Bozbash
Are you cooking?
All about culinary art...
Bozbash - an oriental guest on your table
Bozbash (translated as Grayish Head) is a popular Caucasian dish, which is a seasoning soup based on lamb broth. The food must contain essential ingredients in the form of chickpeas and chestnuts (they can be replaced with potatoes). You can also additionally fry already boiled and washed lamb. The set of vegetables is very different and depends on the time of year and region of residence.
The calorie content of the dish is 88-100 kcal per 100 g. This value may vary depending on the fat content of the meat. In this material we will tell you how to prepare bozbash according to several recipes step by step and with photos, and the video at the end of the article will help you correctly create the food over a fire.
Bozbash traditional
Dried fruits, vegetables and lamb are used to prepare this thick Caucasian soup. The dish comes out rich and savory, and prunes add extraordinary flavor notes to it.
- Prunes – 60 g;
- 6 potatoes;
- One bell pepper;
- 2 onions;
- Lamb – 700 g;
- Thyme and basil - 0.5 small spoons each;
- Tomato paste – 2 huge spoons;
- Pepper and salt - to taste.
Traditional bozbash recipe:
- Fill the meat with cool water (2 l). Bring to a boil, do not forget to remove the foam. Reduce the flame and cook for half an hour;
- While the lamb is cooking, peel and cut the onion into cubes, fry it for three minutes;
- Remove the finished meat from the broth, remove all the bones (if any), and cut the product into pieces. Strain the broth;
- Add the meat slices to the onion and fry for 2-3 minutes;
- Cut the potatoes into cubes and add to the bubbling broth;
- Place chopped prunes, peppers and tomato paste in a frying pan with onions and meat one by one, fry for 5 minutes;
- Dip the entire roast into the bubbling broth, add salt and herbs;
- Bring to a boil and cook over medium heat for 17-20 minutes.
Azerbaijani bozbash recipe
This recipe uses lamb ribs, the broth of which is very satisfying, and herbs and vegetables smooth out its fat content. Lamb bozbash is easy to prepare. It is perfect for a holiday and an ordinary home dinner.
- Garlic – 6 cloves;
- Carrots, sweet bell peppers, onions, quince - 2 pieces each;
- Lamb ribs – 1 kg;
- Potatoes – 4 tubers;
- Tomatoes in their juice – 400 g;
- Chickpeas – 2 cups;
- Butter – 100 g;
- Pomegranate juice – 100 ml;
- One bitter pepper;
- 2 bay leaves;
- Water – 4 l;
- Fresh herbs, salt, ground dark pepper - to taste;
- Fragrant peas (pepper) – 6-8 pieces.
- Soak the peas overnight (that is, at night) in cool water, drain it in the morning and add fresh water. Let the chickpeas cook for 1.5 hours;
- Wash the lamb with cool water and separate all the ribs. Let's lower them to the bottom of a deep saucepan, fill them with water and put them on gas. After the broth boils, remove the first foam that has formed;
- Wash and peel the onion and one carrot, lower them completely into the container, add celery or chopped parsley, aromatic pepper and bay leaves for taste;
- Cook the broth over medium heat for an hour, then pass it through cheesecloth or a sieve into a clean container;
- Place the meat pieces separately in a bowl. We no longer need vegetables from the broth;
- Melt the butter ahead of time at room temperature. Let's heat a frying pan with it and place the boiled ribs in it, fry them slightly;
- Peel and cut the second onion into rings, fry in butter in a frying pan until transparent. Wash and peel the carrots, cut into thin rings, then into quarters, add to the onion. Fry the vegetables until golden for 10 minutes;
- Without the help of others, remove the skins from the tomatoes from the jar, chop them in a large bowl and add them to the frying pan, fry them with vegetables for 6-7 minutes;
- Rinse the pepper, cut it in half, remove membranes and seeds, and cut into small slices. Wash and cut the quince in the same way;
- Let's drain the water from the container with the boiled peas, put in the fragrant fried ribs, carrots with onions, crushed quince and pepper;
- Pour the strained broth into a saucepan and cook for half an hour over medium heat;
- Wash and peel the potatoes, cut into small cubes and place in a saucepan. Press the garlic into the broth and add hot pepper;
- Pour pomegranate juice into the container a couple of minutes before it’s ready. Here we will add herbs and spices to taste in Azerbaijani style bozbash. The finished dish must sit under the lid.
Kufta-bozbash
This dish is prepared with large meatballs, which are stuffed with cherry plum (prunes, dried apricots) with the addition of spices and dry herbs. The kufta comes out fragrant, thick and very nutritious.
- Potatoes - 4 pieces;
- Rice – 100 g;
- Onion – 250 g;
- Minced lamb – 900 g;
- Dry chickpeas - a glass;
- Dried basil – 3-4 huge spoons;
- Fresh or dried cherry plum (prunes, dried apricots) – 8 pieces;
- Turmeric – 2 small spoons;
- Dill, salt, chili, mint, saffron.
- Cook soaked peas until soft;
- Mix the minced meat with basil, rice, 1/2 onion tenderloin, turmeric, add salt and form meatballs. Place fresh or steamed dry cherry plum into them. Add the chopped potato slices and meatballs to the pan with the chickpeas and simmer the bozbash soup for 20 minutes;
- Next, add the fried onions, season to taste with dill, mint, chili pepper and saffron, add salt and let it brew.
Chicken recipe
This Caucasian dish is distinguished by its dietary and light taste. There are options without adding chickpeas, which can be replaced, for example, with bell pepper.
- Bell peppers – 150 g;
- Chicken meat – 400 g;
- 6 potatoes;
- Canned tomatoes and onions – 200 g each;
- Butter – 30 g;
- Turmeric – small spoon;
- Salt, herbs and spices.
- Divide the chicken into pieces and boil at home until soft;
- Add chopped potato cubes and bell pepper (previously chopped into strips), cook for 10 minutes;
- Add the fried onions, seasonings, grated tomatoes and boil the chicken bozbash for another 5-7 minutes, add chopped herbs;
- Infuse the dish for 15 minutes.
Beef bozbash
This special and original dish is a masterpiece for people who live in the Caucasus, and is prepared differently in any region.
- Chickpeas – 100 g;
- Beef with bone – 1 kg;
- 4 potatoes;
- 2 tomatoes;
- Water – 3 l;
- Dark peppercorns – 5 pieces;
- One onion;
- Salt - to taste.
How to cook bozbash:
- Soak the peas in the evening;
- We wash the meat, fill it with cool water and put it on the flame. Skim off the foam, then boil the broth for half an hour and strain it;
- Add onion, cut into cubes, to the meat pieces;
- Continue cooking the meat with the lid closed over moderate heat. The onion should be one hundred percent boiled;
- Drain the water from the chickpeas, add fresh water, and cook until half-cooked, skim off the foam;
- Add the prepared peas and chopped tomatoes to the meat, do not stir. Season with salt and pepper, close the lid and cook until the meat pieces are cooked;
- At the end, add potatoes to the beef bozbash and cook until done;
- Towards the end of cooking, add some salt to the broth, remove from heat and wait 10 minutes (the lid must be closed) for the dish to steep.
The culinary masterpiece is served in bowls and seasoned with the freshest herbs.
Video: Recipe for bozbash on the fire
Bozbash prefabricated
Bozbash is a recipe for the first dish, widespread in the Caucasus. Bozbash is characterized by lamb broth and essential ingredients - chickpeas (chickpeas, nokhut, chickpeas, nat) and chestnuts, which are often replaced with potatoes. The individuality of making bozbash is also the additional frying of previously boiled and washed lamb.
Products | ||
Chickpeas – 1 glass | ||
Mutton | ||
Onion | ||
Carrot | ||
Bulgarian pepper | ||
Tomatoes – 2 pcs. | ||
Quince | ||
Ghee – 2 tbsp. spoons | ||
Potato | ||
Reddish wine vinegar | ||
Dry basil | ||
Ground coriander | ||
Salt | ||
Pepper | ||
Parsley | ||
Fresh purple basil |
How to cook bozbash:
Since the evening of the previous day, I washed and soaked about a glass of chickpeas. After all, my family is small - we can’t eat a lot of soup. And the next day I poured the freshest water over the chickpeas, brought it to a boil and set it to cook over a leisurely fire. Probably about an hour and a half.
In the meantime, I cooked the broth. For the broth you should use lamb brisket. But somehow I didn’t have it at hand. But it turned out that here were a few pieces of so-called lamb for cooking. I removed the excess film from them and filled them with clean, cool water. Then, as usual, I brought it to a boil, skimmed off the foam, added a few aromatic peppercorns, a whole carrot, a whole onion, a bay leaf to the broth and, because we couldn’t find parsley root and I didn’t have celery root, I added a piece of dry root ginger It turned out good too. I cooked the broth for some time, but did not cook the meat until fully cooked.
While the broth and chickpeas were boiling in various pans, I, wiping away a greedy man’s tear, chopped an onion into half rings.
I cut a carrot in this manner.
I peeled and cut multi-colored bell peppers into rings.
I scalded and peeled a couple of tomatoes with boiling water, and later cut them into cubes.
And in the Pacifist refrigerator there was such an excellent fruit as quince. Without her, no bozbash would have worked out for me. So, having gotten rid of the partitions (or, smartly, the seed chambers), I cut the quince into fairly small pieces.
Again, successfully, I found clarified butter in my bins, which I drowned and drowned, but it did not drown. It was apropos here. And I melted a couple of spoons of it in a heated frying pan.
In this oil I fried the meat removed from the broth until golden brown. Later I took it out of the pan and set it aside.
In the frying pan given to us in the same oil, I began to slowly fry the onions.
When the onion turned golden, carrots were added to it, which were fried and sautéed until soft. Well, after reaching golden softness or soft goldenness, the tomatoes went into the frying pan. I fried the tomatoes until liquefied (a powerful phrase, in my opinion), reduced the heat, covered the pan with a lid and left everything to simmer for 15-20 minutes.
Lo and behold, the peas are boiled here. He became soft and affectionate. This was exactly where we were supposed to start assembling the bozbash. To do this, the peas were poured with my strong hands onto the bottom of a large, friendly pan.
And now the onions, carrots and tomatoes have already been stewed. It was pleasant to look at them and smell them.
I placed still warm pieces of fried lamb meat on top of the chickpeas, and poured the onion-carrot-tomato mixture on top.
I didn’t stop there and, continuing to write my work with large strokes, I sent the long-already chopped bell pepper and quince into the pan. Here.
Next, such beauty was filled with strained broth. Remember, I cooked first? And our almost ready-made vegetables were quietly cooked in the broth for another half hour.
When the indicated half hour had passed, diced potatoes also went into the soup. Did I forget to tell you that it is needed? I'm a dunce, yeah. By the way, in the original it is not potatoes at all, but even chestnuts. We don’t have them, no matter how annoying it may sound. And 10 minutes after the potatoes, a reddish hot pepper (whole, without holes or damage!) and a couple of garlic cloves crushed with a special device also came in handy.
Here, as a real Caucasian person, I had to season the bozbash with pomegranate juice. But as a Kazakh citizen, I didn’t have it. And for acidification I used reddish wine vinegar. At the very end, I seasoned the bozbash with spices - dry basil, ground coriander, and salt and pepper.
That's it. In violation of technology, I poured slightly chopped parsley and purple basil directly into the pan, covered the soup with a lid and left the bozbash to steep for 30 minutes. Because it tastes better this way.
What's the result? The result was an excellent spicy soup with an obvious Caucasian flavor. And the main thing is that it’s all vitamins. I'll just add lamb brisket next time.
Beef bozbash
Ingredients
Beef – 400 gr;
Onion – 1 piece;
Chickpeas (chickpeas) – 100 g;
Tomatoes in their juice – 280 g;
Butter – 20 g;
Potatoes – 8 pcs;
Ground black pepper - to taste.
- 999 kcal
- 2 hours
- 2 hours
Photo of the finished dish
Rate the recipe
Step-by-step recipe with photos
Bozbash is an Azerbaijani dressing soup, translated as “grayish head”. Bozbash is cooked in meat or chicken broth with the inevitable addition of chickpeas, which should be soaked in the evening if you need the soup for lunch the next day. There are many varieties of bozbash, depending on the region and the taste preferences of each housewife. Now I offer you a version of beef bozbash.
To make bozbash we need beef, tomatoes in their juice, onions, butter, curry, ground black pepper, salt, potatoes and chickpeas. I used beef in half, pulp and ribs.
Pour water over the chickpeas and leave for the whole night (that is, in the dark) .
Cut the onion into cubes. Heat the butter in a saucepan and fry the onion in it until golden brown.
Then add the tomatoes and simmer until some of the water evaporates.
Add beef to the pan, fry until color changes.
Then add the washed chickpeas. Pour the contents with water, bring to a boil. Then add salt, pepper and curry. Cook until the meat and chickpeas are done.
Peel the potatoes and cut them in half lengthwise. It is better to take medium-sized potatoes.
Place the potatoes in a saucepan and cook until tender. Let the soup sit for 30 minutes.
How to cook bozbash beef soup in Azerbaijani style according to a step-by-step recipe with photos
What foods come to mind when you see a juicy piece of beef? Beef stroganoff, shish kebab and roast? Previously, my culinary skills were limited to five to seven variations of making this tasty meat.
But after my husband’s Azerbaijani relatives visited us, the menu was replenished with another “beef” dish. This is a delicious soup called bozbash. It is very nourishing, rich, has a beautiful taste, and can be prepared very quickly. In addition, bozbash is relished the next day, so you can cook it longer. Let's figure out how to cook it!
Azerbaijani beef bozbash soup
Ingredients
Beef | 400 g |
Chickpeas | 100 g |
Tomatoes canned in their own juice | 280 g |
Butter | 20 g |
Water | 2 l |
Potato | 6 pcs. |
Onion | 1 PC. |
Curry | 1 tsp. |
Dark ground pepper | taste |
Salt | taste |
How to choose the right ingredients
- Be sure to pay attention to the choice of beef. If you want to get the most rich dish, take a piece with a bone, and for a “light” option - just low-fat pulp. Pay attention to the color and thickness of the meat: pink or red color indicates freshness, and the appearance of spots or faded color is an indicator that the product is “not the first freshness”. Yellow streaks of fat “speak” of the honorable age of the animal; this meat will be hard. Please note that excellent beef is elastic and flexible; if you press it with your finger, the acquired cavity will fill quite quickly. Try to use chilled rather than frozen meat.
- If you can’t find chickpeas, you can replace them with regular peas.
- If desired, butter can be replaced with vegetable oil.
Step-by-step production
- Wash 100 g of chickpeas properly, then soak them in plain water (not drinking water). It is better to do this at night (that is, in the dark) , in the latter case - for no less than 4 hours.
Making recipe video
To see how to cook bozbash with pieces of beef, watch the following video. It shows the development of making this first dish.
Options for decoration and serving of food
The finished bozbash looks very beautiful - yellowish peas, reddish pieces of tomatoes, tender colors of meat... Usually, to decorate such a soup, it is enough to sprinkle it with finely chopped herbs.
If you want to make this dish even more original, sprinkle the edges of the plate into which you pour the soup with ground paprika and pepper. Such colored “stripes” look very elegant. Serve soup first, after appetizers.
Due to the fact that it is very filling, you can limit yourself to minimal “additions”: pita bread torn into pieces or a dried snow-white loaf, also a vegetable salad or vegetable tenderloin.