Goat stew with rice

GOAT STEW WITH RICE

Ingredients

1.5 kg goat meet (I prefer the neck and front leg, but all parts of the animal are suitable)

Salt, pepper, oregano

1/3 of tsp ground cumin

1 tsp ground coriander

100 g. olive oil

2 cups rice for pilaf

50 g. margarine

250 ml of whipping cream 30% fat

200 g. feta cheese

200 g. grated parmesan

The juice of one medium lemon

Half the peel of a small lemon

20g. flour

Instructions

Buy the meat overnight. Ask the butcher to cut it to 6 or 8 pieces.

Wash the meat and then marinate it.

Put salt, pepper, oregano on it and smear it around with oil.

Leave it overnight in the fridge.

The next day put it in a pot.

Pour water in the pot until it covers the meat and reaches three centimeters above it.

Put the pot over high heat and wait to boil.

Just before boiling, foam appears on the water surface.

Skim  the meat and toss the foam.

When the water boils reduce the heat to medium.

Leave the meat uncovered to boil for two hours.

After two hours, check if it is ready.

The meat is ready when it is soft and unsticks easily from bones.

Remove meat from broth and put it on a serving platter.

Add a little salt on top of it.

Leave it to cool.

You can make pilaf using some broth of the meat.

You can serve the meat with pilaf.

But you can create a different dish, which I describe below.

Goat meat with cheese sauce

Scour the boiled meat from fats, rinds and anything hard.

Cover the meat with aluminum foil and leave aside.

Put the pot with the broth in the freezer.

After 15 minutes a layer of fat is floating on the surface of the broth.

Take the pot from the freezer.

With a spoon remove the fat from the broth and toss it.

Strain the broth in a bowl.

Count how many cups of broth there are in the bowl.

A part of the broth you will use to make the pilaf and another part to make the sauce.

Pilaf

Put in a small pot 5-6 cups broth.

Place the pot over high heat to boil.

Put the rice in a colander and rinse under the tap.

Leave it to drain briefly.

Put in another pot the remaining olive oil and place the pot over low heat.

Pour the rice into this pot and stir. 

Let the rice to cook briefly. Stir frequently to avoid burning.

Pour the boiling broth to the rice and stir.

Add salt and the lemon peel.

Let the rice boil for 10 min and then pour in the lemon juice.

Continue cooking until the rice is softened.

Remove it from the heat.

Meat sauce

Put a nonstick skillet over medium heat.

Put in 50 grams margarine and stir it to melt.

Add 20g.flour and stir continuesly, until it is cooked.

Drop into the pan the pieces of purified meat and stir.

Let them simmer for two minutes.

Pour the cream in the skillet and stir.

Add the feta smashed and the parmesan grated and stir.

Pour 2 cups broth in the skillet.

Add grated cumin, grated coriander and a little ground pepper.

Let all the ingredients to boil for a few min until the sauce thickens slightly.

Serving

Make in the middle of a dish a knoll of pilaf.

Over the top of the knoll put as many tablespoons of meat sauce as you want.

Ground beef pies in ramekins

GROYND BEEF PIES IN RAMEKINS

Use ramekins that resemble small glasses.

Their base must be a circle 5 cm in diameter and their upper circle must have a diameter 7 cm.

The height of the beaker must be 5.5 cm.

These individual pies are delicious and are suitable for formal dinners.

Dough

Ingredients

125 grams of margarine

1 cup water

1 egg

Flour

Stuffing

Ingredients

90 grams of olive oil

1250 grams of ground beef

1 large dry onion

80 grams of wine

Salt to taste

Pepper

4 large ripe tomatoes for the sauce

Bechamel cream

Ingredients

180 g. margarine + the margarine you would use to grease the ramekins

200 g. all-purpose flour

2 liters of milk

Instructions

How to make the dough

Let the margarine in room temperature to soften. 
Put it in a bowl.

Pour in the bowl an egg and a cup of water.

Stir with a wire and add slowly the flour.

You are trying to make soft dough.

Your dough should be thicker than a cake batter.

Take some margarine with your fingers and butter the ramekins.

Take care to coat with margarine the base and also the sides of each ramekin.

Get with your fingers a piece of dough as a walnut.

Place this dough in a ramekin. With your finger coat its base and its sides with the dough.  

In this way you make the shell of a small atomic Tart.

Repeat this process on all ramekins.

From your dough you make 22-24 Tart shells.

How to prepare the stuffing

Put in a saucepan the oil and place the saucepan over medium heat.

Clean the onion, mince it and put it in the pan.

Sauté the onion, stir it often to prevent it from burning.

Put the ground beef in the saucepan and stir it.

Add salt and pepper to taste.

The ground beef should be cooked in low heat to produce its fluids.

Stir often and take care to break the lumps that form in the cooking process.

Pour the wine in the saucepan and stir again.

Leave it to braise and stir often to prevent sticking.

Beat the tomatoes in the blender.

Pour the pureed tomatoes in the saucepan and stir.

Let the meat simmer and to absorb almost all its fluids.

Remove the saucepan from the heat and leave it aside to cool a bit.  

With a large spoon divide equally the meat on all molds.

In every ramekin the ground beef rises just above its middle.

You should leave free space to put béchamel cream.

With this recipe you will make 22 to 24 pies in ramekins.

How to prepare the béchamel cream

Put two liters of milk in a pot.

Place the pot over medium heat to boil.

Put another pot on low heat and put the margarine in it.

Stir the margarine until it melts.

Pour the flour in the margarine and stir constantly.

Cook the flour until it gets beige color.

Pour with a spoon ladle the boiling milk little by little into the flour and stir.

Beat for two min the cream with a hand blender, to homogenize it.

Then stir with a ladle until the cream is about to boil.
The cream is delicious if you remove it from heat a min before boiling.

Turn off the heat and leave the cream aside to cool a bit.

With a large spoon put béchamel cream in every ramekin.

You should stop just before filling it.

With a brush coat the béchamel cream on top with a little melted margarine.

Place the pies in the oven, on the first rack from the bottom, next to each other.

Bake at 200 C degrees about an hour.

When the pies are ready they smell nicely and the surface of the béchamel cream has dark beige color.

Let the ramekins to cool completely.

With a knife unstuck each pie from its ramekin.

Turn the ramekin upside down on a platter. The pie comes out overturned.

Turn it again and bring the béchamel cream up.

    

                                                                                                                                                            

Traditional meat pie

Meat pie

Stuffing

Ingredients

1/2 kilo beef

1/2 kilo pork

1/2 kilo goat meat

 1.5 kilo leeks

1 TB oregano and half tsp pepper

120 g. olive oil

4 large dry onions

400 g. feta cheese

300 g. gruyere cheese

Instructions

Stuffing

Wash the meats, cut them in smaller pieces. Put them in a pot.

Pour water over them until it reaches 4 cm above these.

Place the pot over high heat.

Once the water starts to boil, lower the heat to medium.

Let the meat cook for two hours and then check if it is ready.

The meat is ready when it is tender and unsticks from the bones.

If it is ’n ready, boil it for longer time.

Remove the pot from the heat.

Leave the meat to cool and then clean it.

Remove the fats, the rinds, the tendons and all hard parts.

Cut with scissors the pieces of meat into pieces smaller than one cm in length.

Strain the broth of meat, to be sure that there are no small pieces of bones in it.

If the broth of meat is too much, do not use it all.

Place the chopped meat in saucepan and pour broth to cover them.

Save the left over broth in the freezer for another recipe.

Clean tow leeks, wash them and cut them in small rings.

Add in the pan the leeks, salt, oregano and pepper.

Cook the pieces of meat for another hour until they are almost melted.

Remove the sauce pan from the heat and let it aside for later use.

Clean the onions and mince them.

Clean the remaining leeks, and cut them into pieces 1.5 cm in length.

Wash them very well, changing the water at least three times, to remove the dirt and any small bugs that are hidden among the leaves.

Put another pot over medium heat.

Pour the oil in the pot and add the chopped onions.

Stir occasionally and cook them for a few min.

Add the chopped leeks in the pot and stir.

Wait for a few min until they become soft and tender.

Place the pieces of meat in the pot and stir.

Let them cook for 3-4 min.

Add cheeses in the pot and stir. Cook all these ingredients together for 2-3 minutes.

Take the pot with the stuffing from the heat and leave it aside.

Dough

Ingredients for the dough

150 grams of margarine

1/2 kilo of hard flour

1/2 kilo cornmeal

80 g. olive oil

3 tablespoons vinegar

Lukewarm water as needed to make smooth dough 

How to prepare the dough

Put the flour in a bowl.

In the center of it open with your hand a small puddle.

Pour into the puddle oil and vinegar.

Mix with your hand these ingredients.

Pour warm water into the puddle and knead.

You are trying to make soft dough that does not stick to hands.

To achieve this you may need to add a little flour or a little water.

When the dough you made is soft, cover it with clean towel and leave it in a warm place to rest.

It is better to prepare the dough the night before, because the next day it opens sheet easily.

How to open the sheet

Put the margarine in a pot. Place the pot over medium heat to melt the margarine.

Divide the dough into two approximately equal parts.

Sprinkle with cornmeal the surface on which you are going to work. 

Take a piece of dough and give it a circular shape.

Sprinkle with cornmeal onto the surface of the circular piece of dough and open with your hands sheet.

Sprinkle the top surface of the sheet with cornmeal and open it more with a rolling pin.

The sheet becomes larger with moderate thickness.

With a brush coat with margarine the sheet on top.

Sprinkle with cornmeal over the buttered sheet.

Fold the sheet in half so the two buttered and floured parts coincide.

Smear with margarine the top of the folded sheet and sprinkle with cornmeal.

Fold the sheet again in half.

This way your original sheet is quartet with smaller size.

Open the sheet to the dimensions of the pan you are going to use.

Make the sheet slightly larger, to cover the bottom and the sides of the pan in their lower part.

You can use a big pan having dimensions 31CH41CH5 centimeters, or two circular pans 28 cm in diameter each.

Assembling the pie 

Grease and flour the bottom of the pan with oil

Spread the sheet you have made over it.

Spread the filling evenly over that sheet.

In the same way as before open to quad sheet the other half of the dough.

Cover the pie with that sheet.

Smear the surface of the pie with olive oil.

With a sharp knife engrave the pie into pieces.  

Put the pie in the oven on the first rack from the bottom.

Cook at 160 C degrees for 60-70 min.