Chakhokhbili is one of the main dishes of Georgian cuisine. Initially, its main ingredient was pheasant. This is evidenced by the name of the dish, because "Khokhobi" is translated from Georgian as "pheasant." But, since the meat of this bird is a delicacy, ordinary people began to make chakhokhbili from chicken. And the dish didn't lose a bit to taste.
How is chakhokhbili different from any other poultry stew? A characteristic feature of this dish is the preliminary frying of meat in a dry frying pan for a quarter of an hour. As a result, it becomes covered with a reddish crust. And then the chicken is stewed in tomatoes and spices. Everything else is up to the cooks. A popular dish has many variations. There is chakhokhbili with nuts and vegetables. It can be cooked in a pan, oven and slow cooker. Consider a step by step recipe for chakhokhbili from chicken in Georgian.
The specifics of cooking chakhokhbili
Another distinctive feature of the dish is that the stew is stewed without adding liquid. How is this possible? After all, the extinguishing process itself begins with the fact that the cook pours a little water or broth into the pan or into the cauldron! But in chakhokhbili we add juicy vegetables such as ripe tomatoes and onions. They secrete enough fluid to tender tender chicken. Preliminary dry frying provides a golden crust on the surface of the meat. It does not spread to the fibers, which makes the dish look very aesthetically pleasing. You can experiment as much as you like with the composition of Chakhokhbili, but the essential products are:
- a hen,
- tomatoes
- garlic,
- bow,
- fresh greens
- spice.
Of the latter, it is desirable to use typical Georgian seasonings - hops-suneli or utsho-suneli, hot red pepper and saffron. If the contents of the pan or cauldron begin to burn, you can pour a little red dry wine into the dish. And if the meat is ready, and the juice from the vegetables still does not evaporate, we add walnut kernels for density.
Georgian Chakhokhbili from chicken: a step by step recipe
The first step is to dry roast the bird. Usually housewives deal with a whole carcass that needs to be plucked, gutted and cut. For convenience, we will buy 1.5 kg of chicken legs or legs in the store. You can remove the skin from meat, but this is not necessary.
- Wash and dry pieces of chicken.
- Open the bay leaf in a bowl and add a pinch of suneli hops, tarragon, paprika and mint. With this mixture of spices, rub the pieces of meat and leave them for ten minutes.
- Put the slices on a well-heated pan without fat. Fry for 15 minutes, often turning the meat. It is necessary that the chicken pieces in the chakhokhbili retain their integrity and be rosy. The meat prepared in this way is transferred to the stewpan.
- We clean and chop five onions with rings. Grind four cloves of garlic.
- Put the vegetables in the pan where the chicken was fried. There should still be juice from the meat.
- Add a little vegetable oil and fry the onions and garlic until golden. Let's put them to the chicken.
Cooking in a stewpan
On this, the process of cooking chakhokhbili from chicken in a pan is over. Now go to the quenching. For this culinary action you need, as you know, a liquid. Therefore, we choose three ripe tomatoes. Tomatoes need to be blanched first. We make a cross-shaped incision on each fruit. We put the tomatoes in a colander and scald with boiling water, and then pour over iced water. From the "contrasting soul" the skin will fall off the tomato very easily.
Cut the pulp of tomatoes and add to the chicken. We put the stewpan on the fire and simmer for several minutes until the tomatoes give off a plentiful juice. Salt and add more Caucasian spices. The main secret of a successful chakhokhbili is the correct combination of liquid and meat. Vegetable juice should acquire the consistency of the sauce. If there is little liquid, the dish will burn up, and the chicken will remain damp. Pouring water is not recommended - red dry wine is better. At the end of cooking, pour the cut green fresh cilantro. Serve the stew in soup plates, with pita bread or a shot of scotti.
A very quick recipe for cooking in a pan
Unlike other dishes of Georgian cuisine, chakhokhbili is considered uncomplicated. This recipe will allow even a novice chef to cook a delicious stew. We take two chicken thighs, rinse them and fill them with water. We put the pan on the fire. While the meat is cooked until half cooked, we will take up other ingredients for the chakhokhbili from chicken with tomato paste.
- Peel and finely chop two onions. Fry them in a mixture of vegetable and butter.
- Finely chop two or three cloves of garlic, add to the onion.
- We spread a tablespoon of real Georgian adjika and two tablespoons of tomato paste in a pan. Mix and continue to fry.
- Remove the peel from two fruits, cut the flesh into a small cube. If tomato juice is left on the board, carefully pour it into the pan. Tomato paste cannot completely replace tomatoes.
- By this time, the chicken should already be half cooked. We take the meat out of the broth and transfer it to the pan. Add spices (uzo-suneli, red pepper, imeretinsky saffron, tarragon) and salt. Stew for another quarter of an hour.
- Sprinkle the finished dish with fresh green cilantro.
Another recipe
Since chicken chakhokhbili with tomatoes is very popular in Georgia, it is prepared in different ways in different regions of the country. And each recipe claims to be called classic. This, for example, includes carrots and bell peppers in the list of ingredients. Vegetables will enrich the taste of the dish, give it juiciness and additionally saturate with vitamins.
As usual, fry the chicken in a dry pan. Thus, we “seal” the juice inside the pieces. After that, fry the onion with garlic in butter. Next, in the same fat, brown the sliced carrots and two Bulgarian peppers chopped into strips. Put chicken, onion, carrots and pepper in layers in a stewpan or deep pan. Add a spoon of adjika on top. Also cut finely (or rub) peeled tomatoes. Salt and simmer under the lid over low heat for 30 minutes. Then we season with Georgian spices, sprinkle with cilantro. Cooking another five minutes.
Chakhokhbili with potatoes
This dish, which looks like a very thick soup, does not need a side dish. Traditionally, it is eaten simply with tortillas. But if you want to bring the Georgian stew closer to the Slavic standards of the meal, cook chicken chakhokhbili with potatoes.
- We begin the work, as the traditional recipe prescribes, by rolling meat in spices and frying it in a dry pan.
- Peel and chop two onions and five potatoes. Three cloves of garlic finely chopped.
- In a stewpan with chicken, add a mixture of butter and vegetable oils. Fry onions with meat.
- Five minutes later, cut four peeled tomatoes and put them in a saucepan. Add potatoes immediately. Stew for about 20 minutes.
- Add a third of the chopped garlic, spices and cilantro. Cooking another five minutes.
- In the pan in which the chicken was fried, put the remaining garlic. Warm up until the fat is saturated with aroma.
- Pour the dish with garlic oil and serve.
Multicooker Recipe
With the help of modern kitchen appliances, you can easily and simply cook chakhokhbili from chicken. In a slow cooker we put slices of breaded in spices and fried poultry, chopped onions, bell pepper, garlic and peeled tomatoes. Salt, pour a tablespoon of seasoning hops-suneli, chop over a small bunch of basil and cilantro. Put a small piece of butter and pour red dry wine. We turn on the multicooker on the "Extinguishing" mode, and set the timer for one and a half hours. In a slow cooker, chakhokhbili from a chicken comes out not burnt, well cooked. The poultry meat itself is divided into fibers, and the gravy will get the consistency of a thick sauce.
Oven Recipe
You can extinguish the meat in the oven in ceramic pots. As a result, the Georgian dish will delight you not only with its exquisite taste, but also with its original form of serving. Sprinkle the chicken with spices and fry in a dry pan. Separately, we put potatoes in whole tubers to cook. We shift the meat into preheated pots. Stew in a slightly preheated oven - five minutes under the lid and ten minutes without it. In butter we pass onion with garlic. Add to the pots along with chopped large pieces of boiled potatoes and crushed tomatoes without a peel. Return the chakhokhbili from the chicken to the oven. If desired, you can add some dry wine. We mix cilantro, basil and other spicy greens with dry spices (a tablespoon of sunflower hop seasoning is mandatory) and add to the pots at the end of the stew.
Winter recipe
If there are no fresh tomatoes, then, as an exception, you can cook chakhokhbili from chicken only on tomato paste. Rub the pieces of meat with spices, leave for ten minutes. In a casserole, we heat three tablespoons of vegetable oil. We spread the chicken there. Having achieved a golden skin, we add to the meat two onions shredded in half rings and three cloves of garlic squeezed through a press. We wait until the vegetables turn golden. Next, add two tablespoons of tomato paste and one spoon of wine vinegar. Salt the dish and season it with spices. As a liquid necessary for stewing, pour half a glass of dry white wine and three tablespoons of Madeira or port. Cover the cauldrons and simmer on very low heat for forty minutes. Sprinkle the finished dish with fresh herbs.
Chakhokhbili from chicken with nuts
This recipe is practically no different from the classic. Walnuts are a very popular product in Georgia. They are added to various dishes, not only in chakhokhbili. Nuts need to be crushed not very finely so that the pieces can be felt. This is best done with a rolling pin. Next, fry the nuts in a dry pan to give them crispy properties and enhance the aroma. Add them to the dish with vegetables. Stew for 30-40 minutes. We decorate chakhokhbili with nuts, another popular product in Georgia - pomegranate seeds.