, leave me alone, I still have to stuff fish today!”
Our love story for stuffed fish began a long time ago, when we were young. But I want to start the story with the events that happened in our family not so long ago, even fifteen years have not passed.
Things didn't go well for me that year. That's not going business and that's it. Sometimes, in order to divert my mind from sad thoughts, I called my older comrade, the father of my late friend, Mikhail Natanovich, who lived alone in a large, deserted house.
- Mikhail Natanovich, what do you have for lunch? Well, then I'm for "kerosene" and to you!
We jokingly called vodka kerosene. Mikhail Natanovich, despite his lonely life, cooked hot every day and believed that this was the key to his health. We ate deliciously, drank, turned on a tape recorder with songs from that time when his house was a full bowl and there was not enough room for dancing, and we remembered the past, or we simply remained silent and sighed about today.
- Well, Stalik, are you upset about money? Here, rub the palm of one hand with the thumb of the other. Rub well! Look, what's rolled up there? Not rolled up, no pellets? And sometimes it rolls, right? That's what rolls - the money is! Nothing rolled up on your hand today, you won’t be upset because of this, right?
- Yes, how? After all, the house, family, children. Dress, teach, feed. And here - at least crack - I fight like a fish on ice, but nothing goes.
“Wait,” Mikhail Natanovich interrupted me. - Do you have an anniversary this year? Forty years old? Here, arrange a holiday so that everyone gasps. Call the whole city! Call everyone so that everyone can see - things are going well for you! And then we'll see.
I arranged to rent a hall in a newly built restaurant, where customers have not yet found their way. I promised them:
- Such people will come who will then go to you every day! And I will cook myself. So let's cook that everyone will think "this is a restaurant!"
And I started shopping for groceries. You won't believe it, I had only 600 dollars, and we invited and fed 120 people to satiety. I won’t be able to list all the menus and tell in detail how you can get out of the situation even with such little money, so I’ll only talk about the highlight of that evening - gefilt fish, stuffed fish.
First of all, I went to the Syr Darya and bought 22 fish there. Among them, there was just no one - and pike, and silver carp, and carp, and grass carp and snake-head. In a word, everything that is found in this river, if only the fish were larger.
Traditionally it is believed that pike is the most suitable fish for gefilte fish. This is due primarily to the fact that the pike itself is a rather dry fish and is rarely tasty if cooked as it is. Therefore, cutlets and gefilte fish are most often prepared from pike.
The second reason for choosing a pike is that it is easier to remove the skin from a pike than from other types of fish. If the pike is not yet gutted, then you just need to cut the skin at the head and the whole skin will be removed entirely, with a stocking.
Unfortunately for pike, its caviar has recently been popular, so they catch it more and more for caviar, and the carcass itself is sold cheaper than the rest of the fish. But, alas, already ripped through the stomach. Well, nothing, you can cook it like that - just remove the skin.
Here skinning a carp is somewhat more difficult. But there is a trick - take two napkins, hold the carp's slippery skin with one hand, and the flesh with the other. Where the meat remains on the skin, carefully trim with a knife.
Chop at the base of the tail, cut off at the base of the head too.
Remove the gills from the head, thoroughly rinse everything inside.
Remove the meat from the ridge, do not pay attention to small bones.
Ridges, ribs, heads, send to cook, pouring a small amount of water.
I forgot to tell you that you need a few more fish than you are going to serve. For example, if you want to cook two stuffed fish, then buy three fish at once. Of those that I bought for my fortieth birthday, my wife prepared 12 for the table - the largest and most beautiful. And the trifle all went in addition to minced meat.
In general, in addition to the minced fish itself, in the fish gefilt there are onions fried in vegetable oil (do not spare the oil!) And white rolls soaked in milk.
For example, this time we got five kilograms of minced meat twice passed through a meat grinder, so we put six pieces of rolls, and there were probably about a kilogram of onions, if you count raw.
A large spoonful of sugar went into this amount of minced meat.
A couple of tablespoons of fine salt.
And a full, with the top, a spoonful of black pepper.
Minced meat must be properly kneaded and knocked out, just like minced meat on a kebab.
For greater smoothness, you can add half a glass of cold water to the minced meat.
And with this stuffing it is necessary to stuff the fish skin and head. You don't need to sew anything, everything will be fine!
This time I thought: stuffed fish is good for everyone, but some zest is missing in it!
And here's what I came up with. In Azerbaijan, they cook lavang fish, that is, stuffed fish. Only there they do not remove the skin from the fish, but prepare minced meat from soaked plum marshmallow (lavashany), nuts, and fried onions. At first, there was an idea to add all these components to minced fish and thereby decorate its taste. But then another idea came to mind, a better one.
We rolled minced meat for lavanga into a sausage, wrapped it in cling film and cooled, almost frozen.
Then this sausage was inserted into the belly of one of the fish and covered with other stuffing.
Here - as if there is nothing. Close, smooth the skin!
The baking sheet is greased with oil and onions and carrots are laid out on it in thick rings.
The fish is placed on top.
It would be nice to grease the fish with oil before baking.
I inserted a thermometer needle into the mouth of one of the fish and set the oven temperature to 140C at a humidity of 50%. If you don't have oven humidity control, place a hot frying pan down and pour boiling water into it. And that's it - close and bake. Focus on the beautiful color of the skin, but I warn you that the fish should be cooked for quite a long time, an hour and a half or two, if not more.
Oh, yes, I know that many fish are not baked, but gefilte fish are cooked in a patch, in the same oven! And I am ready, ready to please both ours and yours, so long as there is no war. That's what we needed the broth for! Do you understand me? Has it reached you now?
Only at first I poured pomegranate juice into the patch, and put carrots and beets under the fish.
And he poured enough broth into the patch so that the fish was waist-deep.
That's it, this patch can be kept in the oven for at least five hours, just don't heat the oven too much. Here is that baked fish, when it is ready, take it out, but let this one still stand! The longer it stays in the oven, the tastier it will be!
Of course, in determining the readiness of the fish, one must focus not only on the color of the skin outside, but also on the temperature and consistency of the minced meat inside. In fact, the minced meat should reach a temperature of 65C in the very middle of the fish and harden, lose plasticity.
Fish can be served warm or cold. I love carrots that served as a substrate for fish and serve fish with it. Olives are very appropriate for such fish, and salted lemon is just super!
Let the fish that was stewed in its own broth and pomegranate juice cool, remove from the patch and cut into washers.
Decorate it with those beets and carrots that served as a substrate, and warm the sauce a little and pour over the dish that is already ready to serve.
Well, now, it remains only to tell how it ended. In general, how you start a year or decade is how you spend it. My business went uphill after that birthday, I worked from four in the morning and fell into bed at ten in the evening, every day I drove several hundred kilometers behind the wheel, did not disdain any earnings, and in the summer I began to build a large new house. True, I found out that it would turn out to be big, beautiful and expensive in a couple of years - closer to the finish of the construction.
I don’t even know what influenced the then changes for the better in my life - my work or the taste of our stuffed fish. We have been preparing fish for fifteen years already, we learned from books, but gained experience by stuffing cones. Well, I finally learned to work by my forty years.
Most likely, good teachers, like the aforementioned old man, who improves health with pilaf, mutton fat, vodka, a barbell and a love for women and dancing, have influenced.
Anyway, good luck to you guys. Don't put your hands down. And if it seems that there is absolutely nowhere to put them, prepare a gefilte fish and invite guests. Do not sit idle, most importantly, do not sit and everything will be fine.
© STALIC
In all cuisines of the world there is some kind of signature dish. What is the culinary hallmark of the country. For Jews, this is stuffed carp. And this dish is not only delicious, festive, beautiful, but also ritual. “Gefilte fish”, stuffed fish, is usually served at the Why don't we treat ourselves to this dish. It doesn't require a lot of ingredients. The cooking process may seem laborious at first. But over time, when certain skills are developed, you will cope with it faster and faster. And it is not at all necessary in Hebrew, it must be served in its entirety. Cut into lengthwise pieces, it is also very tasty. This dish does not have as many variations as Ukrainian borsch, but they still exist. In this article we will consider the Zhytomyr recipe.
Step one. Fish preparation
Gefilte fish, Jewish stuffed carp, is not a dish of the Sephardim, but of their more northern relatives. It especially took root in the so-called "Pales of Settlement" of the Russian Empire. Zhytomyr is just such a city in which non-Jews constituted a national minority. There, the dish requires two fish - carp and pike. The sweetish meat of the latter will serve as a filling. Any self-respecting housewife from Zhytomyr skins carp with a "stocking". To do this, you must first clean the fish from the scales, and then from the insides, making a neat incision on the belly. Then we wrap the carp in a plastic bag and beat it off on both sides with a wooden mallet. Let's put it in the fridge overnight. This technique will allow us to easily remove the skin from the fish.
Step two. Removing the skin with a stocking
We have the most difficult stage in preparation. After all, the whole Jewish stuffed carp should be served at the festive table. This fish has a strong skin, but we must be careful. On the inside of the abdomen, not far from the incision through which we gutted the carp the day before, we make two new ones. Naturally, the skin is left intact. We pick up the flesh with our fingers and begin to push it towards the back. Having reached the ridge, with scissors we cut off the spine from the head and tail. We twist the skin like a stocking. The resulting meat is separated from the bones. The same can be done with pike. To facilitate the task, you can boil this fish and remove the skin from it as needed. We do not throw away the bones - everything will fit in the Jewish economy.
Step three. Filling
Jewish stuffed carp will be tastier if we fill it not with fish mousse, but with meat. Therefore, carp and pike fillets are passed through a meat grinder. And meticulous Zhytomyr housewives finely flog him with a knife. Next, put in the filling everything that we throw into minced meat for cutlets: finely chopped onion fried in oil, a bun soaked in milk, three eggs. Only spices need to be used for fish. This stuffing needs to be beaten off well. We take it with our hand and throw it back into the bowl with force. So the fish will turn out more tender, and the minced meat structure will not tear the skin of the carp. If it is still too tight, add milk. We stuff carp without fanaticism. After all, when cooking, the filling will swell and inevitably tear the skin. From the remaining minced meat, you can make fish cakes another time. Sew up the belly of the fish.
Step four. carp cooking
We cut into thin plates a kilogram of onions, four or five pieces of carrots, one parsley, a quarter of a large celery root. In Zhytomyr, the national dish "Gefilte fish" is called "Jewish stuffed carp with beets." This root vegetable gives the jelly an amazing ruby color. We clean and cut into small plates four medium beets, and one three in a separate bowl. We take a large saucepan and cover its bottom with washed onion husks (a Jewish housewife, as we remember, does not throw anything away just like that). We put the bones and fins in a bag of several layers of gauze, tie it with a long thread, the end of which will hang from the pan (for convenience, it can be tied to a handle). We close the husk with half of the vegetables. We put in turn carrots, onions, roots, beets. We put a carp on it. Cover with the remaining half of the vegetables. Pour water up to the top. We put on fire. When it boils, remove the foam, throw peppercorns, bay leaf, salt. Reduce heat to low and simmer for two hours.
The final stage in the preparation of the dish "Jewish stuffed carp"
The recipe from Zhytomyr suggests that the jelly should be ruby in color. To do this, add a little vinegar to the grated beets and dilute with a small amount (half a ladle is enough) of broth. Then we carefully drain the liquid through gauze. And squeeze the beet pulp to the last drop. This liquid is called "kvass" in Ukrainian cuisine and is widely used in the preparation of borscht. Here we observe an interesting phenomenon, how two national culinary traditions enriched each other in the Pale of Settlement. Ukrainian kvassok will be poured into the broth, in which carp is boiled, stuffed in Jewish style. Let it boil for just a minute and turn off the fire. If you cook longer, a beautiful color will not work.
Serving carp on the table
Let the broth cool down. We pull out a gauze bag with bones by the thread. Arrange some of the vegetables on a platter. Place the carp on top. Carefully remove the threads. Lean the head and tail to the carcass. Pour the strained broth over the fish. And put in the refrigerator. And after a few hours we serve it on the table. Jewish-style stuffed carp, the photo of which looks very original, will be a signature dish and will amaze guests. For convenience, you can cut the fish into portions. But this should be done in front of astonished guests.
For all birthdays in our family, stuffed fish takes pride of place on the table. Everyone loves it, and therefore there are always helpers in cooking. For those who have never stuffed fish, don't worry, it's not as hard as you think. Today I will share with you all the secrets of tender, juicy, fragrant stuffed carp, pitted. I am grateful for the recipe to my neighbor Mina Abramovna, who prepared it according to her signature recipe, passed down from generation to generation, of course, with some changes.
To prepare Jewish stuffed carp, we need a carp - it is desirable that it be more than 1 kilogram.
First of all, we clean the scales, remove the eyes and gills. Then we cut off the head - from the side of the abdomen, but not completely. When the knife touches the spine, we take it out, and with a sharp movement we raise the head up, breaking the spine. We do not separate the head from the body.
We begin to remove the skin with a stocking. With a small knife with a sharp end, we slightly cut the skin over the meat, make a small hole so that half a finger fits into it. We insert a finger into the hole and with gentle movements begin to separate the skin from the meat. Finger movements resemble the movements of a "janitor" washing the windows of a car. So we separate the skin from both sides.
Separating the skin, turn it inside out.
In those places where there are fins or bones, we insert scissors inside and cut them off. We continue to remove the skin, turning it up to the tail - the lower, the better. Then - cutting the spine, leaving the skin with the tail.
As a result, we have separate skin with a head and tail and fish meat on the bone. Wash them.
Now we will separate the meat from the bone. To do this, we will make a longitudinal incision along the carcass. Then, with a sharp knife, we separate the meat from the spine and costal large bones.
So, we have skin, meat and bones. We need everything.
And now - a chip that will give the fish a unique taste. Let's cook onion jam. Cut it into half rings, add water, vegetable oil and 2 small pinches of baking soda. Bring to a boil and cook over low heat until it thickens and acquires the color of apple jam. Onions should be prepared ahead of time.
Grind the cracker in a blender bowl as finely as possible.
We put the fish, the yolk (we have three of them, 3 fish were cooked) in the blender bowl and punch the fish very well. If you grind through a meat grinder, then skip 2-3 times. There are a lot of small bones in carp, they need to be crushed well.
Add onion jam to the fish.
Also add ground crackers, salt and pepper. Blend well again in the blender.
We shift the minced meat into a bowl and add the protein whipped to peaks, which will add airiness to the minced meat. Mix thoroughly with gentle folding movements, like a biscuit.
Under the fish we make a vegetable pillow - we cut the onion and carrot into rings and lay them under the carp. On the sides we lay out the ridge with the costal bones. Cover with gauze.
We fill the carp carcass with minced meat, not very tight, so that the fish does not burst during heat treatment.
We spread the carp on cheesecloth in a baking sheet, pour warm lightly salted water to half the height of the fish, cover with foil. We send it to the stove, bring it to a boil, reduce the gas. The water should barely boil. Cooking time is one and a half hours. It is advisable to cool the fish in a baking sheet.
We shift the finished chilled fish to a dish. I usually take a thin sharp knife, cut into portions and only then start decorating. But you can not cut at this stage, but cut already at the time of serving.
Decorate as you wish.
We usually decorate Jewish stuffed carp with mayonnaise, lemon, tomatoes, cranberries. Every time we try to change the design.
Calories: Not specified
Time for preparing: Not specified
To cook boneless fish, I offer you a wonderful step-by-step recipe with a photo “Jewish Stuffed Fish”. I myself have cooked it many times, so I know how it is done and I can tell you, since many do not dare to cook such a dish due to ignorance. I will tell you in an accessible way how to stuff a fish and at the same time remove all the bones from it. Look at the photos, where you can see a lot of interesting things. It is very convenient to eat fish if all the bones in it are removed in advance, and many of your guests will be grateful to you for this. Moreover, the fish cooked in this way turns out to taste very tender, soft and tasty. I think you'll like this one too.
Required products:
- 1 carcass of fresh fish weighing 700-800 grams;
- 1 medium carrot;
- 1 large onion;
- 1 chicken egg;
- 50 grams of salted crackers;
- A little salt to taste;
- 1 coffee spoon of baking soda;
- 70 grams of vegetable oil;
- 50 grams of water.
Recipe with photo step by step:
First of all, I prepare the onion for the stuffing, as it needs to cool before I add it to the minced fish. I cut the onion into medium pieces, since then I will still twist the onion in a meat grinder. I send it immediately to a hot frying pan, pour in oil and water. 
Saute the onion over medium heat to get a caramel hue. I add soda to the onion, stir it for another 10 minutes and turn off the heat. 
Now that the onion is cooling down, I'm going to fish. I had a pelengas. I wash the fish, clean it carefully from the husk so as not to damage the skin. I cut the fish near the head, but not completely. Through this incision I take out the gills. I also remove my eyes. 
I begin to pull the skin of the fish, carefully holding my head. If necessary, I trim slightly with a knife, but the skin should be pulled together like a stocking. The meat and bones should remain on one side, and the skin and head on the other. 
I remove the meat from the ridge, throw out the bones. 
I grind fish meat, fried onions in a meat grinder, break a chicken egg into minced meat, and immediately crumble crackers. 
I stuff the fish. 
I make a vegetable pillow out of carrots and onions, put a fish on it, if desired, lightly water with mayonnaise. 
I bake the fish for 40 minutes until it becomes golden. 
I serve both hot and cold. It will be delicious, I promise you! 
I can easily cut such stuffed fish into portioned pieces, so that everyone will get it.
« Fish fish "(pike in Hebrew) is one of the most famous dishes of Jewish cuisine.
We start cooking 3.5 hours before serving.
Fish fish recipe with photo:
1. We clean and gut the pike. Cut off the head, fins and tail, put in a pot of cold water, bring to a boil. Remove the foam, add bay leaf, 2 carrots, 2 onions, salt and 5-10 peas of allspice and black pepper. We cut the pike completely along the line of the abdomen, so that one large piece is obtained. We remove the bones, very carefully cut the fillet from the skin, cut into medium pieces.
2. Chop the remaining carrots and onions. Fry the carrots for 8 - 10 minutes over medium heat in 2 tbsp. tablespoons of vegetable oil. Fry half the onion in a separate pan in 2 tbsp. tablespoons of vegetable oil for 10 minutes until golden brown.
3. Cut off the crusts from the bread, soak the pulp in cream. We mix the pieces of fish fillet, soaked bread, raw and fried onions, garlic and pass through a meat grinder three times. We transfer the minced meat to a bowl, mix with fried carrots, eggs, soft butter, pepper and salt to taste.
.4. We spread the film on the table. I put fish skin on it. Trimming the edges of the skin. The cuts remaining from the fins are laid with cut pieces. We spread the minced meat on the skin, giving it the shape of a thick sausage. We stretch the film, wrap the minced meat so that the edges of the form close. 
5. We wrap the roll in three layers of film, we tie the edges with strong knots. On top of the film, wrap the “fish sausage” in foil, put it in a narrow saucepan (goose), pour in a part of the fish broth and cook under a lid for 40 minutes over low heat. Cool, put in the refrigerator for 1 hour. Then remove the film from the roll and cut into circles 3 cm thick.
6. Soak 10 gr in cold water for 20 minutes. gelatin. We filter the remaining fish broth, add white horseradish, swollen gelatin, mayonnaise. We mix everything thoroughly. We put the roll mugs on the grate installed above the dish. Gently pour over each circle with the resulting mixture. We put in the refrigerator for 1 hour.
7. Cut the beets in half, pour 1½ cups of cold water, bring to a boil, cook for 30 minutes, cool the broth slightly. The remaining gelatin is soaked in beetroot broth for 20 minutes. Then add beetroot horseradish. Pour into a shallow dish. Let it cool for 2 hours, cut into cubes, decorate the pike with them and serve.
"Fish fish" (pike in Hebrew) ready.
Compound:
- fresh pike - 1 8 - 2 kg.
- cream with a fat content of 33% - 0.5 l.
- white bread - ½ loaf
- large onion - 4 pcs.
- medium carrots - 4 pcs.
- egg - 8 pcs.
- butter - 350 gr.
- mayonnaise - 400 gr.
- ready-made horseradish - 150 gr.
- ready-made horseradish with beets - 150 gr.
- small beets - 1 pc.
- garlic - 6 cloves
- gelatin - 50 gr.
- bay leaf - 1 pc.
- allspice and black peppercorns
- freshly ground pepper, salt
- vegetable oil.
