benazir's blog

Middle Eastern Lamb Stew

Actually this was one way to make pide which I have blogged about in a previous blog post. What I have beside it is called Middle Eastern lamb stew and it is a Turkish dish. In a mortar and pestle to start you will need 1 red chili, it doesn’t matter if it is chili de arbol a round red chili or a long dried red chili. You can also use a couple of dashes of red pepper flakes if you prefer. Add 1 small piece of broken cinnamon stick in the mortar and pestle along with 3 cloves, 1 pinch each of cumin seeds, peppercorns and coriander seeds. You also need to make Pepper Paste before you get started.

In an instant pot add 1/4 cup of olive oil or grapeseed oil, 1 onion or shallot cut in half moon slices, select saute for 10 minutes to cook the onion until it is brown and add 4 cloves of garlic chopped. Add the pepper paste, 1 bay leaf and the contents in the mortar and pestle, 1 bullion cube or 2 pinches of bullion powder, seasoned salt or vegtea seasoning. Add 3 dashes of maggi or knorr aroma. Dice 1 tomato that cooks until it gets mushy and either 1 large or 2 medium or 10 baby eggplants. Add 1 kg or 1 lb of just lamb. Add 5 cups of water and this is ready to either pressure cook or slow cook. Take your pick and it depends on how much time you have.

If pressure cooking first you have to select cancel if you you have any time remaining after you had it on saute function. Close your instant pot with the pressure cook lid and have it on sealing position then select pressure cook and you can toggle it to either high or low which I prefer high and the time for 20 minutes or you could put a sheet of aluminum foil over the top held down by a large enough lid on the cooker itself then select slow cook and toggle this between high and low also then the time for 4 hours and press start. Make sure the condensation collector is on the cooker in the back. If you are using the pressure cook setting when the time is up, place a steam diverter over the top of the vent and either tap the quick relase button or let the pressure release natrually. Serve this up with either plain yogurt just as it is on top or with either parsley dill or mint on top of the yogurt.

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