Tasty, satisfying and aromatic real kharcho soup is a dish of Georgian cuisine, from the smell of which people already salivate, and those who try it will certainly ask for supplements. The main thing is to make it according to the very recipe for making kharcho soup that Georgians use, and then the result will be simply fantastic.
Soup ingredients
Despite the fact that there are many variations of kharcho soup, there is a certain set of ingredients for the classic Georgian recipe for its preparation, without which the dish will already be completely different. So, for the broth we need:
- 500 grams of beef brisket;
- whole onion;
- a whole little carrot;
- parsnip, horseradish and a little celery optional;
- bay leaves, allspice and peas.
Moreover, the classic recipe for making real kharcho soup requires the creation of beef-based broth, but you can also make it from lamb, pork or chicken, at the discretion of the person who will prepare this dish. The weight of other meat, of course, will coincide with the weight of beef.
And for the soup itself we need:
- 3 tablespoons of tkemali sauce;
- a glass of peeled walnuts;
- 2 medium sized onions;
- 4 cloves of garlic;
- 100 grams of rice;
- hops-suneli, greens and saffron;
- whole bitter pepper;
- salt, sugar and lemon to taste.
And here, of course, there may also be variations, for example, in the absence of tkemali sauce, it will be possible to make kharcho soup according to the recipe with adjika or tomato paste, which will not greatly change the taste of the dish.
Cooking broth
First of all, you will need to wash the beef, dry it and cut it into slices from a matchbox, and then put it in a pan and pour water so that it completely covers it. Then we put the pan on the fire, and as the water boils, pour the broth in a minute, wash the meat again, put it back into the pan, add new water and put the peeled carrots and onions, as well as parsnips, celery and horseradish. As soon as the water boils, in accordance with the recipe for making kharcho soup, we remove the foam and add bay leaf, spices and salt to the meat, after which we leave the broth to boil for one and a half to two hours on low heat. After this, we pull the meat onto a plate, where it will wait for its turn.
Preparation of all ingredients
While the broth is boiling, we have as much as 2 hours, during which it will be possible to prepare all the necessary components for the soup. First, you can peel the vegetables, and then cut the onions into quarters and grate the carrots on a medium grater. Then you will need to chop nuts in a mortar, not trying to make them the same, because in a real kharcho soup, the nuts must be of different sizes. Rinse the rice thoroughly, changing the water several times to completely get rid of the turbidity. And finally, saffron should be steamed, for which it will need to be put in a cup, pour in beef broth, cover with a saucer and wait about 10 minutes.
Cooking Kharcho Soup
When the broth with all the other ingredients is ready, you can begin to focus on the classic recipe with a photo of kharcho soup and proceed to the direct cooking of our first dish. Actually, nothing complicated will already be there. We throw washed rice into the broth along with a whole pod of hot red pepper, wait for the water to boil, put a small fire and proceed to parallel passivation of onions and carrots in vegetable oil. Frying vegetables, pour the frying in kharcho, and fry the nuts in a dry frying pan to give a flavor, and immediately put them in the soup. Then we add the tkemali sauce to the pan, take out the red pepper from it, pour saffron into the soup and add meat, suneli hops, crushed garlic and chopped herbs, on which the cooking process will be completed.
Bringing to the ideal taste of the dish
However, despite the end of the preparation of kharcho, before serving it to the table, it will be necessary to bring the taste of the first dish to the ideal. To do this, you will need to salt the soup to taste. Depending on the degree of acid in the tkemali sauce, the taste of kharcho is leveled with a few pinches of sugar. And, on the contrary, if the sauce was not very acidic, then you can add sourness to the soup using freshly squeezed lemon juice. After adding salt, sugar and lemon, you need to mix the soup well, cover for 15 minutes to insist, and you can call everyone to the table.
Recipe for Kharcho Soup in a Redmond Slow Cooker
If you have a slow cooker, kharcho soup can be cooked much faster and easier than in a conventional pan. The ingredients for this option exactly match the components of the classic recipe, and the cooking process itself is also very similar. First, wash and cut the meat, then put it in a multicooker bowl with whole onions and carrots and leave the broth to cook for an hour, turning on the “Soup” mode. Having cooked the meat, we transfer it to the plate, pour the broth, throw the onion and carrot, and instead, put the chopped carrot and onion into the multicooker bowl and set the mode to "Fry" for 10 minutes. After that, we throw pieces of boiled meat to the vegetables, mix everything and again set the mode to "Fry" for 5 minutes. Then we add broth and washed rice to meat and vegetables and set the “Soup” mode for 20 minutes. In the end, it remains to add all the other ingredients to the kharcho, cook the soup for another 5 minutes, and the dish will be ready.
Cooking Quick Vegetarian Kharcho Soup
It happens that there is no time, but I really want to try your favorite first dish. Then you can use the vegetarian recipe for instant soup kharcho, thanks to which the whole cooking process takes only an hour. For this we will need all the same components as for the classic version of kharcho, only the need for meat will disappear, and instead you will need to take 4 medium-sized potatoes.
For cooking, the first thing you need to do is wash the potatoes and put it to boil in their uniforms, slightly salting the water. While the potatoes are being cooked, we rinse the rice so that the dregs leave, and set it to cook in another saucepan for twenty minutes. In the meantime, we chop nuts, crush garlic, cut onions, three carrots and put a frying pan with sauce or tomato paste on the fire, warming them and stirring. After that, according to the recipe for making kharcho soup, first add onion with garlic to the pan, and then carrot with nuts, which are well-fried for 5-10 minutes. By this time, rice and potatoes have already been cooked, so we add water and the contents of the pan to the rice, and quickly cool, clean, cut the potatoes into small pieces and add them to the pan after a while. Let the soup boil for a couple of minutes, add herbs, salt and spices to taste, leave it on the fire for another minute, and everything will be ready.
Recipe for Meatball Kharcho Soup
To diversify the diet, your favorite kharcho soup can also be prepared with meatballs, which our kids especially love. To do this, we will need all the same components as always, only meat will need to take 300 grams, and rice - 3 tablespoons. First of all, we rotate the meat together with a small onion in a meat grinder or grind it in a blender, then add salt and pepper to the minced meat and make small meatballs, after which we start cooking soup.
To do this, let the water boil and put the washed rice there. As the water and rice boil, make a small fire and at the same time peel the vegetables, and then cut the onions, three carrots, crush the garlic and crush the walnuts. Next, we pass the onions with carrots in vegetable oil and put them in the rice, previously putting the meatballs in the pan. After that, we wait about ten minutes, add all the other components to the soup, boil the kharcho for another 15 minutes, at the end we throw the chopped greens into it - and you're done.
Lamb kharcho
Despite the fact that usually this first dish is made from beef meat, you can cook kharcho soup according to a step-by-step recipe for cooking lamb, thereby making the dish especially hearty and piquant. All the ingredients of the dish again coincide with the classic ones, only instead of beef you need to take the mutton, which is also mine, we cut it, but before cutting it into slices, the fat is cut from it, which is crushed. And we put this fat in a pan, melt it, and then put chopped lamb there and fry the meat for about 10 minutes.
At the same time, we put a pot of water on the fire in parallel, and as the water boils, we put the meat there. While it is boiled for a couple of hours, we are preparing the components, as in the classic recipe, and pass the onions with carrots in vegetable oil. After two hours, add rice to the pan to the meat, and tomato paste to the pan to the vegetables. After 5 minutes of stewing vegetables, add them to the pan, wait a little more and throw chopped nuts, garlic and herbs there. After that, cook the kharcho for about 5 minutes - and the dish is ready.
Kharcho with adjika or tomato paste
If you don’t have one of the most important components of our first dish - tkemali sauce, then do not despair, because you can make kharcho soup according to the recipe with tomato paste or adjika, depending on whether you have one or another component, as well as your taste preferences . Actually, the cooking process of this dish completely coincides with the classic recipe. You also need to cook the broth, chop nuts, chop onions, grate carrots, crush garlic, and passivate vegetables. But if tkemali sauce is usually added to the pan, then adjika or tomato paste should be added to the vegetables and stewed with them. Yes, and sugar, in this case, there will be no need to add kharcho, but just a little lemon juice in the soup will not hurt at all.
Mistress note
Some argue that, despite following the exact recipe for making kharcho soup, they did not get the dish as it should be. So, to avoid this, you just need to know about some of the secrets of cooking.
- In no case should you let the pod of hot pepper boil, otherwise the taste of the soup will be excessively sharp.
- So that the soup does not become too acidic, the sauce should be added carefully, without swinging a spoon, almost at the very end of the preparation of the dish.
- Grinding greens, it is better to grind it with salt and garlic, so the soup will become even more fragrant.
- When laying harch-suneli seasonings in kharcho, you should not spare her, you cannot spoil the dish with it, but with a lack of spices the soup will not be so tasty.
- Before pouring soup on plates, kharcho soup should be allowed to infuse under a closed lid for twenty minutes.
- Serving soup to the table is recommended with a stack of chacha and fragrant hot pita bread.