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Beef Beshbarmak

Beef beshbarmak

Made from simple ingredients — easy, distinctive, and great for dinner! Beef beshbarmak is a traditional dish of the Turkic peoples, made of tender meat, homemade noodles, onion, and a rich, herby broth. Beshbarmak is traditionally made with lamb, but it comes out very tasty with beef too.

UnicornSteak

Recipe author

Composition / ingredients

Servings:

Beef

300

Onion (all vegetables medium-sized)

Carrots

Bay leaf

Dill seeds (seeds)

Peppercorns

Salt

Wheat flour

200

Eggs (optional)

Water

Translation table of volumetric measures

Nutrients and energy value of the composition of the recipe

By weight of the composition:

Proteins 35 % 11 g

Fats 10 % 3 g

Carbohydrates 55 % 17 g

140 kcal

GI: 22 / 0 / 78

Cooking method

Step 1:

How do you make beef beshbarmak? Gather all the ingredients. The fattier and better-quality the beef, the tastier (and richer) the dish. You can use a piece on the bone. The success of a beshbarmak depends directly on the quality and tenderness of the cooked meat.
Step 2:

Rinse the meat under running water and put it into boiling unsalted water. Use enough water to cover the meat completely. If you have a pressure cooker or pressure multicooker, by all means use it — it'll cut the cooking time by at least half!
Step 3:

Skim off the foam with a tablespoon. As the water boils down, you can top the pot off — but with boiling water only; cold water would toughen the meat from the temperature shock.
Step 4:

Wash and peel the carrot and cut it into a few pieces. Peel an onion. Add the vegetables to the pot, along with the bay leaf, dill seeds, and peppercorns. Salt the broth. Cook the meat over low heat for about 1.5–2 hours, until tender — it should pull apart into fibers with a light press of a spatula. The cooking time depends on the age of the animal, which part of the carcass the cut is from, and its size.
Step 5:

While the meat cooks, make the noodles. Put sifted all-purpose wheat flour into a bowl, add salt, crack in the egg, and gradually pour in ice water. Knead a stiff dough, like for pelmeni.
Step 6:

Divide the dough into 3–4 small pieces — it'll be easier to roll out.
Step 7:

With a rolling pin (or a pasta machine), roll the balls of dough into sheets no more than 1 mm thick. Cut the dough into large diamonds. They say you can judge a Kazakh cook's skill by how thinly she can roll out the inkal (noodles) with a rolling pin.
Step 8:

Lay the inkal out on a board or towel so the pieces don't touch. Leave the noodles to dry until serving.
Step 9:

When the meat is done, pour 3–4 ladles of broth into a separate saucepan and bring it to a boil. This broth is called "sorpa." Add an onion sliced into thin half-rings to the sorpa. I happened to get a hybrid onion — yellow skin, pale-purple flesh. But I figured that would look even prettier.
Step 10:

Blanch the onion over low heat for 3 minutes, until it softens slightly. Don't cook it all the way — it should stay a little crisp. Transfer the onion to a separate bowl, where it waits its turn. This onion is called "tuzdyk." It keeps the noodles from sticking together before serving.
Step 11:

Add a little more broth to the same saucepan and boil the noodles over low heat for 7–8 minutes. They're usually cooked in batches, 2–3 at a time, so the inkal doesn't clump together while cooking.
Step 12:

Arrange the noodles on a serving platter. Lay the onion over them. Set a little onion aside for garnish.
Step 13:

Take the meat out of the broth and pull it into fibers. The meat is traditionally chopped fairly fine as a sign of respect to the eldest guests. Pile the meat in the center of the platter. Garnish the beshbarmak with the reserved onion and, if you like, fresh herbs. Pour the sorpa into bowls and garnish those with herbs too.

"Beshbarmak" translates to "five fingers." Kazakhs eat beshbarmak with their hands (partly for religious reasons, and simply because it's more convenient), wrapping a small amount of hot meat in warm inkal and washing it all down with sorpa.
Enjoy!
Be ready for the flour to come out to more or less than the recipe states. Go by the desired dough consistency rather than the exact amount of flour. To avoid mistakes, read up on flour and its properties!
For cooking, it's best to use filtered or bottled water with a neutral taste. If you use tap water, keep in mind it can give the dish an off, characteristic flavor.
You can swap the beef for any other meat you prefer. Keep in mind, though, that the cooking time, flavor, and calorie count will change. Pork and lamb are generally fattier than beef, while chicken or turkey breast is leaner. And the cooking time depends not only on the type of meat but also on which part of the carcass is used and whether the meat is older or younger.