Meat cooked in ceramic pots always has excellent taste, aroma and a very appetizing appearance.
In addition, due to the thick walls of the earthen pot, which heat up slowly and evenly, the meat does not fry or boil, but is languishing, so it retains all its beneficial properties.
At the same time, cooking meat in a pot is not at all difficult, the main thing is to properly prepare and put food into it, and all that remains is to wait until a deliciously fragrant and tasty dish can be extracted from the oven. You can cook almost any meat in pots. Of course, its different types require different heat treatment times: beef should be cooked for at least an hour and a half, pork for at least an hour, chicken in a pot is usually ready in 40 minutes. Also, vegetables, mushrooms or potatoes are usually stewed with meat in pots. which give the meat an excellent taste and aroma, and can also be used as a side dish.
One of the basic principles of cooking meat in pots is the compatibility of the components with each other by their culinary properties and taste. Meat, especially poultry, goes very well with sour fruits and berries. For example, a very interesting combination is a fat duck or a goose with an orange. The combination of chicken with apples and potatoes is considered a classic. If the meat is cooked in a pot with porridge, the dish is very well seasoned with onions, garlic and mushrooms.
Potted Meat - Food Preparation
When cooking meat in pots, all the components in them can be laid immediately, without prior heat treatment, and you can put already prepared products there.
In the first case, cooking takes less time. For equally well prepared products that require different duration of heat treatment, you can, for example, cut the meat into small pieces, and vegetables - larger ones.
If previously prepared products are put in the pot, then the problem of the time difference of their heat treatment does not arise. That is, slicing the meat into pieces of the right size, we fry it in oil in a pan, then we also prepare the vegetables and put everything in a pot in layers for cooking.
Meat in pots - cooking utensils
Choosing a pot, you need to calculate which capacity fits you best. Usually use pots from 250 ml to 500 ml.
It is not recommended to use whole culinary pots with a glazed inner surface, since tin, which is part of the glaze, can get into the food when it is heated and cause poisoning.
At the same time, choosing a pot with porous walls, you can get really healthy and tasty dishes. So, soaking it before cooking a dish in water for about half an hour, you fill its pores with moisture, which during the heat treatment will pick up the products and make them more juicy.
Recipe 1: Potted Meat with Mushrooms and Potatoes
The classic combination is meat, potatoes and mushrooms, in this dish it finds a completely new sound thanks to the addition of pickles. Roasted carrots, onions, as well as garlic and greens complete the tasty picture.
Ingredients:
0.5 kg of veal or pork;
10 potatoes;
2 carrots;
200 gr. champignons;
2 pickled cucumbers;
2 onions;
bunch of dill;
3 large cloves of garlic;
rast. onion roasting oil;
to taste salt, pepper.
Preparation:
1. Prepare the products: cut the meat into small pieces, pickled cucumber - into small cubes, mushrooms - not too thin slices, chop the garlic with dill, onion, finely chopped, fry in vegetable oil. Cut potatoes into strips.
2. Fold the products in a pot: meat mixed with pickled cucumber; mushrooms with dill and garlic; above - potatoes, salt and pepper.
3. Add water or broth so that the liquid barely covers the contents of the pot, on top we “cover” everything with a layer of sour cream and sprinkle with grated cheese.
4. Cover the pots with lids, put them in the oven and cook our dish for an hour.
Recipe 2: Pot Meat with New Potatoes
This dish is easy to make, even without having a special skill and plenty of time. It is prepared from the most familiar to us products - meat, potatoes, onions and carrots. However, this meat in pots with its seeming simplicity is very tasty and nutritious. Ingredients:
200 gr. chicken meat;
1 carrot;
1 onion;
300 gr. small new potatoes;
several black peppercorns;
Bay leaf;
vegetable oil;
to taste the salt.
Preparation:
1. Cut the meat and fry it in vegetable oil, put it in the pot.
2. After peeling carrots and onions, we cut them into small cubes and pass in a pan from under the meat.
3. Wash new potatoes thoroughly and remove the rind.
4. Put the steamed vegetables on the meat in the pot, then the whole potatoes.
5. Fill the contents of the pot with hot water, which should barely cover it, salt, pepper, add a bay leaf.
6. Cover the pot with a lid, stew in the oven for about an hour.
Recipe 3: Potted Meat with Turkish Vegetables.
If you are fed up with the usual meat in pots with potatoes, cook this dish and you will not regret it! It is prepared as simply, but its taste and aroma, obtained through the abundance of vegetables with which meat is stewed, will please even the most discerning lovers of good recipes.
Ingredients:
1 kg of mutton;
4 tbsp. l margarine;
10 pieces of shallots;
150 gr. green beans;
1 large eggplant;
2 medium potatoes;
2 medium carrots;
2 large tomatoes;
3 green sweet peppers;
a small bunch of dill;
to taste ground black pepper and salt.
Preparation:
1. Cut the lamb into small pieces, put them in a large clay pot.
2. Prepare the vegetables: cut the tomatoes in circles, cut the ends of the green string beans and cut them in half, wash the beans and cut them into long pieces, clean the eggplants and cut them into pieces up to 4 cm, clean the green peppers and cut them in 4 pieces, washing my shallots, potatoes clean and cut into large cubes.
3. Then put the prepared vegetables in a pot on the meat in layers: tomatoes, beans, eggplants, peppers, on top of the peppers - a whole shallot, on top of it - a few more slices of tomato, then potatoes and again slices of tomato.
4. Salt and pepper, sprinkle with finely chopped dill, put the margarine on top, pour half a glass of water. Covering the pot with a lid, simmer everything for about 2 hours. When the meat is soft, our dish is ready.
Potted meat - tips from experienced chefs
To prevent pots from cracking due to temperature drops, they are recommended to be put in a cold oven, so that they evenly heat up with it.
Experienced cooks believe that if you put the food in the pot in its raw form, the meat in the pots will be more delicious, as it absorbs the aroma of other products during the cooking process.
If in the process of cooking you see that you need to add more liquid to the dish, you only need to use hot water or broth in a small amount, otherwise the pot could burst.
Since the top layer of products during the heat treatment process can dry out, it is advisable to make it from onions or tomatoes, which give juice. Ideally, you should always cover the pot with a lid or wrap with foil, or cover with a piece of dough.
Hot pot, extracted from the oven, can be put only on a wooden stand or board, and not on a cold surface, otherwise its bottom may crack.
Remove the pot from the oven better shortly before the readiness of the dish. So it will cool down a little before serving and reach readiness under the action of the hot walls of the pot.
Remember that food cooked in a ceramic pot in the oven has good digestibility and the ability to restore the body, so it is not only tasty, but also extremely useful.
