Recipes for cold crumble soup with kvass, classic recipe 25 minutes 80 kcal...
Aromatic, satisfying and rich, kharcho soup is good for winter lunches, when it’s frosty outside and you want to warm up. A popular Georgian dish, a cross between meat soup and stew, has long taken root in Russian cuisine. It's hard to resist, especially if the kharcho is prepared according to all the rules. But in order to enjoy this dish, you don’t have to go to a Caucasian restaurant. Let's talk about how to cook properly tasty soup Kharcho at home in compliance with Georgian traditions.
What is kharcho
Nobody knows when the recipe first appeared in Georgian cuisine. It is known that once the word “kharcho” was used to describe beef in a sauce made from walnuts and thin slices of dried tklapi plum puree. A little later, rice began to be added to kharcho, and now in the Caucasus it is believed that real kharcho is cooked from beef, tklapi, walnuts and rice. In the summer months, plum puree is replaced with fresh plums or tkemali sauce. It is also possible to add other products to the dish, because in different regions of Georgia, kharcho is prepared in its own way, and each recipe claims to be a classic. The delicious beef broth with its piquant plum sourness, delicate flavor of walnuts and spicy aroma of spices and herbs remains unchanged. Sometimes plums are replaced with prunes, tomatoes, tomato paste or pomegranate juice.
Cooking kharcho soup correctly: preparing the meat
The classic kharcho soup is usually prepared from beef, but since there are many various recipes For this dish, it is permissible to use lamb, pork and chicken. The meat must be the freshest and highest quality. It is best to take beef with a bone, pork ribs or fillet, lamb brisket, shoulder or neck, and if you decide to cook chicken kharcho, both thighs and breast will do. The meat is washed well, cleaned of films and tendons, but whether it is worth removing bones and fat is a personal matter for each housewife. Some cooks believe that bones add richness and flavor to the broth. If you cook a dietary version of kharcho, then fat, of course, will be superfluous, although it makes the soup much tastier. The meat is removed from the finished broth, the broth is filtered, the meat is separated from the bones, cut into pieces and returned to the broth. The basis for Georgian kharcho is ready!
Secrets of cooking kharcho
Well-washed rice of any kind, except crushed and steamed, is placed in the finished broth. Round rice is ideal for this dish, as it looks very appetizing when cooked. While the rice is cooking, add sauteed rice until golden crust onion, bay leaf, slightly mashed black peppercorns, crushed walnuts, cherry plum pieces or fresh plum puree (prunes, tkemali, pomegranate juice). In some recipes you can also find tomatoes - they are usually used without skin in crushed form. But it is best to take cherry tomatoes, which give the soup originality. Towards the end of cooking, spices are introduced into the kharcho - suneli hops, red Bell pepper, saffron, coriander, adjika and any tasty spices. If you are cooking for children, do not add hot spices to the dish. After the soup is ready, add finely chopped garlic, chopped parsley, cilantro, rosemary and celery greens to the pan.
The sequence of adding ingredients and cooking time may vary depending on the recipe. Sometimes kharcho is prepared with bell pepper, carrots and potatoes, Italians generously add olives and basil to the dish, and the French prepare kharcho with cheese and cashew nuts. The soup is steeped for 20 minutes to make it more piquant, spicy and rich.
Cooking classic beef kharcho at home
The classic soup is cooked in beef broth without onions, carrots, potatoes and tomatoes. Cook broth from 400 g of beef on the bones and 2 liters of water - this will take about 2 hours. Strain the broth, separate the meat from the bones, cut it into pieces and put it back into the pan. Add 4 tbsp to the broth. l. rice, a few sprigs of parsley and cilantro (then do not forget to take them out), and when the rice becomes soft, add half a glass of roasted crushed walnuts to the soup. At the very end of cooking, add a finely chopped head of garlic, the remaining chopped herbs, salt, 1 tsp. hops-suneli, tklapi plate or 3 tbsp. l. tkemali. A pleasant sourness is a must in kharcho - it is this that gives the dish a unique Georgian flavor.
If you want to learn more about how to cook kharcho, take a look at our catalog with recipes and photographs, experiment and surprise your guests. Kharcho soup is served with fragrant homemade bread or lavash. This dish is not only appetizing, but also healthy - maybe that’s why there are so many long-livers in the Caucasus?
The aromatic tomato soup kharcho is one of the representatives of Georgian cuisine, which has long conquered the hearts and stomachs of many people outside its homeland. Despite the fact that this dish has a rich taste and aroma, it is not at all difficult to prepare. Kharcho soup has undergone many changes during its “travel” around the world - it is made from chicken, lamb and pork, and potatoes are added. We offer a recipe for kharcho soup with beef, rice and walnuts.
Let's start with what we need to prepare a delicious Georgian kharcho soup. Prepare and place in a convenient “reach” area 0.5 kg of beef (pulp or meat with bone - at your discretion), 2 medium onions onions, 150 g walnuts (shelled) and 150-200 g rice. Note that for kharcho it is better to use rice varieties such as round or long-grained. To give the soup a specific tomato-piquant for the taste of kharcho we will still need 1 tbsp. tomato paste and plum sauce“Tkemali”, 5 cloves of garlic, seasonings (khmeli-suneli, bay leaf, ground red pepper, black peppercorns) and herbs (cilantro, basil). Also don’t forget salt and 1 tbsp. sunflower oil. Now we proceed to the first stage of preparation - laying the meat. We clean our piece of beef from films, rinse thoroughly and cut into small pieces - 20-25 mm. Please note that it is advisable to cut the meat across the grain. Pour water into the pan where our kharcho will be cooked (3 liters is enough) and place the chopped beef in it. Add bay leaf, salt (to your taste) and peppercorns. Cook the broth until the meat is half cooked (about an hour), but do not forget that after boiling you need to remove the foam and reduce the heat. The second stage is adding rice and preparing the dressing. Required quantity sort the rice and rinse thoroughly cold water, then add it to the broth and cook for 10-15 minutes. By the way, for those who cannot imagine soup without potatoes, it is at this stage that you can add a couple of peeled and cut into small cubes potatoes. While the rice is cooking in the aromatic beef broth, you can start preparing the dressing for the kharcho. To do this, cut the onions into small pieces and saute in oil until beautiful golden color. Then add tomato paste to the onion and simmer everything for a couple of minutes.
Of course, the recipe we presented for Georgian kharcho soup with beef is just one of many delicious recipes this dish. You can see another one of them, where tomatoes are used instead of tomato paste, in the video below.
Perhaps cooking is comparable to good music. Each dish has its own melody, which changes when moving from one stage to another. And the final chord of this melody resonates with pleasure in every cell of the body.
Georgian men breathtakingly perform any musical theme with just their voice. And they also invented the recipe for “Kharcho soup”, rich, thick and aromatic. So let's sing about "Kharcho soup."
Recipe for real “Kharcho soup” in Georgian
“Kharcho soup” - a simple recipe for a hot dish Georgian cuisine.
To prepare “Kharcho soup” from beef for 8-10 servings you will need:
- 600 g beef brisket,
- 2 large bulbs,
- 4 medium tomatoes,
- 70 g rice,
- 100 g walnut kernels,
- 2 tsp tomato paste,
- 5 cloves of garlic,
- 2 bunches of greens,
- 1 pod hot pepper,
- salt ,
- pepper ,
- Bay leaf ,
- khmeli-suneli seasoning.
Cooking method
- Cut 600 g of beef brisket into small pieces, each of which can easily fit in a spoon. Pour bones and pieces of meat cold water(2-2.5 liters) and set to cook over high heat. I practically do not cut off the veins before cooking, because... I think that bones and sinews give the broth richness. In addition, a cooked vein is easier to remove from an already boiled piece of meat with less loss.
- While the broth is boiling, carefully remove any foam that forms from the surface. In principle, we are preparing an opaque soup and the flaws from unskimmed foam will not be noticeable in it. However, they gather in foam harmful substances from meat, for example leftovers medicines, which were given to the animal. So skimming foam is a very important stage of cooking meat.
To add more flavor to the broth, it would be nice to add parsley or celery root to the pan during cooking. But you can get by with just stems of greenery (in this case, they will need to be removed 15 minutes after planting). The broth has boiled, add salt, reduce the heat to low, cover the pan with a lid and leave for about an hour.- We rinse the rice, fill it with cold water and leave until the final stage of cooking the soup.
But I wonder where the simple Georgian peasants who invented the recipe for “Kharcho soup” got their rice? It's a long way from China. Most likely, the tradition of adding rice appeared much later, already in the twentieth century, when cooks thought about a nutritious filler for soup that would not spoil the taste of Kharcho and would be much cheaper than meat. However, I could be wrong...
- Using a rolling pin and a plastic bag, chop the walnuts. The output should be pieces no larger than 3-4 mm. In one of the classic recipes from western Georgia, the nut is pounded in a mortar until it becomes fine crumbs, so that it is not visually noticeable at all in the finished dish. I like it when grains of nuts are visible in a bright red soup. Lightly fry the nuts and set aside.
Take 2 large onions, peel and chop as finely as possible. Onions add a certain pungency and flavor to a dish, but too much of it or large pieces can “overwhelm” the taste of other ingredients. Therefore, it is better not to overdo it.- Considering that the taste of Kharcho is based on meat broth with the addition of tomato and spices, neglect fresh tomatoes it is forbidden. At worst, you can take a “plastic” Turkish tomato, even it will give the dish an elusive aroma of freshness. After careful research at the market (March is ending after all), I managed to find Belgian plum tomatoes. They are moderately meaty and juicy - just what you need for soup.
- Scald the tomatoes and remove their skins. Cut into pieces about 2-3 cm. Take the hot pepper, remove the seeds (we are preparing a moderately spicy soup and we don’t need additional bitterness), cut into thin strips.
Place a frying pan on the fire, heat it up, pour in vegetable oil and fry the onion. Add the tomatoes, mix and let the vegetables simmer for about 5 minutes. After that, add hot pepper, 2 teaspoons of tomato paste, salt and pepper and leave for another 5 minutes. Tomato paste will add a little more sourness and make the color of our soup more saturated.
Remove meat and bones from the broth. Let's sort them. Add the pieces of meat to the pan and let the dressing fry again. After 3-5 minutes, add the resulting mass to the broth and bring to a boil.
Add rice. If you want to make Kharcho as a soup, and not as a thick stew, it makes sense not to add rice at all or add very little of it - 50 grams of dry cereal. Cover the soup with a lid and let it simmer over low heat for another 15 minutes.
We chop the greens - a bunch of dill and parsley. Chop 5 cloves of garlic. Grind the garlic with salt, a pinch of pepper and herbs until smooth.
Kharcho is a liquid dish of national Georgian cuisine. Kharcho soup is thicker than regular soups, in which liquid makes up 50% of the total mass. A lot of spices and pepper are usually added to this soup - this is an integral part of its preparation.
The basis of the soup is tkemali - dried plum. It is thanks to her that the soup has a slightly sourish tint. Kharcho must contain walnuts, without which it will not be considered a national Georgian dish. Previously, kharcho soup was cooked only with beef, but these days it is replaced with pork, lamb, veal and even chicken.
If you want to try Georgian beef kharcho soup, then know that preparing it yourself is not so difficult. Just follow the recipe carefully and then you will get a real Georgian dish. See below for how to prepare it.
- Beef - 600 gr.,
- Onion - 1 large,
- Long grain rice - 150 gr.,
- Garlic - 5 cloves,
- Tkemali - 60 gr.,
- Walnuts - 120 gr.,
- Khmeli - suneli - 1 tsp. without a slide,
- Salt - to taste
- Ground pepper - to taste
- Fresh cilantro - to taste.
Cooking hot-spicy Georgian soup
Georgian kharcho should be made with beef and nuts. Spicy is the main taste of the unusual kharcho soup. So if you are a fan of hot dishes, this soup is for you.
So, in front of you step by step recipe cooking kharcho with beef with photo:
- Fill a saucepan with about three liters of water and add the meat, cut into medium pieces. To ensure transparency of the broth, you must skim off the dirty foam on top of the water. Cook for about 1.5 hours, so the broth will be tasty and rich.
- Now you can put tkemali in the soup. The broth needs to become sour - so its quantity can be determined by eye.
- The onion must be crushed and added to the soup. Cook for half an hour.
- Roast the walnuts without adding oil. Press them in a mortar and add to the soup.
- Wash the good rice and add it to the soup.
- Chop the garlic into small pieces and add it to the soup.
- Now add spices and salt to the soup and keep it on the fire for about 8 minutes.
- Turn off the gas and let the kharcho brew.
Serve the dish hot, sprinkled with fresh cilantro on top. If you really like sour cream, then you can put it in this delicious soup. As you can see, the recipe for beef kharcho is quite simple, although it requires a lot of time to prepare, but this makes it richer and tastier.
A simplified version of making kharcho soup.
Products we need:
- Beef, better to use on the bone - 800 g,
- Onion - 1 piece,
- Medium garlic - 4 cloves,
- Tomatoes - 4 pieces,
- Smoked meats - about 100 grams
- Long grain rice - 100 grams,
- Bay leaf - 3 pieces,
- Dill greens,
- Fresh cilantro - to taste,
- Ground black pepper or peas.
Cooking steps:
- Boil the bone with beef for about an hour, then add chopped onion, salt and pepper. Add bay leaf.
- Soak the rice in water. It needs to turn white and become soft. It will soak for about half an hour.
- Cut smoked meats into medium pieces. It is best to use smoked pork.
- Now you need to add tomato paste and rice to the broth. When it boils, reduce the gas and keep it until the rice is ready.
- When the rice is cooked, crush the garlic and add it to the soup. At the very end you can add finely chopped herbs - dill and parsley.
When you pour the soup into bowls, place fresh chopped cilantro on top. Also, many people use ground or fresh red pepper. The recipe is called simplified, since cooking beef kharcho is not as difficult as in the previous version.
How to choose beef for soup?
Beef is commonly used in many soups as it is the most popular type of meat. However, how to choose good beef, not every housewife knows. Choose young meat - it is much softer than the meat of an adult animal. The meat of a young animal can be distinguished by its color - it is bright red.
In order for the beef in soup or any other dish to be soft, it must be marinated. Bay leaf makes the taste of beef much more expressive if used in a marinade.
Beef is a very healthy meat that contains iron and proteins. Thanks to beef, the body's cells are saturated with oxygen, which is why it is so useful for men involved in physical activity, for example, for athletes.
You are convinced that preparing beef kharcho is not difficult. And if you have any questions, watch the video, which will make the process of making soup even easier.
Beef kharcho is a culinary treasure of national Georgian cuisine, which has won recognition all over the world due to its excellent taste and nutritional properties. The dish is a medium-thick soup prepared with the addition of tkemali.
How to cook beef kharcho?
To prepare the dish you will need very little free time, a simple set of ingredients and a few necessary recommendations that you need to remember when following any recipe.
- Kharcho is prepared in beef broth, which ideally should be cooked from a whole piece of brisket with bone. When the meat is ready, it is separated from the bone, cut into small slices and added to the dish at the end of hot cooking or to the plate when serving.
- Often, Georgian soup is supplemented with rice, less often barley or potatoes.
- Mandatory additives, without which kharcho will not be the same, are walnuts and tkemali.
- Spices for beef kharcho can be selected individually according to taste or follow the recommendations of the classic recipe.
Beef kharcho - classic recipe
The classic recipe for Georgian beef kharcho is prepared with the addition of hop-suneli, ground red hot pepper and black pepper. In addition, the composition of the hot dish is supplemented with garlic, fresh cilantro and parsley, bay leaves, tomato puree, paste or grated fresh tomatoes and tkemali.
Ingredients:
- beef - 700 g;
- rice - 150 g;
- onion - 1 pc.;
- garlic - 5 cloves;
- tkemali - 60 g;
- tomato puree - 3 tbsp. spoons;
- hops-suneli - 1 teaspoon;
- cilantro - 1 bunch;
- laurel - 1-2 pcs.;
- water - 2.5-3 l;
- salt pepper.
Preparation
- The meat is boiled in water until soft.
- Add tkemali, tomato, onion, cook the soup for 30 minutes.
- Pour rice into the pan and cook hot until the cereal is soft.
- Add garlic, pounded with cilantro and salt, to the beef kharcho, seasonings, pepper, salt, heat for 5 minutes and let the dish brew for another 15 minutes.
Beef kharcho with nuts - recipe
Beef kharcho is most often prepared with walnuts, which give the dish a traditional richness, thickness and a pleasant nutty flavor. Whole kernels should first be dried in a dry frying pan without adding oil, and then crushed with a rolling pin or ground a little in a mortar.
Ingredients:
- beef - 700 g;
- rice - 150 g;
- onion - 1 pc.;
- garlic - 1 head;
- tkemali - 60 g;
- walnuts - 120 g;
- tomato paste - 2 tbsp. spoons;
- hops-suneli - 1 teaspoon;
- parsley and cilantro - 1 bunch each;
- water - 2.5-3 l;
- salt pepper.
Preparation
- Boil beef until soft.
- Add tkemali, tomato paste, onion and rice to the broth, cook the dish until the cereal is soft.
- Grind garlic and herbs with salt in a mortar and add to the soup along with nuts.
- Season the beef kharcho soup with salt, pepper, hops-suneli, and heat for another 3 minutes.
Beef kharcho soup with potatoes
Beef kharcho soup, the recipe for which will be presented next, is an adapted Slavic version, in which potatoes are added. Tomatoes and tkemali should be in in this case add when the potato slices are ready, as the acid will prevent the vegetable slices from softening.
Ingredients:
- beef - 700 g;
- rice - 80 g;
- potatoes - 300 g;
- onion - 200 g;
- garlic - 1 head;
- tkemali - 60 g;
- walnuts - 120 g;
- tomatoes - 400 g;
- hops-suneli - 1 teaspoon;
- laurel - 2 pcs.;
- parsley and basil - 0.5 bunches each;
- water - 2.5-3 l;
- salt pepper.
Preparation
- Boil the beef.
- Add potatoes, onions and rice to the broth, cook until the vegetables and cereals are soft.
- Add tkemali, tomatoes, garlic pounded in a mortar with herbs, nuts, and spices to the soup.
- Warm up the potato and beef kharcho for another 5 minutes.
Beef kharcho with pearl barley
The beef kharcho recipe can be made with barley instead of rice. Product for more instant cooking should be soaked for several hours and boiled separately until almost done. Adding boiled cereal to the soup will ensure that the broth remains transparent, which is impossible to achieve when cooking together.
Ingredients:
- beef - 500 g;
- pearl barley - 0.5 cups;
- potatoes - 2 pcs.;
- onion - 1 pc.;
- garlic - 5 cloves;
- Georgian adjika - 2 tbsp. spoons;
- tomato paste - 2 tbsp. spoons;
- hops-suneli - 0.5 teaspoon;
- cilantro - 1 bunch;
- water - 2.5 l;
- butter - 30 g;
- salt, pepper, nuts.
Preparation
- Boil the beef and pearl barley until tender.
- Add potatoes and cooked cereal to the broth, cook for 10 minutes.
- Add sauteed onion with tomato, garlic mashed with herbs and salt, seasonings, adjika into the soup and cook for 5 minutes.
- When ready, add nuts to the kharcho with beef barley.
Beef stew kharcho
You can quickly prepare beef kharcho with stewed meat. In this case, canned meat is added at the end of cooking. After finishing heat treatment the dish is allowed to brew for at least 15 minutes so that the components have time to exchange flavors and turn a banal soup cooked on a quick fix, into a true culinary masterpiece.
Ingredients:
- stew - 1 can;
- rice - 150 g;
- onion - 1 pc.;
- garlic - 5 cloves;
- tkemali - 50 g;
- tomato puree - 2 tbsp. spoons;
- hops-suneli - 2/3 teaspoon;
- greens - 1 bunch;
- laurel - 1-2 pcs.;
- water - 2.5 l;
- salt pepper.
Preparation
- Add tkemali, tomato puree and rice to the water and cook until the cereal is soft.
- Add all the seasonings, crushed garlic with herbs, and add the stew.
- Warm up the beef kharcho for 5 minutes, remove from heat.
Beef kharcho with tomatoes
Delicious beef kharcho soup is made with fresh tomatoes, simmered in a frying pan or in a saucepan with the addition of adjika, onions and dried herbs. It is preferable to first peel fresh tomatoes by dipping them alternately in boiling water for a couple of minutes and then in cold water.
Ingredients:
- beef - 600 g;
- rice - 100 g;
- onions - 2 pcs.;
- garlic - 2 cloves;
- tkemali - 50 g;
- tomatoes - 700 g;
- hops-suneli - 1.5 teaspoons;
- dried basil - 1 teaspoon;
- parsley - 1 bunch;
- adjika - 1 teaspoon;
- nuts - 100 g;
- water - 2.5 l;
- salt, pepper, oil.
Preparation
- Add rice to the boiled beef and cook for 10 minutes.
- Sauté onions in oil, add peeled tomatoes, basil, suneli hops, adjika, tkemali, simmer for 5 minutes, place in a pan.
- Add garlic, cilantro, nuts to the soup and boil for 3 minutes.
Beef ribs kharcho
The best recipe for beef kharcho is one that involves cooking hot meat on the bone. Brisket or beef ribs are equally suitable for this. For improvement taste qualities of the finished dish, beef cut into portions is fried on vegetable oil or in a mixture with the addition of cream.
Ingredients:
- beef ribs - 800 g;
- rice - 120 g;
- onions - 2 pcs.;
- garlic - 1 head;
- tkemali - 60 g;
- tomato puree - 100 g;
- hops-suneli - 1 teaspoon;
- greens - 1 bunch;
- nuts - 100 g;
- water - 3 l;
- vegetable and butter - 30 g each;
- salt pepper.
Preparation
- The ribs fried in oil are boiled.
- Add onion, tkemali, rice, tomato to the broth and cook for 15 minutes.
- Place garlic, herbs, and seasonings in a pan and cook for 7 minutes.
Spicy beef kharcho
Proper beef kharcho has a pronounced spicy taste, which in the original is achieved by adding ground hot red pepper or fresh chili, the amount of which is determined individually by each person. Garlic, which should be added at the end of cooking, will add additional piquant spiciness.
Ingredients:
- beef - 600 g;
- rice - 80 g;
- onions - 2 pcs.;
- garlic - 1 head;
- tkemali - 1 glass;
- tomato paste - 3 tbsp. spoons;
- hops-suneli - 1 teaspoon;
- hot pepper - 1 pc.;
- water - 2.5 l;
- salt, pepper, herbs, nuts.
Preparation
- Boil the beef.
- Place onion, rice, tkemali, pasta in a pan and cook for 15 minutes.
- Chop garlic, herbs, hot pepper, grind with salt and add to the soup at the end of cooking.
- When ready, let the dish sit for 15-20 minutes.
Beef kharcho soup in a slow cooker
Easy and simple to cook classic kharcho beef in a slow cooker. The ability of the device to carefully simmer the components will help to obtain a hot dish that is ideal in all respects. If desired, meat and onions can be pre-fried in vegetable oil by setting the device to the “Baking” program.
Ingredients:
- beef - 700 g;
- rice - 1 multi-glass;
- onions - 2 pcs.;
- garlic - 4 cloves;
- tkemali - 50 g;
- tomato sauce- 100 g;
- hops-suneli - 1 teaspoon;
- potatoes - 2 pcs.;
- water - 2.5 l;
- salt, pepper, cilantro, nuts.
Preparation
- Place the meat in the bowl, pour in water, and turn on the “Stew” or “Soup” mode for 1.5 hours.
- After the signal, add onions, rice, potatoes, tkemali, tomato sauce, seasonings, salt, and turn on the same mode for another 1 hour.
- 10 minutes before the signal, add garlic, nuts and fresh cilantro.
