What is shesh barak
I loved shesh barak all my life! I would have eaten this dish every day as a child if only it was easy to prepare. Shesh barak is tortellini like dough filled with minced meat, onions and parsley. The tortellini are then deep-fried and served in a creamy cooked yoghurt.
Time consuming as they are, especially if you are cooking for a bunch of kids like us, my mom came up with a simplified version of shesh barak that satisfied everybody. You can find the story behind her special recipe in my book. Believe me it is equally delicious.
Cooking a creamy yoghurt
As much as I loved yoghurt dishes when I was a young girl, I used to hate the task of cooking it myself. Like all mothers in the Middle East my mom would ask me to do so while she was making the tortellini. Like all mothers she wouldn’t entrust me with preparing the little shesh barak, but she would be more than happy to delegate the yoghurt to me.
Although the task seems simple, it involves constant stirring. If only it didn’t require stirring in the same direction, it would have been an entertaining task changing directions every now and then. So, there I was stirring for a minimum of 20 minutes, always in the same direction until the yoghurt boiled once. My mom would immediately remove it away from the heat and would set it aside until serving time.
Stirring in different directions while cooking the yoghurt would have namely made it curdle and would have eventually spoiled the day with my mother.
With a twinkle in my eye, I now observe my students in the cooking courses while cooking the yoghurt and quietly complaining about this stirring in one direction!
Useful tips
The original recipe requires a bit of patience to make them, though. I always prepare shesh barak beforehand and freeze them. That way, I am relaxed when shesh barak is on the menu. The only thing I need to do is to deep-fry the tortellinis and cook the yoghurt.
Make it once yourself, and you will love the garlic flavour and the brightness of the dried mint in the yoghurt, you will even enjoy eating it without any shesh barak! And why not serve those scrumptious little caps to drinks instead of chips or nuts?
Sahtein!
Also check a reel on my instagram
Shesh barak
Ingredients
for the dough
- 350 g all-purpose sifted flour
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 80 ml sunflower oil
- 150 ml lukewarm water
for the filling
- 350 g minced beef meat
- 1 medium onion 125 g, peeled and finely chopped
- 4 tablespoons finely chopped parsley
- ½ teaspoon cinnamon
- ¾ teaspoon salt or to taste
- ¼ teaspoon black pepper or to taste
- 500 ml sunflower oil for deep frying
for the yoghurt
- 2 litres full fat yoghurt
- 500 ml cold water
- 2 tablespoons corn flour
- 1 egg white
- 2 ½ teaspoon salt
- 40 g butter
- 6 small garlic cloves peeled and crushed
- ½ teaspoon crushed dried mint crushed over the cooked yoghurt to release their oils and essence
Instructions
- For the dough: Mix the flour and the salt in the bowl. Add the oil and the water and knead well for about 5 minutes until it is smooth and malleable. If you feel it is a bit dry, wet your fingertips with little water and continue kneading. Cover with a kitchen towel and let rest for 30 minutes.
- Combine the ingredients of the filling in the bowl.
- Divide the dough into 4 pieces. Roll each piece into a 25 cm long rope. Cover the ropes with a towel while making the tortellini. Cut one roll into 1-cm pieces. Hold one piece between your fingertips and stretch it into a 6 cm round. Place 1 teaspoonful of the filling in the centre of the round, fold it till the ends meet forming a half-moon and pinch the ends to completely close. Now fold both ends to make one tortellini. Repeat procedure.
- Heat the oil in the medium pot over high heat. Gently drop the shesh barak in 4 to 5 batches and deep fry over moderate to high heat for about 5 minutes or until golden brown in colour. Remove with a slotted spoon and drain on kitchen paper.
- For the yoghurt: Whisk the yoghurt, the water, the egg white, the corn starch, the drained rice and the salt in the large pot. Cook the yoghurt over moderate to high heat; whisking all the time and always in the same direction to keep yoghurt from curdling, for about 20 minutes or until it boils once.
- Heat the butter in the frying pan over moderate heat and sauté the garlic for one minute. Stir garlic into the yoghurt and cook over moderately low heat for another 2 minutes. Sprinkle with the crushed dried mint and serve hot.
- Serving: add some cooked yoghurt and some shesh barak into a soup plate and eat hot.
- Tip: Shesh barak can be prepared ahead of time and frozen. Simply fry when needed!
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