Lamajo: Armenian dish recipe with photo. Easy Lamajo Recipe - All About Spicy Asian "Pizza"

The basis of the oriental dish is a thin crust, which is filled with lamb, tomatoes, tomato paste, bell and hot peppers, onions, garlic and herbs. Despite the fact that the meat cake weighs from 150 to 170 grams, it is very satisfying.

What is the secret of a real lamajo in Armenian? The peculiarity of the dish is in a soft cake and juicy filling, crispy edges and spicy spiciness.

Dough

The classic dough recipe for lamadjo is designed to be used for kneading yogurt (matsun). If you were unable to get this fermented milk drink from milk fermented in a special way, then you can replace it with kefir. In this case, try to choose the product with the highest fat content that you can find.

Filling

As a filling, the traditional lamajo recipe involves the use of lamb and tail fat. Partially pork can be used. In this case, try to keep the national flavor and take at least a small amount of lamb available to you. If you keep the ratio of lamb and pork 1:1, then the taste will be excellent, and the specificity of the dish will not be lost.

Armenian flatbread with meat filling is spicy and spicy. The taste is formed by an abundance of spices and herbs. There should be a lot of cilantro, basil, hot pepper, then the dish will turn out to be colorful in an oriental way.

Total cooking time: 90 minutes
Cooking time: 30 minutes
Output: 6 pieces

Ingredients

for the test

• kefir (yogurt) - 250 ml
• wheat flour - 400-450 g
• salt - 0.5 tsp.

For filling

• minced meat - 400 g (lamb + pork)
• onions - 2 pcs.
• greens - 1 bunch (basil, dill, parsley, cilantro)
• garlic - 4 teeth
• red bell pepper - 1 pc.
• hot pepper - 1/2 pod or more
• tomato paste - 2 tbsp. l. or chopped tomato without skin
• salt - 0.5 tsp.
• ground black pepper - to taste

How to cook Lamajo

The recipe for the Armenian Lamajo is very simple, the main thing is to knead the dough correctly so that it does not turn out too steep and knocked down. In a deep bowl, I combined room temperature kefir and salt. Gradually introduced the sifted flour, stirring first with a spoon and then with your hands. The dough should turn out tight, in consistency, like dumplings. You need to knead for at least 7-10 minutes, then it will turn out elastic. I covered the finished bun with a towel and left it to rest for 30-40 minutes so that gluten develops.

In the meantime, I prepared the filling. I passed the pork and lamb pulp through a meat grinder twice. And in a blender, I chopped all the other ingredients: onions, garlic, sweet and hot peppers, fresh herbs. If you don’t have a blender, then cut the onion and pepper into cubes, pass the garlic through a press or chop it on a grater, and chop the greens as finely as possible with a knife.

I combined the aromatic mixture in a bowl with minced meat. I added salt, pepper and tomato paste (instead of pasta, you can chop a couple of fresh tomatoes). Mix everything well so that the spices are evenly distributed.

To make the filling more liquid and easily spread on the cakes, I poured a little water into it. I mixed it again and left the filling to infuse, covering it with a plate so that all the tastes and aromas mix with each other.

The “rested” dough will become noticeably softer and more pliable, like plasticine. I divided it into 6 equal parts - about 80 g, about the size of a tennis ball.

I flattened each portion of the dough, lightly dusted it with flour and rolled it into a cake with a thickness of about 3 mm.

She laid out the finished cakes on parchment (you can place them on a baking sheet greased with oil). I smeared the edges along the contour with loose yolk - this is my personal initiative, there is no such recommendation in the classic recipe. I like it when the edges of the lamajo turn out to be crispy and crispy, moreover, such a “barrier” prevents the filling from spreading when baking, securely holds all the juices inside the cake, they do not spill onto the baking sheet and do not burn.

In the center of each cake laid out the filling - about 1.5 tbsp. l. It must be smeared with a thin layer over the entire surface, slightly not reaching the edge. Spread the minced meat only when you are immediately ready to send the workpiece to the oven, otherwise the meat juices will flow out of the dough.

The oven should be preheated to 200 degrees by this point. I baked the blanks for 10 minutes at the top level so that the filling browned faster and remained as juicy as possible! Be guided by your oven, the time may take from 8 to 12 minutes. As soon as the edges of the Armenian pizza are browned, it can be removed from the pan.

It is customary to put ready-made lamadjos on a plate in a stack, and in pairs - stuffing to each other. Thus, neighboring cakes will not be smeared, and it is more convenient to eat pizza. It is customary to take two pieces of lamadjo from the plate at once, so the filling does not fall out, but remains inside, as if in a “closed” form, between two cakes.

Flatbreads with minced meat are very tasty, spicy, crispy at the edges and soft in the middle. They are always eaten hot, sprinkled with lemon juice before serving. And since this food is spicy, it is customary to serve a jug of tan - this is another Armenian fermented milk drink diluted with matsun mineral water, an analogue of our yogurt. Bon appetit!

1. Minced meat must be prepared independently. In no case do not buy ready-made! In Armenian cuisine, minced meat is most often used, but lahmajo requires a more liquid (pasty) consistency. Therefore, pieces of lamb and pork should be passed through a meat grinder, and at least 2 times.
2. The consistency of the filling should be liquid. Minced meat should be easily spread on the dough and soak it, so water is added to it and kneaded well.
3. Spread the minced meat on the cakes in a thin layer. So the lamajo will bake faster, and the filling will not spread outside the cake.
4. Bulgarian pepper gives the filling a delicious reddish tint, so choose red-colored vegetables. You can use frozen peppers or replace them with sweet ground paprika.
5. No peppers, tomatoes and reluctance to peel the garlic? Then add a couple of tablespoons of spicy adjika to the minced meat - this is just the same mixture of pepper, tomato paste, chili, garlic and herbs, which are traditionally part of lamajo.

Description

Lamajo is a delicious dish of Armenian cuisine. These are very thin, slightly crispy cakes, folded in half and layered with minced meat. Who at least once in his life tried Lamajo, will never be able to forget their divine taste and aroma. And by the way, this is Kim Kardashian's favorite dish, and she knows a lot about delicious food.

You can also cook lamagjo at home, guided by our step-by-step recipe with photos. This Armenian "pizza" is very easy to prepare. The traditional meat for her is lamb, and it is she who is presented in our recipe. However, if you wish, you can replace it with, for example, beef, especially since some consider beef lamadjos even tastier than lamb, but this is a matter of taste. And the dough for lamaggio generally resembles our traditional dumplings, so it’s not at all difficult to cook it.

Let's get started!

Ingredients

• 
  (500 g)
• 
  (2 glasses)
• 
  (taste)
• 
  (500 g)
• 
  (2 pcs.)
• 
  (3-4 tablespoons)
• 
  (taste)
• 
  (taste)
• 
  (taste)

Cooking steps

Preparing the dough for lamagjo. To do this, pour sifted flour and 1 tsp into kefir. salt. If desired, you can add 1-2 more tbsp. l. vegetable oil, but this is not in the original recipe.



We mix the ingredients together and knead the dough, gradually adding flour, if necessary, because the dough should turn out to be cool, like dumplings, and not sticky.



Having achieved the desired consistency, we roll a ball out of the dough and set it aside in the refrigerator while we prepare the filling.



For the filling, we pass the meat through a meat grinder twice, and chop the onion, garlic and herbs (to your taste) with a blender. We combine minced meat with greens and tomato paste, which, if you want, can be replaced with fresh tomatoes.



Salt and pepper everything to taste (Armenians make minced meat very spicy). Since the minced meat will be spread on the tortillas, it should be thin enough for this, so add some water if necessary.



We take out the chilled dough, tear off small pieces from it and roll balls out of them with a diameter of about the size of a tennis ball (for a board game).



Roll out the balls into thin cakes and carefully place on a baking sheet.



We cover them with a thin layer of minced meat on top so that the juice does not drip.



When the oven warms up to 220 degrees, put a baking sheet in it and bake the cakes for 7-8 minutes. At the same time, on another baking sheet, prepare the next portion.



We put the baked lamaggios on a plate on top of each other so that one flat cake lay minced up and the other down.



According to our recipe, Armenian lamajos turn out to be fragile at the edges and tender in the center. They are served with matsun (Armenian kefir) diluted with carbonated water. Here is a pile of delicious fragrant cakes disperses in a few minutes.



Bon appetit!

LAMAJO - How to cook Lamajo (recipe)

Today's Lamajo recipe includes the following ingredients.

LAMAJO - How to cook Lamajo (recipe)

List of ingredients:

For test:

2 cups of kefir (matsun, which we replaced with kefir, we simply have nowhere to take)
about 500 grams of flour
salt

For filling:

500 grams lamb meat
2 onions
a few cloves of garlic, maybe a whole head
3-4 tablespoons of tomato paste
fresh herbs
salt, red and black pepper

Cooking:

We cut off pieces from the dough and roll them into balls the size of a table tennis ball. Flatten the balls, grease with flour and roll into a thin cake like pita bread. Smear the minced meat on the cakes with a thin layer, remember I said that the minced meat should be liquid. Do not put the minced meat in a thick layer, otherwise the juice from the minced meat will flow onto the baking sheet and burn. Put the baking sheet in an oven preheated to 220 degrees and bake for 7-8 minutes, then take it out of the oven.

I usually use two pans. While one is roasting in the oven, on the second I roll out new cakes and spread with minced meat. Eight minutes is just enough, but without assistants, of course, it’s hard.

Put the finished lamaggios on a plate. First, put one cake with the meat up, then turn the second cake over it with the meat down. And so on…

Photo of cooking step by step:

As we have already found out, the dish is a thin flatbread stuffed with meat. Therefore, in order for the dish to turn out to be as tasty as possible, the cake should not be too dry, and the filling should be juicy enough.
In the original, Armenians use matsoni for dough - this is a milk drink similar to our kefir, so we will not wrap it up and replace it with our traditional kefir.

As already mentioned in the ideal lamaggio, the filling should be juicy, so a little water is added to the meat and mixed well.
In order for the meat for our filling to turn out to have a good structure, it must be ground in a meat grinder at least several times.
The filling is applied to the cake in a thin layer so that during the baking process it does not spread and does not burn.

How to Serve Lamaggio

It is known that the success of any dish lies not only in preparation, but also in the way it is served to the table. There are a few simple secrets for serving lamaggio:

cakes are much tastier when they are hot;
before serving lamagjo, sprinkle the cakes with lemon juice;
Lahmajo is best washed down with Armenian tan (fermented milk product) - it softens the spicy taste of the dish.

Interesting himself

way of serving food

: lamaggio is not divided into portions, but laid out in a slide on top of each other. So, you need to put the first row with the filling up, and the next layer should be, respectively, the meat down. According to this principle, lay out all the cakes. And from the plate you need to take two lamajos at the same time, so it turns out that the cakes are closed on both sides.

More interesting pizza recipes

Armenian cuisine has existed for thousands of years. Some dishes are prepared in the same way as 1.5 thousand years ago, for example, “kutap” from fish. But about where the recipe for lamajo came from in Armenian cuisine, disputes are still ongoing. It is generally accepted that the Arab conquerors shared it with the Armenians. The Armenians themselves believe that it was Türkiye that adopted from them the way of making lamajo. But in the countries of the Middle East, the recipe for such a dish is really common, although the name sounds a little different: lahmacjo, lahmacun, lagmajo.

Lamaggio resembles Italian pizza in appearance and composition. But it has much fewer calories, which is important for those who monitor their weight. In Yerevan, right on the street, they offer hot, freshly baked bread with meat and Armenian spices.

The dough for lamagjo is unleavened. For him, you need matsun or matsoni - specially fermented cow, sheep, goat milk. You can, of course, replace it with kefir, but this will be a departure from the classic recipe. The same goes for lamb and tail fat. There is no lamb - you can have pork, but again the national flavor and specificity are lost.

Armenia is famous for seasonings, spices and spices. More than 300 herbs and flowers growing in its mountains are used in food as seasonings. The Armenian lamajo recipe is unthinkable without zira, pepper, and garlic. Let's figure out how to cook this dish step by step.

Lamajo recipe

For the test you will need:

• wheat flour of the highest grade - 0.5 kg;
• matsun - 1 cup (200 g);
• water - 0.5 cups;
• salt to taste.

For filling:

• lamb pulp - 0.5 kg;
• fat tail fat - 50 g;
• tomato paste (preferably homemade) - 1.5-2 tbsp. spoons;
• onion - 2 pcs.;
• garlic - 2-3 cloves;
• herbs - cilantro, basil, thyme;
• spices - ground black pepper, zira, chili (you can use a ready-made mixture of spices);
• salt;
• water.

Cooking

The dough for the tortilla is prepared like a regular unleavened dough.

1. Sift the flour on a board or into a bowl.
2. Make a depression in the center.
3. Pour matsun, water, salt into it.
4. Knead a stiff dough like dumplings.
5. Cover, set aside for half an hour.

Now you need to prepare the filling. For this:

1. We turn the meat with lard, onions and garlic through a meat grinder.
2. Add spices, finely chopped herbs, tomato paste to the minced meat, salt well.
3. The filling should be very juicy so that it soaks the cake a little during baking. To obtain the desired consistency, add water and mix well again.
4. Leave the meat to marinate in the seasoning mixture.

Roll out the dough into a roll, cut into pieces. We roll the balls, each roll into a thin cake 12-15 cm in diameter. We put stuffing on it. Bake in the oven at 200°C for 10 minutes. Sprinkle the finished cakes with lemon juice, put them in a hill, filling each other. It is customary to take two Lamaggios at once.

Advice! The video recipe demonstrates the process of its preparation more clearly, especially for novice cooks.

Matsoni Recipe for Lahmajo

To prepare a real Armenian everyday dish lahmajo, you need to use a real Armenian matsun. To prepare matsun or matsoni for lamajo, you need to boil the freshest milk - cow's, goat's, sheep's, you can mix milk of different types. Cool down to 40-45°.

For the first time, self-fermented milk is used as a starter, in other words, a clot of curdled milk. All subsequent times in this capacity use the matsoni obtained the day before. In the cooled milk, poured into a glass, add a tablespoon of sourdough and mix thoroughly. Add the mixture to the rest of the milk, mix.

There are two ways to further fermentation:

1. Wrap milk with sourdough in a blanket, put in a warm place.
2. Put in portioned pots in a warm oven with the door ajar.

Depending on the ripening time, matsun is more sour or not very sour. Sometimes 4-6 hours is enough, but some hold 12 or more. Armenians believe that real matsun is exclusively in the mountains. But if everything is done correctly, it will be no worse at home.

Advice! Classic matsun will not work from store-bought milk.

After ripening, the matsun is placed in the refrigerator. There he will mature. The released whey must be removed, you can leave it for baking bread, for example. After 2-3 days, the mass is placed in a linen bag and the serum is decanted. Ready matsun can be spread on bread, pita bread, used in the preparation of first and second courses. It contains a large number of useful substances, vitamins, lactic acid bacteria. Eating it in food heals the body and prolongs life.

The Armenian Lamajo recipe is not only with meat, but also with cheese as a filling. It is advisable to take salty cheese for Lamajo, in Armenia they use suluguni. In restaurants, several varieties are taken for cooking: suluguni, mozzarella, hard cheeses. Ground black pepper, dried mint, basil are used as seasonings. The dough recipe is the same as for lamajo with meat.

Cheese is cut into cubes, or rubbed on a coarse grater. It is laid on a cake, sprinkled with seasonings, spices, finely chopped herbs, baked in the oven for 8 minutes. Served with melted butter.

Another option is lamaggio with meat and cheese. On top of the meat filling, place pieces of suluguni, greens, bake in the oven.

For those who haven't found

For those, who:

• did not find and could not make matsoni;
• who does not like lamb and has not found tail fat;
• who wants to quickly and from what is at hand.

There are several tips. We replace matsun with kefir, lamb with pork, use the seasonings that we have. You can add 0.5 teaspoon of soda to the dough for softness. We do everything else according to the classic recipe. Pepper well and salt the minced meat, add your favorite seasonings or those that are. We bake, we enjoy. It will still be delicious.

Little tricks and big secrets of Armenian pizza

In cooking, you can not do without various subtleties and nuances. Especially a lot of them in national cuisines. Famous chefs keep many of their "chips" a big secret. For novice housewives, it is sometimes not clear why a dish prepared in strict accordance with the recipe does not taste the same as that of a friend or neighbor.

How to cook lamadjo is quite clear, but there are a few little secrets to achieve a special taste:

1. The cake must be soft, the filling must be very juicy.
2. It is better to cut the fat tail into small pieces along with onions and garlic, and not to twist with meat in a meat grinder.
3. It is advisable to purchase herbs for Lamajo in an Armenian spice shop.
4. The filling should be spread on the cake with a thin layer in order to bake better.
5. Instead of tomato paste, you can add chopped fresh tomatoes and sweet peppers to the minced meat.
6. Minced meat in a meat grinder must be scrolled 2 times.
7. Lamajo is traditionally served with tang, which emphasizes the taste of the dish.

Conclusion

Armenian cuisine has been known since ancient times. Her dishes are delicious and unique. Lamajo occupies a worthy place among Armenian dishes, although it is considered everyday. For almost 14 centuries, it has been eaten with pleasure in Armenia and the Arab world. This dish successfully combines the gifts of generous mountains and the warmth of human hands. Bon appetit everyone!

For true fans of Caucasian cuisine, a step-by-step recipe for Armenian lamajo will be a real find. This unusual dish will also be appreciated by lovers of traditional pizza. For those who have never encountered this unusual dish before, it will certainly be interesting to know what it is.

In fact, the recipe for Armenian lahmajos, despite such an intricate name, involves the preparation of simple flatbreads with meat. Their peculiarity lies in the soft, tender dough and juicy filling. The traditional lamajo recipe involves the use of lamb, but now many chefs add pork to Armenian pizza.

A little about lamaggio

Armenia is considered the birthplace of a dish with an unusual name. However, in reality, the lamagjo recipe originated in the Arab countries, and only a few centuries later it became known to the inhabitants of the Caucasus. The local chefs liked the dish so much that its recipe became an integral part of the Armenian cuisine.

Visually, these are very thin crispy cakes covered with meat filling. As a rule, lamadjos are folded in half, but sometimes they are twisted into rolls. If you want to learn how to cook this dish, a step-by-step lamajo recipe will help you - with a photo, of course. What's more, it's so easy! After all, Armenian cakes are considered one of the easiest to prepare, they are often prepared for a quick snack. And although the cooking process will not take you more than an hour, the quality of the lamajo will not suffer from this, and the result will certainly exceed your expectations.

Dish Features

Any Armenian housewife knows how to cook real lamajos. This dish is not usually served on some solemn occasions, but, despite this, the preparation of "pizza" in Armenia is masterfully approached. Therefore, before proceeding with the manufacture of lamajo, you need to learn about some of the features of the dish.

• The basis for the dough is matsoni - a fermented milk drink made from boiled cow's or goat's milk. Of course, it is simply impossible to find such a product in our stores, so Russian housewives have long been using ordinary kefir to make lamajo.
• The filling for Armenian pizza should be quite liquid. It is this quality of lamaggio that significantly differs from the classic Italian pizza. The filling should be easily spread over the dough and soak it with juice. And to achieve the desired consistency, you need to add a little water to the minced meat and mix it well.
• According to the traditional recipe, it is best to put lamb in lamajo. Although now even native Armenians allow themselves to mix this kind of meat with a small amount of pork.
• In Armenian cuisine, minced meat is often preferred. However, in the case of the preparation of cakes, this is unacceptable, since the filling should be as juicy as possible. The selected meat should be chopped with a meat grinder, and it is advisable to do this several times.
• Spread the filling on the dough in a very thin, neat layer. Otherwise, when baking, the meat may simply spread and burn, which will spoil the cake.
• As a result, the dish should be spicy and spicy. You can achieve this taste with the help of all kinds of oriental spices that are traditionally used in Armenian cuisine: for cakes, you will definitely need cilantro, thyme and purple basil. It is noteworthy that the recipe for Armenian lamajos involves the use of a large number of herbs.
• To make the taste of the dish more delicate, it is served with tan, an Armenian fermented milk drink reminiscent of yogurt. It is prepared from milk, yeast and brackish water.

Required Products

What do you need to make classic Armenian flatbread? With a photo of lamaggio, the recipe will be more informative, but, you see, you still can’t do without a list of products. So, you will need:

• 200 ml of kefir;
• 100 ml of water;
• 500 g wheat flour;
• the same amount of lamb or pork pulp;
• 2 large onions;
• a few cloves of garlic;
• a tablespoon of tomato paste;
• freshly squeezed lemon juice;
• salt and ground pepper;
• a bunch of basil, cilantro and thyme.

Armed with all the necessary ingredients and recommendations, you can proceed to the direct preparation of the Armenian lamadj according to the recipe.

cooking

First of all, sift the flour, taking a sufficiently deep container. Make a small depression in the resulting slide and pour in water, kefir and throw a pinch of salt. Begin to gradually stir in the flour from the center to the edges. After the dough stops sticking, you can work with it with your hands. As a result, the mass should turn out to be quite dense, resembling dough for dumplings. When finished kneading, wrap the lump in a bag and refrigerate.

Second phase

Now you can proceed to the preparation of the filling for future lamajos. Grind the meat with a meat grinder. The juicier the minced meat turns out, the tastier your cakes will come out. Therefore, it is advisable to skip the meat several times through a meat grinder. Peel the vegetables and chop the greens, getting rid of the thick legs. Grind all this with a blender to a puree state. Mix the prepared mixture with minced meat, add a spoonful of tomato paste, a pinch of salt and pepper to taste. Mix well and add a little water if necessary.

After the dough has cooled, it can be removed from the refrigerator. Divide the mass into 7-8 identical parts and form balls out of them. Then sprinkle each piece with flour, flatten and roll thinly. The thickness of the resulting cakes should resemble pita bread - while the dough is slightly translucent.

Baking Armenian flatbread

First of all, preheat the oven to 220 degrees. Grease a baking sheet with vegetable or butter, lay out the prepared lamaggios. The cakes themselves can be of any shape - some craftsmen form peculiar boats from the dough, other chefs prefer simple circles. The shape of the lamaggio can be left to your discretion, although in the homeland, only round cakes are baked. After spreading the dough on a baking sheet, apply the prepared filling in a thin layer, without touching the sides. It takes about 10 minutes to cook the dish in the oven. When the cakes are ready, their edges will become rosy. On this, the process of preparing Armenian lahmajos can be considered complete!

Serving the dish

After reviewing the recipe for Armenian lahmajos (with a photo and a description of the process), you will learn about all the secrets of preparing this extraordinary dish without exception. Now only one question remains: "How to serve meat cakes beautifully?" And in this regard, Armenian cuisine has a few simple recommendations.

• Lamaggio should be served immediately after cooking, while still hot.
• Before putting the dish on the table, sprinkle it with freshly squeezed lemon juice - a few drops are enough.
• It is not customary to serve cakes in portions to each guest - one plate with a slide of lamajo should be placed on the table. And so that the dish does not deteriorate, it must be folded in a certain sequence: the bottom cake should be put with the filling up, and the next one - vice versa, and so on. You need to take lamadjo from the plate in the closed state, that is, two cakes at once.

The final tan recipe

As already mentioned, the spiciness of meat cakes can be softened with the help of tana, with which it is customary to drink lahmajo. However, since it is impossible to find this drink in our area, you can put ordinary unsweetened yogurt instead. Another way out of the situation will be the hand-made preparation of the Armenian tan. To do this, you will need full-fat milk and special bacteria for sourdough. Warm the boiled milk a little and add the appropriate amount of bacteria to it. After the drink begins to ferment, pour some salty water into it and stir. So you get a traditional Armenian tan, which can be safely served with hot meat cakes!