Echpochmak is a Tatar national dish. These are small amazingly tasty pies made from yeast dough. Minced meat with the addition of onions and potatoes is used as a filling.
Products required for cooking
To prepare the dough, you will need the following ingredients: 3 cups of wheat flour, 200 g of butter, 1 chicken egg, 1 tablespoon of sugar, 0.5 teaspoon of salt, 2 teaspoons of dry baker's yeast.
For the filling: 500 g of meat, 500 g of potatoes, 2 large onions, black pepper and salt to taste.
The echpochmak recipe allows the use of any meat: beef, pork, chicken. You can cook minced meat by combining, for example, beef with chicken.
Cooking echpochmak
Echpochmak differs from the usual pies in that all the ingredients for minced meat are not scrolled through a meat grinder, but finely chopped with a knife. Chopped meat, finely chopped onions and diced potatoes are mixed in a deep bowl. Salt and pepper the minced meat to taste. The prepared filling is placed in the refrigerator.
Sifted flour is poured into a deep container. Cut the pre-frozen butter into small pieces and grind with flour until crumbs are formed. Beat a chicken egg with sugar and salt separately, add baker's yeast. When the yeast dissolves, the volume of the resulting mixture is brought to 250 ml, adding water.
The mixture is poured into flour crumbs and kneaded with an elastic dough that does not stick to hands. The finished dough is wrapped in foil and put into the freezer for half an hour. After the expiration of time, the dough is cut into 30-36 approximately equal parts. Roll each piece with a rolling pin until a sufficiently thin circle is obtained.
Place the filling in the middle of each mug. The edges of the dough are pinched tightly, forming a triangular echpochmak. Traditionally, the edges of the dough are pinched in the form of a "string".
A baking sheet is greased with vegetable oil and the workpieces are transferred to it. For the dough to rise, leave a baking sheet with pies covered with a towel in a warm place for 20-30 minutes.
The oven is heated to 200 ° C. Place the baking sheet on a medium level. Echpochmaki should be baked for 20-30 minutes. About 5 minutes before the end of cooking, remove the baking sheet from the oven and grease the pies with a beaten chicken egg. This will allow you to get very nice, ruddy baked goods.
Ready echpochmaks are taken out of the oven and transferred to a dish. Now you need to cover the pastries with a napkin for 15 minutes. This time is quite enough to brew aromatic tea.
