Lagman is an integral part of the Uzbek cuisine, this dish is hearty, dense and very tasty. But the fullness of the taste of this wonderful soup can easily be surpassed by the fullness of discussions about the theory of the origin of this dish.
Lagman story
Lagman is one of the most common dishes of the Central Asian territory, widely distributed in Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan. This is a national dish of Uighurs and Dungans, who once lived in the Land of the Rising Sun. From there the legend of its origin.
Want to hear this legend?
The legend of the three travelers
Once upon a time, at the crossroads, three tired and hungry wanderers met. They left so long that they were so tired and hungry that they barely dragged their legs. And, having met, they began to think how to eat hearty and hearty to continue their long journey.
One traveler had flour, butter and meat with him, the second carried a deep frying pan and some eggs, and the third came with vegetables and odorous spices.
One of the wanderers was a cook’s apprentice, he asked the people he met not to despair and promised to feed them. They went down to a clean spring and began to cook. They made dough from flour and eggs and rolled them into long thin noodles. They prepared noodle sauce from fried meat, broth and stewed vegetables.
While they were enjoying a delicious meal, a certain high-ranking man passed by. He had been on the road for so long that all he wanted was to get to his province faster, eat heartily and relax. On the way, he felt a pleasant, satisfying aroma of stew and followed. The aroma was so delicious, and it was so hungry that a Chinese official asked the strangers to treat them.
After he was full, he said: "Your dish is so tasty and satisfying, I want you to cook this dish in my city."
Lagman in Uzbek cuisine
Later, a magnificent dish spread throughout the vast country. But how did lagman appear in Uzbek cuisine? It is believed that this happened due to the resettlement of the Dungans and Uighurs, who once lived in China. They differed in religious views from the accepted faith in that territory (they were Muslims), they had to move from China and look for new places to live.
Interestingly, Dungan from Dungan means dough, elongated dough, and one of the ingredients of lagman is long noodles, which are manually stretched from the dough.
Lagman has not been cooked in China for a very long time and is not a national dish, but thanks to the Uzbek chefs, the recipe for a delicious Lagman has not been forgotten, and you and I can enjoy the great taste that appealed to the Chinese official.
Today there are a lot of recipes for lagman, each one who cooks it adds and removes some ingredients to his taste, as well as experimenting with meat. We will reveal for you several ways to prepare a lagman, you will definitely like one of them.
Cooking lagman
So, how to cook lagman, this famous Uzbek dish? What vegetables and meat do we need? The classic lagman is made from lamb meat , lamb is most often used in this cuisine, as the territory of Uzbekistan is famous for their breeding. Beef is a less common product, however, and it is often found in recipes.
But before thinking about meat, we need to cook noodles.
Noodles
Lagman is divided into two parts, into two stages of cooking. Noodles are cooked for a long time, so if you want to cook a lagman for dinner, you need to do noodles in the morning, or replace it with a store. Vaja - sauce, or, more correctly, the broth is prepared later.
What do we need for cooking noodles?
- 3 cups flour;
- 1 chicken egg;
- 1 glass of water;
- 2 tbsp. l vegetable oil;
- a pinch of salt.
Let's start cooking the noodles. In a glass of water, stir the salt. We beat the egg into the flour, mix and slowly adding water. Water should be infused slowly, a couple of spoons. It must be dry. The dough will be ready as soon as it starts to mold together.
Knead the dough thoroughly, with cams, bend the edges inward and mix again, mix. The dough should be steep and uniform. It’s difficult to disturb him, so be patient.
The finished dough should be left for an hour under a towel.
After an hour, cut the dough into several pieces and roll into long sausages. Twist them with a snake and lay them on the bottom of a wide bowl, smeared with vegetable oil. Leave the dough for half an hour.
Roll the dough again, on even thinner ropes. Fold them again and coat with oil.
The last step is to beat the ropes into a long, strong noodle. Taking the ends of the rope, beat it on the table. When the noodles get too long, fold them in half. So you need to beat off all the noodles. Professional chefs can beat off a slice of dough of five meters of excellent noodles, but you beat, as you know, most importantly, not too thin, but not huge huge pieces.
Place the finished noodles in a deep bowl.
If the noodles turned out to be too much for your lagman, don’t worry, homemade noodles, oiled, can be stored in the refrigerator for up to a week, so you can use it a few days later as a side dish for dinner or in the broth.
While the noodles are resting, we’ll do the vaja.
Meat selection
As already mentioned, the classic lagman is made from lamb, so before you make the vaja, let's find out how to choose quality meat.
Meat is selected by touch and appearance. Fresh mutton is elastic, elastic. The fat layer is white. Yellow color or friability of fat indicates that the ram is old.
And also pay attention to the smell, it should be fresh, not give off musty, rotten or other extraneous odors.
The age of the meat can be determined by the color of the meat, the lighter it is, the more young. Young meat is also more tender and less dense.
To determine whether fresh meat or thawed, you can use the pressure of a finger. If the hole is smoothed out, the meat is fresh, thawed meat loses its elasticity.
A little advice on cooking lamb. If you bought a frozen product, do not defrost it in warm water, as the meat loses its taste and its beneficial properties.
Following these instructions, you can also choose fresh beef.
Classic lamb lagman
So, we chose the lamb. Let's finally learn how to cook lagman and meat vaja for him.
To make waji we need meat and vegetables. What vegetables are part of the lagman? How much meat do we need?
- 1 kg of lamb;
- 6 cloves of garlic;
- 4 onions;
- 3 tomatoes;
- 2 carrots;
- 1 bell pepper;
- 20 ml of vegetable oil;
- pepper, herbs, salt and other seasonings for lagman.
Rinse the meat, dry it and chop it into cubes. Salt and pepper, mix, thereby rubbing salt well into slices of meat.
Put the meat in a deep pan and sauté until golden brown. Finely chop the onion and toss it into the pan.
It is also necessary to add vegetables to the lamb lamb. Peel the carrots and cut into large strips. Do not chop carrots on a grater, this is not at all what we need. Cut the pepper into small cubes and finely chop the tomatoes.
Add carrots and pepper to the meat, pour boiling water and mix, and simmer over medium heat for about 20 minutes. Add tomatoes, spices and garlic, as well as herbs before the meal is cooked.
Wadja for lamb lamb is ready.
Dish formation
Only a little remained, to form a lagman and serve.
Boil the noodles in salted water, rinse it in a colander and place on plates. The noodles should fill 2/3 of the bowls. Put the meat, vegetables and pour the broth on the noodles.
Sprinkle the finished dish with fresh herbs and call everyone to the table.
Beef Lagman
A hearty dish, isn't it? And what a wonderful smell! How competently disclosed all the taste qualities of meat. We have another way to cook lagman - beef lagman.
What we need for him:
- 400 g of beef;
- 3 tomatoes;
- 1 bell pepper;
- 2 carrots;
- 1 large potato;
- half a radish;
- 100 ml of vegetable oil;
- salt, spices and herbs.
We cut the meat into large pieces and send it to a saucepan with boiling water. Since beef is hard enough meat, it is advisable to boil it, at the same time we will get a delicious meat broth, on the basis of which we will prepare a vaja.
While the meat is cooked, cut the vegetables into cubes. Chop the onion in half rings. Carrots julienne. Coarsely chop the potatoes into small pieces of radish.
We take out the cooked meat and transfer it to the cauldron, fry until golden brown, add spices, salt. We will send onions and carrots there too. Stew meat for 10 minutes, add the remaining vegetables and fill with broth and leave for half an hour under the lid on a small fire, stirring occasionally.
5 minutes before cooking, add garlic and your favorite spices. We will talk about what spices are suitable for lagman a bit later. Boil the noodles and the dish is done.
It remains only to form a lagman, do not forget about additional greenery.
Here's how to cook beef lagman, appetizing, satisfying, with a fatty broth and a wonderful combination of vegetables.
Chicken Lagman
How to cook chicken lagman? Chicken is not so common in Uzbek cuisine. However, we have prepared a chicken lagman recipe for you.
What do we need to cook it?
- 400 g chicken;
- 1 PC. bulb;
- 1 PC. carrot;
- radish - 1 pc.;
- 1 tomato
- 1 PC. bell pepper;
- 2 cloves of garlic;
- 2 tbsp. l tomato paste;
- 1 tbsp. l Paprika
- 1 tsp black pepper;
- 100 ml of vegetable oil;
- salt, greens and favorite seasonings for lagman and chicken.
Coarsely chop the chicken and send to a cauldron or pan with a thick bottom.
Chop the onion, cut the carrots into strips. Send it to the chicken, stir-fry them together.
Chicken is cooked quickly, so after 20 minutes, you can add the rest of the ingredients: pepper, tomato, radish, chopped into cubes, tomato paste, spices and herbs, as well as allspice garlic.
Cook the noodles and form a dish. Chicken fillet is less heavy meat, it does not contain fat like lamb or beef, so it does not look such a difficult lunch, however, this does not cancel its incredible goodness.
Here is such a wonderful recipe for a lagman with chicken.
We hope you enjoyed our mouth-watering recipes.
Enjoy your meal!