Beef basturma at home

The appearance of basturma is associated with the troops of Genghis Khan. Usually, a warrior took a piece of meat with him, which he hid under a horse’s saddle. For a long time traveling, the meat managed to be saturated with horsepot salt and lose all moisture under the weight of the rider. Whether this is so is not known for certain, but now this dish is very common in the territory of the countries of the former Ottoman Empire.

Today, basturma is prepared from lamb, pork and even chicken, but beef jerky is considered a classic, traditional option. Mandatory spice for snacks is a chaman or blue fenugreek. Some culinary experts sometimes replace it with ground caraway seeds, but this is not the same taste.

It is better to get acquainted with the appetizer where it is a national dish, in order to know the true taste and not to be disappointed. But if a trip to one of the countries located on the expanses of the former Ottoman Empire is not included in the immediate plans, you can cook beef basturma at home. The process is, though painstaking, but simple.

Classic Beef Basturma Recipe

According to the classic recipe, basturma is absolutely not difficult to prepare, although the whole process takes almost a month. But if you have patience and the necessary ingredients, you can treat yourself and your household with a delicious and, most importantly, quality delicacy.

To prepare basturma, you will need meat and spices per one kilogram of beef tenderloin. The latter are no less important than the main product.

• Mix salt, sugar and pepper. Coat the piece of beef thoroughly with the resulting salting mixture. To speed up the process of cooking basturma, cut the meat into thin pieces 2 cm wide.
• Transfer the meat boned in the salting mixture to a colander installed above the bowl or pan, put the oppression on top (for example, a liter jar of water). Move the structure to the refrigerator for 3-5 days, so that the workpiece is well salted. Turn on the other side at least twice a day.
• On the fourth day, prepare a marinade with a chaman. To do this, mix all the spices in a bowl of a different capacity and, adding a little water, bring the mixture to a thick sour cream. Then remove the marinade for a day in the cold so that the spices can "make friends" and form a harmonious bouquet.
• Put salted meat in a suitable container, thoroughly coating and coating with marinade on all sides. Put the beef in the marinade in the refrigerator for another three days.
• After that, dry the meat on a baking sheet, until you get a crust of spices. Do it in a draft (you can on the windowsill at the open window, if the temperature allows), regularly turning from one side to the other.
• Hang dried beef in a cool dark place with a temperature of no higher than 7-8 degrees. In a city apartment, the refrigerator door is suitable for this purpose.
• As soon as the piece of meat hardens and ceases to be felt softness inside, the basturma is ready.

Armenian recipe

The recipe for Armenian basturma is interesting in that the beef is pre-salted in brine (we take spices per kilogram of beef tenderloin), and not in a dry way.The second point: for brine and for pickling, red dry wine is used, which gives dried meat not only a special taste, but also color.

Ingredients for brine on red dry wine:

• 1000 ml of dry red wine;
• 180 g of table salt;
• 10 g of red ground pepper;
• 30 g of the chaman (fenugreek);
• 30 g of sumac (dried ground pomegranate);
• 30 g chopped garlic.

Ingredients for Coating Marinade:

• 15 g of salt;
• 90 g of garlic, passed through a press;
• 15 g of sumac;
• 10 g of chaman;
• 10 g of hot red pepper in powder;
• 100 ml of red wine to obtain the necessary consistency.

Ingredients for a thick coating:

• 5 g of salt;
• 5 g of chaman;
• 5 g of red pepper;
• 5 g of flour.

1. Dissolve salt in red wine, add garlic and other spices, mix well and put meat in it. Top set oppression. To beef well saturated with salt, make a few punctures with a knife. Send the meat tenderloin in brine for seven days in the refrigerator to pickle.
2. For a coating of spices, first mix all the dry ingredients, and then, pouring wine in small portions, bring to the consistency of thick sour cream.
3. Carefully coat a piece with thick marinade on all sides and put in the refrigerator for a day so that the meat absorbs all the aromas of spices.
4. After a day, peel the coating in a separate bowl. Pass a rope through a piece of tenderloin so that it can be suspended. Mix the cleaned coating with flour, pepper, salt and a chaman. The resulting thick coating with a brush to cover the workpiece from all sides. It should get a layer of 2-3 mm.
5. Hang the meat for 10-14 days on the door of the refrigerator for drying. During this time, the beef will become dense and a little hard, but not like a stone.

Calorie content

Beef wound in a special way has a relatively low calorie content for meat products - 240 kcal / 100 g. This is due to the fact that fillet without fat is used to prepare basturma.

Since the raw materials are not subjected to any heat treatment, all the benefits of beef are preserved. The product is useful to include in the diet to make up for the body's need for animal fats. Dried beef will help to quickly build muscle mass, cope with chronic fatigue and defeat anemia. Spices included in the marinade have antibacterial and anti-inflammatory effects.

Useful Tips

Use only fresh meat from a trusted retailer to make sure that no parasites have chosen it. The ideal time for making a meat snack is spring or the beginning of summer, when the weather is hot and cold, and you can safely hang the meat for a couple of weeks on the balcony.

Before starting cooking, meat for basturma must be rid of excess fat and films. After that, it needs to be cut into wide long strips, the thickness of which does not exceed three centimeters.

If salting occurs not in a dry way, but in saline, then it must be very concentrated. Check if the salt concentration is sufficient, you can use a chicken egg. If it pops up and does not sink, the brine is prepared correctly.

Extract of meat under oppression lasts 3-7 days. At this stage, the weight of the load mounted on top is of great importance. On a piece of beef weighing one kilogram take oppression weighing 10-12 kg.

Shelf life of home-made basturma in the refrigerator is six months. Cured meat is served as an independent snack, simply cut into thin slices or making sandwiches.

An interesting fact about basturma, the explanation of which has not yet been found by scientists. A small portion of aromatic basturma is able to give a person's sweat the smell of spices in which it was pickled. Why this happens is unknown, but the aroma is so persistent that no deodorant can cope with it. True, in 10-15 hours everything goes by itself.

Do not be afraid, you can safely eat delicious beef jerky in spices, cooked at home. Cooking it is not so difficult.