Karnıyarık

The lamb is cooked before it goes in and the dish is baked in sauce and eaten hot, with a pepper laid on each one.

Lamb. Not vegetarian — contains lamb.

Ingredients

the aubergines

• 6 medium aubergines
• oil, for frying
• 6 long green peppers
• 6 tomato slices

the filling

• 500 g minced lamb
• 2 onions, finely chopped
• 3 cloves garlic, crushed
• 2 tomatoes, chopped
• 1 tablespoon tomato purée
• a handful of parsley, chopped
• salt and black pepper

the sauce

• 1 tablespoon tomato purée
• 400 ml hot water
• 1 teaspoon salt

Method

1. THE LAMB IS COOKED BEFORE IT GOES IN AND THE DISH IS BAKED IN SAUCE AND EATEN HOT. That is the whole difference from the meatless aubergine on its own page, and it runs all the way through: there the filling is onion softened for twenty-five minutes and the dish is cooled for four hours; here the filling is lamb browned hard with onion and the dish goes to the table straight from the oven, with sauce spooned over. Two dishes from one aubergine, and neither works done the other way round -- cold karnıyarık is a plate of set fat.
2. A LONG GREEN PEPPER AND A TOMATO SLICE GO ON TOP OF EACH ONE. Laid over the split before baking. The pepper is not a decoration: it roasts in the oven's dry heat above the sauce line and gives each portion a charred, slightly bitter note that cuts the lamb. The tomato slice bastes the filling as it collapses.
3. THE AUBERGINES ARE PEELED IN STRIPES BEFORE FRYING. Alternating strips of skin removed down the length, leaving a striped aubergine. The bare strips soften and take up the sauce; the remaining skin holds the shape through forty minutes in the oven. Fully peeled they slump; fully skinned they stay tough on the outside.
4. THE MINCE IS BROWNED HARD AND THEN COOKED DRY. Over a high heat until it catches, then the tomatoes in and cooked until no liquid is left in the pan. A wet filling makes the aubergine soggy from the inside and thins the sauce it is sitting in.
5. THE SAUCE COMES UP THE SIDES AND NOT OVER THE TOP. Four hundred millilitres poured around them, to about a third of their height. The filling must stay above the waterline so it browns; sauce poured over turns the whole thing into a stew.
6. THEY ARE SPLIT AFTER FRYING, NOT BEFORE. Fried whole and striped, then slit along the top while still hot and the pocket pressed open. Split first, they absorb a great deal more oil through the cut face.
7. The aubergines PEELED IN STRIPES down their length and fried whole in oil, turned, 10 MINUTES, until browned and softened. Drained on paper.
8. The long peppers fried briefly in the same oil until blistered, and set aside.
9. The onions softened 8 MINUTES, then the lamb added over a HIGH heat and browned hard 10 MINUTES until it catches.
10. The garlic, chopped tomatoes and 1 tablespoon of purée added and cooked until the pan is DRY, about 8 MINUTES.
11. Seasoned and the parsley stirred through.
12. Each aubergine SLIT along the top and the pocket pressed open with a spoon.
13. Set in a baking dish and stuffed generously with the lamb.
14. A TOMATO SLICE and a fried LONG PEPPER laid on each.
15. The remaining purée whisked into the hot water with salt and poured AROUND them, to a third of their height.
16. Baked at 190°C for 40 MINUTES.
17. TESTED: the filling should be browned on top and the aubergines should hold their shape when lifted. Served HOT, with the sauce spooned over.

Our own recipe. This one was written for this site rather than taken from anywhere, so there is no source to point you at. The quantities and the order of the steps are choices, not the only way to do it.

Filed under Turkey · All recipes