Despite belonging to Georgian cuisine, khinkali is loved in many countries of the former Soviet Union. True, not everyone knows how to cook them, but they eat with pleasure, especially since in supermarkets you can sometimes buy very good frozen semi-finished products.
How many minutes to cook khinkali is usually written on the package. But basically they cook longer than the usual dumplings or dumplings. Some are boiled in salt water, others are cooked in a double boiler like manti.
It is tasty in both cases, it is important that during the cooking process the walls of the “bag” are not damaged from the dough and juice does not leak, which should be quite a lot in the middle of the khinkali. How much to cook them so that the dough doesn’t burst and they do not turn out to be raw - it’s not so important, the main thing is to do it as accurately as possible and in plenty of water. At its core, they are a bag of dough, inside which is meat with onions and spices.
As for the recipes for making khinkali (how much to cook, how to make the dough, what size and shape they should be), these moments can radically differ, to the extent that each village has its own unique composition or shape.
How to make dough
For khinkali, it should be fresh, thin, easily rolling. In principle, from dumplings or from the one from which manti is made, it is not particularly different. For 3 cups of flour, take a glass of water, an egg and a little salt. Beat the water with an egg, salt, pour the flour onto the table, make a depression in the slide, pour out the liquid components and knead the dough. To make it roll well, it should be kneaded for a rather long time, and then put in an cold place for an hour, covered with a towel or wrapped with a film.
Minced meat
Naturally, the main component of the filling will be meat. True, in the original it is not passed through a meat grinder, but finely chopped, but in stores, of course, there will be ordinary stuffing. If you cook them at home, then you can spend time chopping. For a pound of meat (this can be pork, lamb, beef or a mixture of several types), take 3 onions and a glass of meat broth (with it you get juicy and tasty khinkali). How much to cook the broth and how to cook it depends on the meat, you can not do it on purpose, but use the one left over from preparing another dish. In addition, you will need salt to taste, spices (red, black peppers are better to take freshly ground) and greens (basil, parsley, dill).
Finely chop the meat and onion, add spices, herbs, broth and knead the minced meat until smooth (you can even beat it slightly). If there is too much liquid, so much so that the components in it begin to float, it is better to drain a little.
Cooking process
A small sausage is made from part of the dough, which must be divided into round pieces. A circle is formed from each and rolled out thinly enough, but not to transparency, so that the dough does not burst during the cooking process. The minced meat is laid out in the center (the circle should be large enough - about 10-12 cm in diameter) and, having folded the edges, pinch them with your fingers, forming a tail, with which you can later take khinkali. How much to cook them depends on the size, but on average - about 15 minutes after boiling. And certainly in a large amount of water, so that they do not stick either to the walls of the pot or to each other.
When serving, sprinkle this dish with black pepper and fresh herbs. Some housewives think how much to cook khinkali in a double boiler, hoping that such a dish will come out juicier. In fact, when cooked correctly and in a saucepan, they will come out tasty and juicy, but in a double boiler they will have to be kept for 40 minutes, if you have time, you can try it, it’s also tasty.