The most common ingredient in Czech cuisine is onion. It is no difference even in this sweet-sour sauce although you would not expect that from its appearance.
This special Czech sauce is called "Rajská omáčka" which means the Tomato sauce and we usually serve it with pork meat balls and macaroni. If you think that macaroni is not a really typical Czech food, you are completely right. The more traditional way of serving this sauce is with the Czech yeast dumplings.
It is also common to replace the pork meat balls with a slice of backed pork or beef meat but my favourite combination is the one you see on the first picture, eating the sauce with macaroni and pork meat balls.
 |
Yeast dumplings. Author of the picture: Manfred Morgner; Picture Licence
|
Would you like to cook this sauce for yourself at home? Why not? It takes just about two hours and the result is really delicious.
Bellow, I share the receipt I am using to cook this sauce with you. Enjoy it and share your results or questions with me.
- 1 tbsp. butter
- 2 - 3 pieces onions
- 6 - 8 balls allspices
- 6 - 8 balls black pepper
- 2 - 3 pieces bay leaf
- 1 pinch thyme
- 4 pieces cloves
- 2 - 3 tbsp. granulated sugar
- 1/2 tsp. cinnamon
- 2 cans tomato puree (circa 300 grams)
- hot watter/broth
- 3 tbsp. sweet tomato ketchup
- 1 pinch salt
- 4 tbsp. smooth flour
- 1 pot cold water
How to prepare the sauce:
- Cut the onion into pieces (can be bigger).
- Take a deep pot and melt the butter in it.
- Fry the cut onion on the butter (until it's gold).
- Add the spices (allspices, black pepper, bay leaf, thyme, cloves) and suggar and fry for a while. (The suggar should start caramelize a little)
- Add cinnamon and fry again for a while.
- Add the tomato puree and stir the whole content of the pot.
- Add hot water or better a broth (beef broth for example) until you have the amount of sauce that you would like to have (I usually put around 3 contents of my small jug kettle in it which makes my pot filled into 3/4).
- Add ketchup and salt and stir.
- Mix the smooth flour with cold water in a bowl and stir until there are no lumps.
- Add the flour-water mix into the boiling sauce until its a little more dense. !!Don't forget to stir the sauce the whole time in order to prevent the flour from creating lumps!!! In case this happen with the whole mixture, just make another flour-water mix and try the process again. You will get rid o the lumps latter.
- Now, leave the sauce boil for another 20 minutes. It should become even denser.
- When it's done, taste the sauce and flavour it according to your taste. You can add more sugar, salt or ketchup. I usually need to add more sugar and ketchup 'cause the sauce should be sweet (but not too much) and a little sour in the background of the taste.
- Stir the sauce properly again.
- Strain the sauce to another pot in order to get rid of the spices, onion and the flour lumps.
- Throw the content of the strain away.
- It's done!!! Eat it warm!!!
What you need for the meat balls:
- a bit cold water
- 0,5 kg ground meat (pork/beef)
- salt
- 1 pinch chili spice
- 1 - 2 pieces eggs
- soya sauce
- 1 pinch sweet pepper spice
- 1 piece onion
- breadcrumbs
How to create the meat balls:
- Put the meat with water, salt, chili spice, eggs, soya sauce and sweet pepper spice into a larger bowl.
- Cut the onion into really small pieces and add it to the mixture.
- Mix the content of the bowl properly.
- Add breadcrumbs until the mixture holds together.
- Your mixture is done!!!
- Now, in order to taste if I put enough salt, soya sauce and other spices, I usually put a really small amount of the mixture (nail amount) into a hot pan until its fried and taste.
- Add some spices if your mixture needs it.
- Now, take a higher baking sheet and put a little bit of cold water inside (the whole bottom should be covered).
- Create small balls (size of golf balls) from the meat mixture and place them on the baking sheet.
- When you are done, bake the balls on 200 degrees Celsius until they are done inside (It should become dark brown on the top).
- You are done with the balls!! Eat them warm with the sauce or just with bread.
What you need for the macaroni:
- macaroni
- salt
- water
How to prepare the macaroni:
- Put the macaroni into a salted cold watter and cook according to the instructions on the wrapping.
Would you like to have dumplings instead of macaroni? No problem!
What you need for the yeast dumplings:
- 30 dcg coarse flour
- 1 tsp salt
- 21g fresh yeast
- 150 ml milk
- 1 piece egg
How to prepare the yeast dumplings:
- Put lukewarm milk with sugar into medium bowl.
- Crumble the yeast into it.
- Cover the bowl and let the mixture come (in some warmer place). The mixture should increase its amount twice!!
- Put flour, salt and egg into a large bowl and add the yeast mixture.
- Stir it all properly with your hands or cooking spoon.
- Cover the dough with dish towel and let it come on a warm place again. It should increase its amount twice again. Be patient, it takes some time!!!
- Separate the dough into 2 - 3 pieces.
- Roll out each piece separately with your hands on a surface covered with smooth flour. You should try to create an oval shape (circa 30 x 9 x 5 cm).
- When it's done, leave the dumplings rise again for another 15 minutes.
- Then, cook in steam for 20 minutes!!!
- After that, do not forget to pierce the dumplings a few times in order to let the steam go out of the dumpling.
- In order to cut dumpling in slices, you can use a thread when it's still warm or wait until it's cold and use wet knife.
Enjoy!!! and don't forget to send me picture with your success!
No comments:
Post a Comment