Re-discovered cutlets this year. And no, I have no idea how to spell the word correctly in any language, apparently, since "cutlet" seems to be more of a small steak-with-bone thingy, for the search "kotlet" google claims this to be a Persian dish, I have no idea by this point how many t's the word is spelled with in Estonian, and I have an equally small amount of grasp on why I automatically wrote the title of the post like I did...
Whatever - the fried minced meat patties.
Memo for self about the most recent recipe, because that stuff was yummy!
- 1.1 kg of minced meat (mix of fatty and lean, fully lean tastes dry and is too crumbly)
- 3 small or 3 large onions (keep the peels for colouring eggs in the spring, of course)
- 1 large carrot
- 1/3 loaf of white bread (found a really tasty cake-like one last time, hard to not just eat it as is, tbh)
- enough milk to fully submerge the bread
- 5 small gloves of garlic (minced, no need to pre-cook, or if, then only a bit)
- 3-4 eggs
- 1/3 tablespoon of cinnamon (makes the whole thing awesome, I promise!)
- 2 tablespoons of paprika powder
- 1 tablespoon of dried oregano
- bunch of fresh pepper
- an amount of salt
- butter, coconut oil, rendered pork fat (or whatever other grease)
Peel and roughly grate carrot.
Peel and chop onion.
Optional step: cry like there is no tomorrow, because fk, this is getting to be an allergy-level reaction - I am not even doing the chopping, just being in the same room, and the pain in my eyes is terrible!
Cut the bread into 1-2 cm cubes, put into bowl, cover with milk, leave to soak.
Cook the onion. (Do not use raw chopped onion directly - doesn't have time to cook through and the crunchy is nasty to eat. Pre-fry onions in butter until caramelised, or at least blitz the raw ones into a paste in a mixer. Frying the onions is a better option because it also raises the temperature of the meat mix, so it is not as cold-induced-painful to mix by hand.)
Add carrot and fry that a bit too.
Put all the meat into a biiiig bowl.
Add spices, onion, carrot, soaked bread-milk, garlic, eggs. (But take care about the timing for adding eggs - if broken right on top of the hot onions, will start to cook at a wrong time and place.)
Mix everything first with a utensil (not "an" utensil, by the way because grammar is...), then go hands in and squish until everything is uniformly paste-like and you get bored.
Some grease on the hot pan, fry up a small test-spoonful, break in half to see whether the middle is cooked through, taste and adjust seasoning of the rest of the mix, if necessary.
Fry them all up, layer with paper towels to remove extra grease before eating/storage.
Amounts above are enough for 2 people for 5 meals.
Cheers!
Hedi
