🇺🇿 Uzbekistan
MastavaUzbek rice and lamb soup
A rich Uzbek soup of fried lamb, a large amount of vegetables (carrot, pepper, tomato, potato) and rice, served hot with sour cream and fresh coriander.
Origin and history
Mastava is a traditional Uzbek soup of meat, rice and many vegetables, described as an everyday dish served with fresh herbs and sour dairy (katyk, yogurt or sour cream). One Russian-language recipe publication says it appeared many centuries ago, with Silk Road exchange blending eastern and western cooking, and notes that it is sometimes called a liquid pilaf because of how it is cooked. Its vegetables change with the season.
Make it at home
- Makes
- 4 servings
- Total time
- 1 h 30 min
- Hands-on
- 45 min
Ingredients
- 350 g12 oz lamb (rib, neck or leg), cut in 2 cm (3/4 in) pieces
- 50 g1.75 oz fat-tail fat (kurdyuk), cut small; or 3 tbsp vegetable oil
- 85 g3 oz onion, diced
- 100 g3.5 oz carrot, diced 8-10 mm (3/8 in)
- 85 g3 oz potato, diced 8-10 mm (3/8 in)
- 100 g3.5 oz sweet pepper, seeded, in small squares
- 100 g3.5 oz tomatoes, diced slightly larger; or 1 tbsp tomato paste
- 2 cloves garlic, 1 sliced, 1 grated
- 30 g2 tbsp round-grain rice, rinsed until the water runs clear
- 1 tsp ground coriander
- 1/4 tsp ground cumin (zira)
- 2 bay leaves
- 1.2 L5 cups hot water
- salt and black pepper, to taste
- fresh cilantro (kinza), parsley, basil, sour cream or plain yogurt, to serve
Method
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1. Melt the fat-tail fat in a heavy pot or kazan over high heat until crisp and golden, lift out the crackling and leave the fat.
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2. Brown the lamb in the hot fat, stirring, until its liquid has evaporated and it has a light brown crust.
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3. Add the onion and cook until soft, then the carrot, stirring until it softens.
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4. Pour in enough hot water to cover. Add coriander, cumin and salt, bring to a boil, and cook uncovered at a medium simmer for 15 to 20 minutes.
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5. Add the potato, pepper, tomato, garlic, the rest of the hot water and the bay leaves. Cover and cook for 15 minutes.
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6. Add the rinsed rice, cover and cook 10 minutes, then add black pepper and basil and cook 5 more minutes until the rice is tender.
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7. Serve with herbs, a little raw garlic if you like, and a spoon of sour cream or yogurt.
Notes
- The quantities are the nur.kz recipe (1 kg lamb, 3 L water, 70 g rice, for a large batch) scaled to about a third, with the rice rounded up slightly.
- To keep the rice from swelling in leftovers, cook it separately and add it to each bowl just before serving, as Uzbek tourism sources describe.
- Beef can replace lamb and oil can replace the fat-tail fat; canned tomato paste can replace fresh tomatoes. Long-grain rice also works, with less starchy body.
- Mastava has rice and a lot of vegetables but no pulses, which sets it apart from mashkhurda (mung beans and rice); because it is cooked much like plov it is sometimes called a liquid pilaf.
- Keeps 3 to 4 days in the fridge; the rice will absorb more broth, so thin with hot water when reheating.
Adapted from Nur.kz, Mastava po-uzbekski (step-by-step recipe, scaled from 20 servings to about a third) and Uzbekistan Tourism, Mastava.
At the festivals
No festival we list has printed it on a menu yet.