Our simple recipe for lamb pilaf in a slow cooker will certainly be appreciated by meat lovers. The Uzbek cuisine dish is prepared in a lighter version, and therefore it can easily be included in the everyday menu.
The composition of the products will not differ in any way from the selection of ingredients for traditional pilaf in a cauldron. The only thing is that a little less seasoning will be used.
So, we will need: selected lamb pulp with fat, steamed long-grain rice, onions and young garlic, as well as odorless vegetable oil, barberry berries, coriander peas, salt and a mixture of peppers.
Let's start preparing lamb pilaf directly from preparing the meat. It needs to be washed well and dried. Frozen is not an option for us. We use chilled selected lamb. Cut into small cubes of equal size.
Onions must be peeled and chopped into any shape.
Heat the multicooker in the “Frying” mode for a minute, and then add vegetable oil to the main multicooker bowl, continuing heating for another two minutes. Place the onions in a heated container, and after 5 minutes add the lamb. Brown the ingredients well until half cooked. Salt the meat after the liquid has evaporated.
After the onions and lamb, carrots chopped into strips or cubes are sent into the multicooker bowl. Continue cooking meat and vegetables in the “Frying” mode for another 5 minutes.
While zirvak (the correct name for frying meat for pilaf) is being prepared, let’s start with the spices. Coriander should be crushed in a mortar and then mixed with barberry and pepper.
Then season the boiling zirvak with the resulting spicy mixture.
Fill the rice layer with boiling salted water to the 2 liter mark. Switch the equipment to the “Stew” or “Pilaf” mode for 40 minutes and close the lid.
During the cooking process, you need to add young garlic cloves directly in the peel to the rice. The finished lamb pilaf remains in a closed multicooker and reaches its perfect condition right before serving.
In the slow cooker, the lamb pilaf turned out crumbly, aromatic and very tasty.
When this incomparable dish reaches your plate, it will no longer be possible to distinguish it from pilaf prepared in the traditional way. Shall we check it?
A slight hint of green coriander flavor would be very welcome. Bon appetit!
Pilaf is one of the main traditional dishes of national Uzbek cuisine. The classic set of products must certainly include young lamb meat, the taste of which makes the finished treat truly unforgettable. Lamb pilaf in a slow cooker is a simplified and most affordable option for preparing this oriental dish at home. Thanks to the presence of such a simple but necessary device as a multicooker, the entire cooking process takes no more than an hour.
Despite the fact that the dish consists of several ingredients, it is considered the most difficult to prepare. The main problem is the correct preparation of zirvak and the main component - rice, which must certainly be crumbly, but not overcooked. The multicooker copes well with this complexity, so for amateur cooks it becomes an indispensable assistant in the kitchen. Homemade pilaf with lamb in a slow cooker turns out almost flawless, both in taste and appearance no different from a dish prepared by a professional chef.
Subtleties of cooking
- Lamb has an unusual smell that not everyone likes. But young lamb smells practically nothing. Its meat is soft, juicy and cooks quickly.
- For pilaf, you need to take those pieces of carcass with few veins and fat.
- Particular attention should be paid to spices and spices. Rosemary, thyme, cumin, garlic, onion, turmeric, and curry are suitable for lamb. They will not only drown out the specific smell of meat, but also improve the taste of the entire dish. And turmeric will also give rice a beautiful yellow color.
- You need to choose the right rice. Good pilaf is made from large rice, which expands almost 2.5 times during cooking. Long grain rice is also suitable. You should not cook pilaf from broken rice or with a lot of flour. When cooked, such rice quickly boils and sticks together.
- Rice for pilaf must be washed until the water becomes completely clear. The rice is then soaked. Thanks to this, it is saturated with moisture, swells and ultimately cooks much faster, while maintaining the integrity of the grains.
- The amount of water is not indicated in the recipes. It depends on the juiciness of the meat, carrots, as well as how well the vegetables are fried, and whether the water has been completely drained from the rice after soaking. It is believed that you need to pour in enough water to cover the rice by one centimeter
. Therefore, when adding water, monitor its level. - Before adding food, first heat the fat, otherwise they will not be fried, but stewed. This is especially true for lamb, which for pilaf must be fried until golden brown to improve its taste.
- Unlike rice porridge, which needs to be stirred periodically to prevent it from burning, pilaf is not stirred until it is completely cooked.
Pilaf with lamb and garlic in a slow cooker
Ingredients:
- lamb – 500 g;
- rice – 2 tbsp.;
- large carrots – 1 pc.;
- large onion – 2 pcs.;
- water;
- garlic – 6 cloves;
- vegetable oil – 60 g;
- salt - to taste;
- black pepper – 0.2 tsp;
- seasoning for pilaf – 1 tsp.
Cooking method
- Rinse the rice thoroughly and soak for one hour.
- Cut the onion into quarters and then cut into strips.
- Cut the carrots into large strips or use a Korean carrot grater.
- Wash the lamb, dry it with paper towels to remove moisture, and cut into small pieces.
- Pour oil into the multicooker bowl and turn on the “Baking” mode. When the oil is hot, add the onion and fry with the lid open for 5 minutes.
- Add carrots, stir and continue frying for another 5 minutes.
- Add the chopped meat and fry everything together until the multicooker turns off. Most often, a given program lasts 45 minutes.
- Drain the rice and place it in a sieve. Pour into the bowl and smooth out.
- Put spices, herbs. Peel the garlic and stick it into the rice.
- Pour in hot water to cover the cereal by one centimeter.
- Close the multicooker, turn on the “Pilaf” mode and cook until the beep sounds.
- Gently stir the finished pilaf with a spatula. Turn on “Heating” and leave for half an hour.
- Pilaf with lamb and garlic is ready!
Note: This and subsequent recipes use a 160g multi-cup.
Meat baked with herbs and garlic
Provencal herbs add a special flavor to any dish. And, of course, garlic, which has its own spicy taste, also plays an important role in the overall composition. And now we will tell you how to cook lamb in a slow cooker with garlic and herbs.
Ingredients:
- 1.5 kg lamb;
- six cloves of garlic;
- tsp Provençal herbs;
- three tablespoons of olive oil;
- sprig of rosemary;
- mixture of peppers, salt.
Cooking method:
- Grind the mixture of peppers in a mortar, add garlic passed through a press, herbs, rosemary leaves, salt and olive oil.
- Rub the resulting mixture thoroughly onto the lamb, wrap it in foil and leave to marinate for an hour.
- Then put the workpiece in a bowl and bake for 1.5 hours in the “Baking” mode.
After eating lamb, a specific aftertaste remains. To tone it down, cook the meat with any sour fruits, vegetables or sauces, for example, tomatoes, quince, cherry plum, lemon juice or wine vinegar.
Pilaf can be prepared in completely different ways, and a huge number of recipes have been invented for this. There are pilafs with mushrooms, vegetables, seafood, fruits, various vegetarian, sweet or some other original dishes. But still, one of the most popular is the classic recipe, where the two main ingredients are lamb and rice. We will tell you how to cook lamb pilaf in a slow cooker in this article.
It's no secret that spices play an important role in pilaf. By changing one or another seasoning in a recipe, you can get completely different tastes. In our opinion, the combination of rice and lamb meat with delicate saffron, sour barberry and hot pepper is very successful, which we will try to prove to you with this recipe. Here's what we need:
- lamb pulp – 0.5 kg;
- long grain rice – 0.5 kg;
- garlic – 1 small head;
- saffron – a small pinch;
- dried barberry – 1 tbsp;
- zira – 1/3 tsp;
- onion – 2 heads;
- sunflower oil – 50 ml;
- hot red pepper - a pinch;
- carrot – 1 pc.;
- salt.
We will describe below how we prepare lamb pilaf in a slow cooker:
- Vegetables in pilaf must be cut by hand, that is, we do not need to grate the carrots, but chop them into thin strips. Onions can be cut into cubes or quartered rings. We will chop the lamb into small pieces, and leave the garlic as is, just remove the top dirty husk from the head.
- Before preparing pilaf, rice is washed thoroughly and many times until clear water is obtained. Then you can soak it for 30-40 minutes so that it cooks faster in the dish.
- When we cut the meat and vegetables, heat up the vegetable oil in the slow cooker and throw the lamb into it. Frying it in the “Frying” program will take about 20 minutes, all this time the pieces must be mixed with a spatula.
- After 20 minutes, add carrots and onions to the lamb. They will immediately release the juice, so the device can be switched to the “Stew” program and cook the ingredients for another 15 minutes.
- Boil the kettle and pour hot water over the ingredients in the bowl. It is necessary that the boiling water covers the meat by 2 cm. At this stage, the dish can be salted and hot pepper added.
- Place the cleanly washed head of garlic into the bowl and add all the other seasonings, including barberry. Close the boiling container and simmer the meat for 40 minutes.
- Drain the water from the rice and place the cereal in a bowl. Pour more water so that it covers the rice by 2 cm. Leave the “Stew” program or turn on the “Pilaf” or “Rice” option. Cook lamb pilaf in a slow cooker for another 40-45 minutes. The process can be considered complete when the liquid disappears from the cereal.
Pilaf with lamb and barberry in a slow cooker
Ingredients:
- lamb – 700 g;
- rice - 3 tbsp.;
- large carrots – 1 pc.;
- large onion – 2 pcs.;
- water;
- garlic – 1 head;
- barberry - a small handful;
- zira – 1 tsp;
- seasoning for pilaf – 1 tsp;
- vegetable oil – 60 g;
- chopped lamb fat – 1 tbsp. l.;
- salt - to taste.
Cooking method
- Rinse the rice and soak for an hour. Place on a sieve.
- Cut the lamb into pieces. Trim and chop the fat.
- Cut the carrots and onions into strips.
- Turn on the multicooker in the “Baking” mode. Add lamb fat and melt. Remove the cracklings.
- Pour in vegetable oil and add onions and carrots. Fry with the lid open for 5 minutes until the vegetables are soft.
- Add the lamb, mix everything and cook until the meat is lightly browned. Add salt and pilaf seasoning.
- Pour in the rice and smooth it over the entire surface with a spatula.
- Add cumin and barberry. Please note that barberry is sour, so be prepared for the pilaf to be sour.
- Peel the garlic from the top husk, cut off the bottom, rinse under running water. Stick into the center of the rice.
- Pour water to cover the cereal by one centimeter.
- Set the “Pilaf” program and cook until it ends.
- Gently stir with a spatula and leave to heat for half an hour.
- Pilaf with lamb and barberry is ready!
Uzbek lamb pilaf in a slow cooker - cooking secrets
To prepare real Uzbek lamb pilaf in a slow cooker, you need to carefully select the ingredients; it is advisable to take fresh meat with pieces of fat and veins.
It is better to use young garlic, or at least one whose cloves fit tightly and the husks do not flake off much. Before cooking, the top is peeled as much as possible and lightly washed.
It is also advisable to take young carrots and not very long ones, 15-20 centimeters long, ideally they should be yellow.
You need to take short-grain rice, because long-grain rice is too thin and breaks easily, turning into porridge.
The hot pepper should be whole, without damage to the shell; if the seeds spill out, it will turn out too hot.
Ingredients:
- lamb - half a kilogram;
- Polished round grain rice - half a kilogram;
- carrots - 300 grams;
- onions - 3 medium-sized onions;
- young garlic - two heads;
- red hot pepper - one pod;
- seasoning for pilaf (cumin-jeera) - half a teaspoon;
- dried barberry - half a teaspoon;
- vegetable oil - 150 grams;
- lard (preferably lamb) - 50 grams;
- salt - about one teaspoon
Pilaf with lamb and dried apricots in a slow cooker
Ingredients:
- lamb – 700 g;
- rice - 3 tbsp.;
- large carrots – 2 pcs.;
- large onion – 1 pc.;
- water;
- ghee – 100 g;
- dried apricots – 100 g;
- spices - to taste;
- salt - to taste.
Cooking method
- Rinse the rice and soak for an hour. Place on a sieve.
- Cut the lamb into 15 g pieces.
- Cut the carrots and onions into strips.
- Place the butter in the multicooker bowl and turn on the “Baking” mode. When the butter melts, add the meat and fry with the lid open until golden brown.
- Add onion and carrots, sauté until soft.
- Add rice and smooth it out.
- Add washed dried apricots, pepper and salt.
- Pour enough water to cover the contents of the pan by one centimeter.
- Close the multicooker, set the “Pilaf” mode and cook until it turns off.
- Stir carefully and leave to heat for another half hour.
- Pilaf with lamb and dried apricots is ready!
Pilaf with lamb and peas in a slow cooker
Ingredients;
- lamb – 500 g;
- rice - 4 tbsp.;
- peas – 100 g;
- large onion – 1 pc.;
- carrots – 2 pcs.;
- water;
- vegetable oil – 100 g;
- salt - to taste;
- spices for pilaf – 1 tsp.
Cooking method
- Wash the peas and soak for 10 hours in cold water.
- An hour before preparing pilaf, rinse the rice and cover with cool water. Place on a sieve.
- Cut the onion into thin rings.
- Cut the carrots into cubes.
- Cut the lamb into 15 g pieces.
- Pour oil into the multicooker pan. Turn on the Baking program. When the oil is hot, add the meat and fry it with the lid open until golden brown.
- Add onions and carrots. Stir and sauté until the onion is soft.
- Pour in a liter of hot water. Place the peas. Change the program to “Stew/Soup”. Cook for 30-40 minutes. Disable this mode.
- Pour in the rice and smooth over the entire surface. Add spices.
- Pour in enough hot water to cover the rice by one centimeter.
- Set the “Pilaf” mode and cook until the sound signal.
- Gently stir the pilaf and leave on heat for 30 minutes.
- Pilaf with lamb and peas is ready!
Note to the hostess
- If the multicooker does not have a “Baking” program, vegetables and meat can be fried in the “Frying” mode. You can also fry the ingredients in a frying pan, then transfer them to the slow cooker and continue cooking according to the recipe.
- During the cooking process, only hot water is poured. If you pour cold water over the meat, it will remain tough for a long time, and its taste will be worse.
Time: 70 min.
Servings: 6-8
Difficulty: 4 out of 5
At first glance, it seems that lamb pilaf in a slow cooker is a rather banal dish, and its recipe is very simple. Nothing special seems to be required, frying meat is not difficult, and do the same with vegetables.
Cooking rice is generally a piece of cake. All that remains is to mix everything. But this is a mistaken opinion; in order to prepare real pilaf, you will have to try very hard, and you need to find a suitable recipe.
This dish has three main components - rice, lamb and zirvak. Everything else is up to your taste. There are lovers of fatty pilaf, while others have their own preferences regarding spices. To begin with, I will describe the basics of preparing a delicious dish, and then I will give a good and detailed recipe.
To prepare delicious pilaf, you need to go through three stages.
- First you will need to heat the vegetable oil well.
- Next, prepare zirvak, that is, fry meat with vegetables.
- Lastly, add rice and liquid. Well, bring the dish to readiness.
Do not rush to cover the rice with a lid immediately after boiling, let it “boil” a little. If you cook food on the stove, then first the fire should be high, then medium, and only after that turn it very low and close the lid so that the rice evaporates.
It is important to make zirvak correctly, it plays a key role in cooking and the entire recipe depends on it, and cooking begins with it. In the classic version, you need to fry the meat, onions and carrots.
Please note that if you have a good, high-quality recipe, then you will cut the carrots into small strips and not grate them.
When choosing rice, choose the long-grain variety.
You should not take Indian or Thai cereals. And there’s no need to take steamed rice. It, of course, will not boil over, but it no longer contains any useful substances or elements. It is rather a completely useless product. But your recipe will only benefit from Tajik and Uzbek varieties of rice; Italian cereals will also work.
Now let's talk about meat. Since our recipe includes lamb, we will buy it. The most suitable parts of the carcass for our dish are the breast, shoulder or back. Remember that you can only take fresh meat; it has a rich red color.
Before you start cooking, you must remove all fascia and tendons, wash the meat thoroughly and cut it into small slices.
But I advise you to choose spices based on your preferences. You can even use a ready-made mixture that is intended for pilaf.
Cooking lagman
Lagman is another oriental dish made from lamb. Rich broth, tender meat and spices seem to immerse us in the world of the East. Let's see how you can prepare such a dish in a slow cooker.
Ingredients:
- lamb on the bone weighing half a kilo;
- one bell pepper;
- spoon of tomato paste;
- three garlic cloves;
- large onion and carrot;
- 220 g noodles (not spaghetti);
- radish (half).
Cooking method:
- Properly chopped vegetables are the key to a delicious dish . So, cut the onion into half rings, not too thin, but not too thick (2 - 3 mm). In no case should we grate the carrots, but cut them into cubes half a centimeter thick. Cut the pepper into half rings the same thickness as the carrots. Simply chop the garlic and cut the potatoes into small cubes. But you can grate the radish.
- Now the meat. We cut it off the bone and cut it into pieces.
- Turn on the multicooker, select the “Frying” option, pour in a little oil and fry the meat pieces until golden brown.
- Then add onions, carrots, radishes and tomato puree, after five minutes add pepper, and after 15 add seasonings. Here you can use cumin, coriander, a mixture of oriental spices, and, of course, don’t forget about salt. Pour in water, change the “Frying” mode to the “Stewing” mode and cook for two hours.
- Half an hour before they are ready, add the potatoes.
- Boil the noodles separately, but do not cook them for too long - they should retain their elasticity. We wash the finished noodles and transfer them to any container.
- We serve lagman like this: put noodles on a plate, fill it with meat and vegetables and sprinkle with fresh herbs.
Article on the topic: Features of growing tulips
Cooking technology
If all the ingredients are at hand, the vegetables and meat are washed, the rice is thoroughly washed, then you can start cooking.
As I said, the process consists of three stages.
Roasting
Step 1
Not every multicooker has a “Pilaf” mode, so first we switch our unit to the “Frying” mode and set the timer for twenty-five minutes.
Step 2
The onion is cut into thin rings or half rings.
Place it in the “miracle oven” and fry for five minutes. Fry the meat into medium-sized cubes until they turn white.
Seasonings
Step 3
All our spices need to be thoroughly ground, this can be done with a mortar and we put them in a slow cooker. You can, of course, use ready-made mixtures, but I prefer to do everything myself.
Step 4
We wait about fifteen minutes and add chopped carrots to the meat.
We wait another seven minutes. Now it's the turn of raisins and butter. In total, frying lasts a little less than half an hour.
Add rice
Step 5
The cereal, which we have previously washed well, is poured into the multicooker bowl on top of the zirvak. After this, very carefully pour hot water in a circular motion. Make sure that the rice is submerged one centimeter in the liquid.
Cooking process:
The onion needs to be peeled and cut into thin rings. Wash the carrots and chop into medium pieces. Switch the multicooker to the “Baking” mode. Add onions and carrots. Cook for 5 minutes adding oil.
The lamb needs to be cut into large pieces. It is best to choose pulp with a small amount of fat, however, you can also use lamb ribs in the recipe. Place the meat on the onion.
Continue cooking for another 10 minutes. Leave the lid open. The juice released from the meat should evaporate.
Pour in water.
Add salt.
Mix the spices for the pilaf and place in the multicooker bowl. It is also worth noting that spices can be purchased not individually, but already collected in one package.
Mix all ingredients. The broth with meat for pilaf is called zirvak. Add rice. Parboiled rice does not need to be washed. There is no need to mix the ingredients at this stage of cooking; you should carefully distribute the rice on top. Change the multicooker mode to “Stewing”. Cook for 30 minutes.
Separate the garlic cloves from each other. Place them in the slow cooker 10 minutes before the end of the cooking process. Add the whole hot pepper there. Close the lid and wait for the signal.
Lamb pilaf in a slow cooker is ready, as you can see, it’s very easy to prepare! Serve this dish hot. Bon appetit!
To prepare real tasty Uzbek pilaf in a slow cooker, you need to stock up on good quality products. You need to take firm, coarse-grained rice. Long thin rice is not suitable because during cooking the grains will split in half and the pilaf will eventually become sticky and not crumbly. Let's not even talk about instant rice. Mutton. The meat needs to be fresh, or at most chilled. Frozen won't ruin the taste, but you don't know how many times it's been frozen. We buy lamb at the rate of approximately 700 grams of tenderloin, 200 grams of small bones, preferably ribs, and 100 grams of fat, preferably from the inside. It’s better to buy yellow carrots; if you don’t have them, then red ones will do. Small, about 15 centimeters long. Garlic must be taken young. If you take a stale one, you don’t know what condition the cloves are in. This is important because we will not clean one head. Even one spoiled clove will ruin the taste of the entire dish. Zira. If it is not there, then there is no point in preparing real Uzbek pilaf; you will end up with rice porridge with lamb. As an option, you can use the seasoning in “For pilaf” packets, but I repeat, this is an option.
Products:
- durum rice 1 kilogram;
- lamb 1 kilogram;
- carrots 500 grams;
- onions 2 onions;
- two heads of garlic;
- vegetable oil 150 grams;
- cumin (cumin) 1 tablespoon;
- hot pepper 2 pods;
- salt to taste.