Those who were lucky to visit Ossetia had the opportunity not only to appreciate the fabulous beauty of nature, but also to try a real Ossetian pie with beet tops. Such a pie always has the shape of a circle, outwardly resembling the sun. Baking is prepared with a variety of fillings, but almost always use a special Ossetian brine cheese.
The most popular Ossetian dish
In the arsenal of Ossetian cuisine there is a large number of varied and delicious dishes. But one of the most popular and favorite is the Ossetian pie with beet tops. Having tried it once, you will surely never forget its wonderful taste. Any holiday table in Ossetia is always decorated with three pies. Why are there exactly three, you ask? Everything is very simple. They symbolize the earth, sky and the sun. That is why they are laid out in just such a quantity.
In our article we want to tell you how to bake a real Ossetian pie with beet tops. Having a detailed recipe, even an inexperienced housewife can cope with the preparation. Having cooked pastries once, you will certainly fall in love with this wonderful dish and you will be able to cook it yourself using a variety of fillings. In large cities, you can now order such pies, but they do not always correspond to what they should really be. Anyone who has ever tasted a real pie in Ossetia will never forget its amazing taste.
To appreciate the taste of Ossetian pastries, we offer to cook beetroot pie with young leaves. They have the sourness that is needed for the filling.
Ingredients for Real Topped Pie
In order to cook an Ossetian pie with beet tops, we need the following products:
For dough:
- Three tablespoons of sugar.
- 200 ml of warm water.
- Three tablespoons of flour.
- A bag of dry yeast or 60 grams of live.
For the test:
- A kilogram of flour.
- Water or whey - 0.5 l.
- Margarine.
- One egg.
- A pinch of salt.
- Three tablespoons of vegetable oil.
For filling:
- Young beet tops - 0.6 kg.
- Dill - 100 g.
- Chives - 100 g.
- Brined cheese (Ossetian) - 0.6-0.8 kg. If you don’t have just such cheese, then it can be replaced with suluguni, Adyghe or simply cheese.
- Homemade sour cream.
- Salt.
- Ghee - 50 g
Ossetian beetroot pie: recipe
We begin the preparation of the pie by preparing the dough from the above components. Let her stand and increase in volume. Next, we sift the flour into a large dish (you need to take only very high-quality flour) with a slide and make a depression in it, pour a little salt into it, break the egg, add vegetable oil and melted margarine. We also add half a liter of warm whey and knead soft dough.
There are no special secrets in making Ossetian pies, just the dough should be gently kneaded, then the baking will be airy. You can also use ordinary yeast dough for cooking. When it is already kneaded, put it in a bowl greased with vegetable oil, cover with a towel and let it come up several times. If the dough was properly prepared, then it will certainly try to escape from the bowl.
In the meantime, we ourselves will be preparing the filling. Tops of beets for a pie must be young. It must be washed, dried, stalks removed and finely chopped. Next, add chopped dill and green onions. Grate Ossetian cheese and put it in a mixture of herbs, adding sour cream and butter. Gently mix the resulting filling, salt and pepper. In the dishes you will certainly have excess liquid from the cheese. It must be drained by tilting the basin. The filling will already be incredibly juicy, so all the excess can be drained so that the cake does not drip.
The finished mixture of herbs and cheese should be divided into three equal parts and each rolled into a ball. In the same way you need to do with the finished test. Each ball of dough should have a slightly larger volume than the filling. Now you can begin to form the cake itself. To do this, press each part of the dough a little with your hands on top, and then put the prepared mass into the recess. Next, pull the dough up, forming a bag, and pinch it. The filling should be completely inside. The more it is, the tastier are the Ossetian pies with tops. Then they need to be turned downside down and allowed to infuse for another ten minutes. After the lapse of time, the baking must be turned over again and begin to carefully distribute the filling to the edges. Gradually the cake will increase in diameter. After that, it can be transferred to a greased baking sheet. The Ossetian pie with beet tops (photos are in the article) has a very moist filling, so it can leak during baking, but there is nothing to worry about.
A baking tray with pastries is placed only in a preheated oven. After seven to eight minutes, the pan must be shaken. This is done so that the baking does not burn. The cake is cooked until it turns golden brown. The finished baked goods are transferred to a flat plate and generously lubricated with melted butter, after which they are covered with a bowl and given the opportunity to thoroughly soak. Here is an Ossetian pie with beet tops and cheese is ready.
Useful Tips
To make good pies, you need to remember some nuances:
- Pies must be sculpted quickly enough and immediately send them to the oven, since they tend to leak.
- A manifestation of the highest skill is considered to be such pastries, the dough of which is very thin, and there are a lot of fillings inside. It’s not so difficult to get such a pie when some cooking skills appear.
- Ready-made pastries are perfectly stored in the refrigerator (up to a week or more). In this case, it is better to cover the pie with a towel.
- Baking can be heated in a pan, in the oven or in the microwave. If you do this on a stove, then you need to sprinkle the cake lightly with water and cover, and then heat over low heat. This simple way will keep the baking soft.
Ossetian pie with beet tops and cottage cheese
Ossetian pies in the form of flat cakes not so long ago became popular with us, but immediately fell in love with the hostesses. There are a considerable number of recipes for such a wonderful dish. And even more there are options for using a variety of fillings. One of the most popular options is Ossetian pastries with tops and cottage cheese. For cooking, we need such components:
- Vegetable oil - 4-5 tbsp. l
- Water (warm) - 200 ml.
- Flour - 0.5 kg.
- A pack of yeast (high-speed dry).
- Cottage cheese - 260 g.
- A teaspoon of salt.
- Beet tops
Cake recipe with cottage cheese and tops
For cooking, take good-quality flour, sift it, mix with high-speed yeast. Mix the resulting mixture well. When using this recipe, you can not make dough, since high-speed yeast itself reacts.
In the resulting mixture we make a deepening and pour warm water there and add a pinch of salt. And then knead the dough, which should not stick to your hands. For this, it must be thoroughly kneaded, the process will take at least ten minutes. Properly made dough is one hundred percent success
The resulting gingerbread man put in a pan and cover with a linen towel. The dough should stand in a warm place, but without drafts, and come up. Its volumes should more than double. Then we thoroughly crush him again and again send him to approach (for thirty minutes).
Cooking pie toppings
While the dough is suitable, you can start preparing the filling. For her, you need to stock up on fresh home-made cottage cheese. It is better to take coarse-grained rather than pasty, since during the preparation the cake may leak from the presence of excess liquid. First, carefully wash the beet tops under water, then dry and chop finely. Next, mix the herbs with cottage cheese. You can also add other aromatic herbs, parsley and onions. The filling can be slightly salted and pepper added.
Pie assembly
The prepared dough should be divided into two equal parts and each rolled into a layer, the thickness of which should be no more than half a centimeter. Put the filling in the middle of the cake. Next, pull the dough to the middle of the cake, leaving a small hole on top. It is necessary for air to escape during the baking process.
Then we transfer the resulting cake to parchment and very carefully knead it. Then, using a rolling pin, you can level the cake to a uniform thickness. You need to work with the test very carefully so that it does not break. Of course, if you are cooking the dish for the first time, then the task will seem rather complicated to you, but gradually you will have certain skills that will allow you to cook an Ossetian pie with beet tops, in which there is a lot of filling and very little dough. Such pastries are considered the best. The cake is sent to a well-heated oven and baked for 20 minutes.
Once the cake is browned, it can be taken out. Ready-made pies are greased with butter so that they are well saturated. A dish consisting of three flat cakes, which are laid one on top of the other, is served on the table.
Features of pie assembly technology
Cooking such a traditional Ossetian dish of tops like a pie requires some skills from the hostesses. No wonder that in Ossetia a woman is considered a good mistress who knows how to bake beautiful pies. It is for this reason that girls from childhood begin to learn the wisdom of making good baking.
To get a beautiful and tasty pie, it’s not enough to knead a good dough and make a tasty filling, you still need to be able to assemble it correctly. And this is not at all a simple matter. Here you need practice and knowledge of some nuances.
To get a real pie, you need to thoroughly knead the dough, and then divide it into equal parts, from which to form balls. Of course, every housewife makes pastries of such sizes as she likes. But for the preparation of the Ossetian pie, it is optimal to take as much dough as it fits in two female hands. With such a quantity it is easy to work, and the cakes will turn out to be of normal size.
The prepared balls from the dough are laid out on the table and each of them is stretched by hand, but you can also use a rolling pin. The result should be a kind of circle. In the center of each spreads more toppings. Real Ossetian pies contain a lot of toppings and very little dough. To prepare such a culinary masterpiece is not so simple. Dough from all sides must be collected in a ball, gluing the edges in the center, but leaving a small hole. The skip should not be rude, but at the same time should hold well.
Further, in the center of each pie, a recess is made, from which the filling gradually stretches to the edges. After this, the resulting pancake must be very carefully placed downward with a seam on a baking sheet with parchment and once again smooth its surface. Ossetian mistresses do this very carefully with their fingers, and not with a rolling pin. The pride of every woman is a pie whose thickness is the same on all sides. At the same time, you need to try not to tear the pancake and at the same time not to spoil its shape, which should always be round. This is due to the fact that Ossetian pies are filled with certain symbolism and centuries-old traditions of baking just such baked goods.
Another important point is the ability to stretch the dough so that the cake has the same thickness over the entire surface. The cake is considered ideal in which the ratio of filling and dough is exactly the same in all places. It is especially difficult to make such a cake with the filling of beet tops, it is very juicy, and therefore there is always a risk of the product getting wet. Of course, making such a pie is not easy, but such Ossetian mistresses are capable of such magic.
There is another small nuance in the preparation of the pie. There must certainly be a hole on its surface that prevents the baking from breaking through during cooking. Through the hole, steam can calmly surface, without damaging the integrity of the pancake. Pies are cooked at 200 degrees for fifteen or twenty minutes. After which they grease their surfaces with plenty of butter. Served on the table, as a rule, three pancakes, stacked on top of each other and cut into sectors, like a cake.
Instead of an afterword
In our article, we presented recipes for making traditional Ossetian pies with tops. We hope that our tips will help housewives to understand the nuances of preparing this wonderful dish and to please relatives with amazingly tasty and fragrant food.