Most people who live outside the United States think that American food is fast food, which is widely represented at McDonald's. Of course, instant dishes came to the world market from North America, but this does not mean at all that US citizens eat only hamburgers or french fries.
In order to dispel this erroneous opinion, readers are presented with information about what constitutes genuine American cuisine, whose national dishes have a long tradition and unique taste.
North America was discovered by Columbus only 6 centuries ago, and the first immigrants from Europe arrived here only in 1620. Since that time, the history of American cuisine has taken count.
American national dishes
The United States of America is a multinational state, the majority of its population are descendants of immigrants from England, Germany, Ireland, Spain, Italy, France. Accordingly, it was the natives of these countries who stood at the origins of the formation of the national cuisine of the United States.
American dishes, recipes with photos of which are given below, have incorporated all the best from European cuisine. However, over several centuries, they underwent changes that affected their taste.
The most famous and popular American dishes are: baked turkey, barbecue ribs, chili con carne - a spicy second dish of meat with vegetables and lots of spices, jambalaya - a dish of meat, rice and vegetables, burgers - sandwiches with cutlet and vegetables, Buffalo wings - fried chicken wings, apple pie, cheesecakes - desserts with cheese, pancakes - American fritters, brownies - chocolate cakes, muffins - cupcakes with filling.
Presented in this article are some popular dishes of American cuisine, the recipe for their preparation, to be more precise, will be appreciated by lovers of delicious food, especially those who are interested in cooking.
Christmas turkey
Baked turkey is a must for Thanksgiving and the Christmas table. In 2016, 85% of Americans spent nearly $ 1 billion buying nearly 45 million turkeys to make a traditional Thanksgiving holiday meal. The average weight of the turkey was 7.5 kg, and its cost was 22.47 dollars.
Try to cook traditional American dishes for Christmas, and the whole family and guests will be grateful for the time spent on mastering this recipe.
The main ingredients:
- Turkey - weighing 4 kg, 1 piece.
- Celery - 1 stalk.
- Carrots - 1 root crop.
- Onions - 2 root crops.
- Drinking water - 550 ml.
- Butter - 40 g.
Ingredients for Marinade:
- Apple juice - 700 ml.
- Drinking water - 7.5 liters.
- Sugar - 500 g.
- Zest of 3 large oranges.
- Garlic - 5 cloves.
- Rosemary Leaves - 55 g.
- Ground black pepper - 40 g.
- Salt - 350 g.
- Bay leaf - 4 pieces.
Preparation of the marinade: place all the ingredients in a large saucepan and mix thoroughly. Put the container on a hot stove, boil the marinade, and then turn it off. The marinade should cool.
Turkey Cooking:
Place the whole turkey in a chilled marinade and put in the refrigerator for a day. After a day, the turkey must be pulled out of the marinade, and soak for 15 minutes in cold water. Dry the turkey with a paper towel.
Cut onions, carrots and celery into large pieces. Turn on the oven and set the thermostat to 200 degrees. Stuff the turkey with half the vegetables and distribute the remaining half over the baking sheet. Bandage the legs of the turkey and wings with a strong thread. Grease the grate with vegetable oil and place on top of the frypot. Smear the turkey with melted butter and lay the breast up on the wire rack. Pour 250 ml of water into a baking sheet, and put in a hot oven for 50 minutes.
Periodically pour turkey juice that has accumulated in the pan, add another 1 glass of water. Continue to bake the bird for another 1 hour and 45 minutes, watering the resulting juice every half hour, and turning the turkey a little to make it brown evenly. Add another 1 cup of water. To determine the complete readiness of turkey meat, a meat thermometer will help: if the temperature inside the turkey thigh is 76 degrees, it can be removed from the oven. Before you start cutting the bird, it must be kept on a dish for 20 minutes.
American turkey filling recipe
Classic American dishes, which include baked turkey, are distinguished by an interesting serving and an unusual side dish. Baked turkey is often served with cranberry sauce and a filling of corn bread with pecans. To prepare it, you will need the following ingredients:
- Corn bread - 1 kg.
- Pecans - 200 g
- Bacon - 6 plates.
- Onions - 3 pieces.
- Shallots - 3 pieces.
- Celery - 2 stalks.
- Chicken broth - 2 glasses.
- Chicken eggs - 3 pieces.
- Butter - 80 g.
- Thyme (dried) - 15 g.
- Sage (dried) - 20 g.
- Ground black pepper - 1/2 teaspoon.
- Salt - 1 teaspoon.
Cut the corn bread into small pieces and leave it on the table for the night, without covering anything to dry.
Melt the butter in a hot frying pan and fry the bacon strips for 10 minutes. Put the fried bacon in a plate, and pour the shallots, onions, celery stalks, sprinkled with sage and thyme into the pan, preliminarily cut into small pieces. Simmer vegetables for about 20 minutes over low heat.
Fry the nuts and transfer together with the bread in a pan with vegetables. Then add the eggs, the remaining oil and pour the chicken stock. Season the resulting filling with pepper and salt. Grease the refractory form with oil, transfer the prepared filling to it, cover it with foil on top and send it to the hot oven for half an hour (temperature 180 degrees). After 30 minutes, remove the foil, add 100 ml of broth and place the mold in the oven again. 10 minutes later, pour in the rest of the broth and send the form into the oven for 20 minutes.
What else can you cook?
In addition to the famous baked turkey, American cuisine is rich in other wonderful dishes that are presented in this review. Among them are recipes for main and second courses, snacks and pastries. Many of them are easy to prepare, as the recipe consists of available products and spices. Dishes of American cuisine, recipes with photos of which you will find below, are prepared from a set of products that can be purchased on the American, European, Russian or Uzbek market. As a result, tasty dishes unlike each other are obtained.
American dishes, the recipes of which have been tested for many decades, will occupy a worthy place in the everyday and festive menu.
Barbecue ribs
Americans are a hardworking people who can not only work, but also relax. Usually they like to spend their free time in the fresh air, away from the bustle of the city. And of course, a good rest is inseparable from delicious food.
Barbecue ribs - American dishes, the recipes of which are mainly created in the southern states of the USA, are traditionally prepared during outdoor recreation. For most Americans, barbecue has the same meaning as May barbecue for residents of the countries of the former USSR. Ideally, the barbecue is fried over an open fire using a grill, but this dish can also be cooked in the oven.
Ingredients:
- Veal ribs - 2 kg.
- Liquid natural honey - 100 ml.
- Worcester sauce - 1 tablespoon.
- Tabasco sauce - 1 teaspoon.
- Soy sauce - 50 ml.
- Garlic - 4 cloves.
- Lemon - 2 pieces.
- Salt - 2 dessert spoons.
For this dish, it is important to choose the ribs correctly - they must have a fat layer of at least 2 cm and no more than 6 cm.
Cooking:
- The first thing you need to do is prepare the barbecue sauce. To do this, mix Worcester, soy and Tabasco sauce, add honey, juice of 2 lemons, crushed garlic, mashed with salt. The prepared marinade is heated in a water bath to a temperature of 45 degrees.
- Cut ribs into 3-4 pieces and completely immerse in the marinade for 12 hours, observing the temperature regime of +5 to +10 degrees.
- After the ribs are pickled, you need to preheat the oven to 220 degrees. Remove the ribs from the marinade and place on the grill pan, pour the remaining marinade and put in the oven for 25 minutes. Then reduce the thermostat to 180 degrees and continue to bake for another 20 minutes.
The finished dish has a dark caramel crust, and the bones usually turn almost black. Inside they are very juicy, and outside are crispy.
Barbecue ribs are served on the table with Tabasco sauce or any other hot sauce. As a side dish, onion rings are fried in a batter. Grilled vegetables go well with barbecue: zucchini, eggplant, potatoes. Drink American dishes cooked over an open fire, beer or wine.
Buffalo Wings
The most favorite American dishes (photo below) include Buffalo chicken wings on their list. The homeland of this recipe is considered the city of Buffalo.
To cook spicy chicken wings, you will need the following products:
- Chicken wings - 10 pieces.
- Any sauce (hot) - 65 g.
- Butter - 50 g.
- Ground spices (paprika, cayenne pepper, garlic, black pepper) - 5 g each.
- Premium wheat flour - 150 g.
- Iodized salt - 15 g.
- Sunflower oil - 250 ml.
Cooking method:
- Wash chicken wings, cut into pieces along the joints.
- In a deep plate, prepare a mixture of flour, cayenne pepper, paprika and salt. Roll the wings in this mixture and send them in the refrigerator for half an hour.
- In a saucepan, bring the vegetable oil to a boil and fry the chicken wings for 10 minutes until a light brown crust. To clean each batch of wings on paper towels to remove excess oil.
- In a separate container, prepare a mixture of hot sauce, butter, garlic and black pepper. Thoroughly mix this mass and reheat on a gentle fire.
- Pour the wings with the resulting hot sauce so that they are well saturated with them. Serve the finished dish on the table hot.
Buffalo wings made using this recipe are an excellent appetizer that goes well with beer.
Chile con carne
This spicy American chili dish is of Mexican origin. It is especially loved by the residents of Texas. The name of the dish, translated from Spanish, means "chili with meat." The main component of this spicy main course is chili pepper. To make chili with meat, you will need these products:
- Minced beef - 600 g.
- Onion - 1 piece.
- Beef broth - 450 ml.
- Red sweet pepper - 2 pieces.
- Chili pepper - 1 piece.
- Canned beans (red) - 2 cans of 200 g each
- Canned Tomatoes - 350 g
- Ground spices (chili, allspice, cumin, paprika) - each 5 g.
- Marjoram - 3 g.
- Sugar sand — 10 g.
- Salt - 20 g.
- Sunflower oil - 0.1 liters.
- Tomato paste - 20 g.
Cooking process:
- All vegetables need to be cut into cubes, and squeeze the garlic through the garlic press.
- Fry the onions in a saucepan with vegetable oil until cooked.
- Add chopped peppers, garlic, ground chili and paprika to the onion and fry for 5 minutes on a low heat.
- Increase the heat on the stove to strong, put the ground beef in a stewpan and fry until cooked, stirring constantly, so that the mass remains homogeneous, without lumps.
- Pour in beef broth, put chopped tomatoes, add tomato paste, sugar, black pepper, marjoram and salt.
- Rinse canned beans under a tap to remove excess salt and add to the stewpan to meat with vegetables, then simmer for another 10 minutes on a gentle fire and get chili.
The dish whose American recipe is given above is ready. Garnish with fresh herbs and grated cheese on top. Sour cream is added to taste. Best with boiled chili spicy rice. Americans like to eat chilli with nachos or tortilla chips.
Instead of mincemeat, you can also use diced meat; in some regions of the USA, oregano and coriander are added to the main spices.
Burger
In the view of many foreigners, American national dishes are fast food, for example, hamburgers and cheeseburgers.
Indeed, burgers are popular not only in America but throughout the world. Very many people at least once in their life ate this sandwich, which includes cutlet, vegetables and cheese. To try American dishes such as a real burger, it is not necessary to go to the USA, anyone can easily cook it.
What do you need for a burger?
- Beef tenderloin - 1 kg.
- Beef fat — 250 g.
- Salt - 2 dessert spoons.
- Onions - 1 large root crop.
- Ground black pepper - 1.5 teaspoons.
- Sunflower oil - 0.1 liters.
- Butter - 3 dessert spoons.
- Burger buns - 6 pieces.
- Pickled cucumbers - 3 pieces.
- Tomato - 1 large fruit.
- Salad leaves - 6 pieces.
- Red onion - 1 root crop.
- Table mustard, ketchup or mayonnaise - to taste.
Cooking Algorithm:
- Finely chopped peeled and washed onions. For 5 minutes, darken the onion in vegetable oil and leave to cool.
- Twist the meat and fat using a food processor, add the cooled onion, a tablespoon of salt and pepper. Stir the resulting stuffing thoroughly.
- Cut the minced meat with wet hands into 6 round patties, 2.5 cm thick. Put the cutlets in the refrigerator for half an hour.
- During this time, cut the red onion rings, thin slices of tomato and cucumbers. Divide each bun into 2 halves and grease with butter on the inside.
- In the brazier, kindle the coals, grease the grate with oil and put the patties in place, fry them, turning them over every 2 minutes, until cooked. Fry the buns on the inside for 10 seconds, making sure that they do not burn.
- Assemble a burger from prepared components: put a lettuce leaf on the lower half of the bun, then cutlet, onion rings, tomato circle, cucumber circles and cover the upper half of the bun with greased mayonnaise, ketchup or mustard.
Many names of American dishes, which are a kind of burger, are unfamiliar outside the United States. Their main difference is in the filling:
- Cheeseburger - necessarily includes cheese.
- The veggie burger is vegetarian, does not contain meat.
- Tofuburger - tofu replaces meat filling.
- Eggburger - an egg is used instead of meat.
American recipe apple pie
American dishes cannot be imagined without numerous pastries and desserts. The favorite sweet dishes are the famous apple pie, New York cheesecake, chocolate brownies, banana split - a dessert based on ice cream, cookies with pieces of chocolate.
Apple-filled cake recipes are available in many cuisines, but only in the US has this dessert become as popular as other traditional American dishes. Apple pie is one of the symbols of American cuisine.
So, to prepare a real apple share, you need the following ingredients:
- Apples - 1 kg.
- Brown sugar - 230 g.
- Top grade wheat flour - 400 g.
- Butter - 225 g.
- Ground Cinnamon - 15 g.
- Chicken eggs - 2 pieces.
Cooking method:
- First you need to mix half of the available sugar and melted butter, and then beat with a whisk or a food processor.
- To the resulting mass, drive 1 egg and the yolk of another egg, beat the mass for 1 minute. Add 350 g of flour and knead the dough, then wrap it in a plastic bag and put to cool in the refrigerator for 40 minutes.
- Prepare the filling: free the washed apples from the skin, cut the core and remove the seeds, cut into thin slices. Sprinkle apples with a mixture of flour (50 g), granulated sugar (150 g) and cinnamon.
- Turn on the oven and set the temperature to 180 degrees. While it is warming up, it is necessary to roll out 1/3 of the dough and lay it on a greased form, not forgetting about the sides. On the rolled dough, put the prepared filling, cover with the rest of the dough and pinch the edges. Paste the pie with a fork or knife so that the steam comes out and the dough does not swell. If there are scraps of dough, you can decorate the cake with them.
- Coat the top of the apple pie with the remaining protein, sprinkle with icing sugar and send to bake in the oven for 40 minutes until a delicious crust appears. Remove the baked pie from the oven and leave to cool for 10 minutes.
Cut apple pie into slices and serve with tea.
American pancakes - Pancakes
Popular American dishes are hard to imagine without pancakes, the so-called round lush pancakes. Many Americans include them in their breakfast and usually eat at least 6 pieces, pouring them with maple syrup, jam or chocolate butter.
Pancakes, unlike ordinary fritters, have a porous structure due to prolonged whipping of proteins. When preparing a dough for pancakes, you can add any fruit puree, for example, banana. If you add cocoa to the dough, you get chocolate pancakes.
The composition of the products for the preparation of pancakes:
- Premium wheat flour - 255 g.
- Chicken eggs - 4 pieces.
- Milk - 235 ml.
- Iodized salt - 4 g.
- Sugar - 30 g.
- Ground Cinnamon - 5 g.
- Slaked Soda - 6 g.
Cooking steps:
- Separate the yolks from the proteins, which for now need to be removed in the refrigerator. In a deep bowl, grind the yolks, sugar and cinnamon until smooth.
- Pour a glass of milk into a bowl with yolks, then whisk the mixture slightly with a whisk.
- Pour the sifted flour into a bowl with egg-milk liquid, continuing to whisk the resulting mass with a whisk. Add slaked soda here and mix the contents of the bowl thoroughly.
- With a whisk, bring the resulting dough to a homogeneous state, preventing the formation of lumps. The resulting mass should be thick.
- Remove chilled proteins from the refrigerator, pour salt and beat in a strong foam using a mixer for 1 minute.
- Carefully introduce the whipped protein into the dough, mix with a wooden spatula.
- Heat a non-stick pan and melt a teaspoon of butter.
- Put the pancakes with a small ladle on a preheated pan with non-stick coating and bake for 2 minutes on each side. Put ready-made pancakes on a plate and continue to bake the next portion. By the way, the pan no longer needs to be greased with oil, since the pancakes should not be greasy, and then they are baked in a dry pan.
Pour ready-made pancakes to your taste with syrup, jam or grease with butter.
American dishes, photos of which cannot convey their unusual taste, will surely please everyone who cooks them.