Ritual Christmas porridge - kutya. Kutya from barley groats

Good afternoon, friends, kutya - a traditional dish for both Catholics and Orthodox. presents to your attention a recipe for kutya for Christmas, made from barley.

It is customary to start a meal with Christmas kutya on Christmas Eve, on the eve. Without this treat, the Christmas table is considered inferior. According to the established rituals, each member of the family should taste kutya porridge. It is given to livestock and domestic animals, it will protect them from diseases and bring good health. Ritual porridge is carried to the temple for consecration, and in the absence of such an opportunity, its houses are sprinkled with holy water on their own. It is customary to treat relatives, friends, neighbors with it on Christmas. In a separate plate, kutya is left to the dead ancestors who protect the house (according to beliefs).
This Christmas version of kutya is a sweet ritual porridge with poppy seeds, honey, raisins and other dried fruits, nuts and other additives. Grain symbolizes the symbol of resurrected life, poppy - prosperity, honey - health and well-being. It is believed that the more additives in a dish, the richer and more satisfying it is, the more successful the year will be.
Traditionally, kutya is made from whole grains of wheat, but other cereals are no less popular: pearl barley and rice. In this article, I propose to get acquainted with simple recipe delicious kutya- , with poppy seeds, honey, raisins and other dried fruits. A culinary specialist of any level will cope with this recipe, because. technologically, kutya is very simple and does not require complex products, especially since step by step photos will accompany the entire cooking process from start to finish.

Pearl barley - 100 g
Dried fruits (raisins, prunes, dried apricots, etc.) - 100-150 g
Honey - 2-3 tbsp. l.
Poppy - 30-50 g

How to cook Christmas porridge - kutya

1. Wash dried fruits and steam with boiling water. Leave them to infuse for 15 minutes so that they become soft and juicy. IN this recipe used: prunes, dried apricots and raisins. But you can add others if you like. dried berries taste. If there are bones in the prunes, then remove them first.

2. After dried fruits, dry with a paper towel and cut into medium-sized pieces.

3. Steam the poppy with boiling water and leave it under the lid for 10 minutes. Drain the water and repeat the same procedure three times.

4. After we grind it in a mortar (you can rub it with a blender) until a white liquid appears.

5. Wash pearl barley and fill it with water. Leave for 1-2 hours to swell and increase in size.

6. Put the grits in a sieve, rinse and fill with fresh water, the amount of which should be 2 times more.

7. Let's cook the porridge after boiling over low heat for about 1 hour. When it absorbs all the water and becomes soft, it is considered that the barley is ready. The basis of ritual porridge should be soft, so it is better to overexpose it on the stove than to remove it ahead of time.
Add crushed poppy seeds to the finished pearl barley.

8. Next we put honey.

9. Then add chopped dried fruits.

At will, kutia can be seasoned with other products, such as:

• fried walnuts,
• candied fruit,
• coconut,
• marmalade,
• spices,
• jam and other flavorings.

Fresh fruits are rarely used, because with long-term storage they will ferment and spoil the porridge. If you decide to include fresh fruits then add them before meals. Then they will retain their taste and texture.

10. Mix the products. Let's try the taste of barley porridge and, if necessary, you can add more honey if there is not enough sweetness.

11. Kutya is usually consumed chilled. But if you are used to eating porridge warm, you can warm it up in the microwave.

Bon appetit! Merry Christmas everyone!

Video recipe for kutya for Christmas from pearl barley

All illustrations for this article are taken from open Internet sources.

“It was on Christmas Eve. White snow lay motionless in the yard. It was getting dark, warm light streamed from the windows of the living room and kitchen. The Christmas table was laid in the house. Soon the whole family will be assembled.

The father of the dwarf family and his middle daughter Polka hid in the hayloft. Through holes cut in the wall by a woodpecker, they watched the worker Oscar gather firewood.
- Look how cautious he is, afraid to stain his festive costume. Yes, you rarely see him in a suit, - said the father.
“Look, the master is returning from the station with a sleigh full of relatives,” said Polka. - So, soon all the children will come to the stable to feed the horses for Christmas dinner, city guests love this business.
“Yes, and then, I suppose, they will want to bring Christmas porridge to the dwarf,” the father grinned into his beard.
“You only have porridge on your mind,” said Polka. - And what is special about it? Mom cooks this herself.
“Maybe so,” said the father. “But it’s not about the porridge itself. People offer it to the dwarf as a sign of respect. This means that they are grateful to him for everything he has done for them, and do not want to quarrel with him. An evil gnome brings misfortune and misfortune to people. And if I'm not respected, I can get angry. You see, baby, when you amaze yourself with overwork all year...
The Pole giggled.
- You said "amazing", but you should say "exhausting".
The father tried to assume importance, but nothing came of it.
“You have no shame, no conscience,” he sighed. “Stop making fun of the old man. Today we don't have time for all sorts of nonsense.
The dwarf grabbed his daughter by the hands, and they began to dance.
"Today is Christmas, we'll go downstairs and have Christmas dinner too..."

Sven Nurdqvist. "Christmas porridge"(translated from Swedish by K. Kovalenko)

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For the celebration of the winter solstice, and then for Christmas different nations cooked cereals. For example, among the Slavs, such a dish was and remains kutya / sochivo (in different regions under these names could be different dishes), in the territory of present-day Great Britain - a kind of oatmeal or some other porridge, to which they could add different ingredients, incl. meat. One of the famous british food is Frumenty, it looks like liquid porridge from grain.

There is a category of dishes that English language are called "porridge": sometimes it's not quite porridge in the sense we are used to, but, as it were, porridge too. As far as I know, the word "porridge" exists only among the Lithuanians ("košė"), among the Slavs and also among the Hungarians, who once settled next to them.

Known french dish Boudin blanc ("white pudding") has its origins in the Middle Ages, when parishioners warmed up with milk porridge after attending midnight mass on Christmas Eve. Bread, fat, starchy ingredients, as well as ham or white meat could also be added to this porridge. I think that the history of this porridge also begins much earlier. From about the 17th century, Boudin blanc took the form of sausages, which the French now, incl. also served at Christmas. They may include white meat, fish, cream, bread crumbs, spices, milk.

A similar custom of cooking porridge for Christmas is still preserved in Scandinavian families (now it is most often rice porrige). The owners prepare porridge not only for themselves, but also for the dwarves: they put it on the porch, on the windowsill, they bring it right into the barn or barn.

***** ***** *****

"Gnomes do not eat meat, so they do not have a Christmas ham. But they cook a stew from various herbs, berries and mushrooms that they managed to gather in a year - from the first bud of a mother and stepmother to the last frozen russula. They bake bread from four grains cereals, and their beer is unusual: the younger the one who drinks it, the weaker and sweeter it is, the older - the stronger and bitter. Therefore, little Pilka, who is barely four years old, drinks beer no less than her old grandfather, who is already four hundred and twenty-seven years old." ( "Christmas porridge")"

Illustration for this tale.

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Some peoples have preserved ancient legends that such a ritual porridge was mixed by the gods from all the good and important that was on earth. These customs are associated with the symbolism of the grain.

Grain is a divine gift, symbolizing an uninterrupted life cycle, the continuation of life after death.

“Truly, truly, I say to you, if a grain of wheat that falls into the ground does not die, it will remain alone; but if it dies, it will bear much fruit.” (Gospel of John 12:24)

Grain also personifies abundance, wealth, fertility. This symbolism applies not only to nature, but also to man: the grain is the seed. The main deities of almost all peoples were depicted in oral traditions and in material art with ears of corn or sheaves. We remember that these same deities were associated with the Sun, the main luminary.

The pagan holidays of the summer and winter solstice, which preceded Christianity, were also associated with these symbols. On the days of the summer solstice (June; Ivan Kupala; Kupala), they not only burned mystical fires, went to the water to let wreaths, looked for a flower of happiness in the forest and thought about love. These days it was customary to water gardens, and special rituals were held in the fields in order to harvest a rich harvest by autumn.

On the days of the winter solstice (December), from this harvest they prepared special dishes and presented to the gods in the hope that next year was just as rich and fruitful in every sense. Since the deities were identified with the forces of nature, from here appeared sacred trees and the celebration of the new year began (see my article).

Now, I think, it is clear why the same kutya, for example, is incl. And memorial dish. It is also prepared on the days of commemoration of the ancestors, and then put out for them on the window. And more interesting: in Scandinavia and Finland, for example, there is a custom to visit the graves of loved ones at Christmas.

All Saints' Day (Halloween) was once celebrated as a modern New Year, i.e. it was the boundary not only between different worlds but also between the old and the new year.

Gnomes are Scandinavian Christmas givers. According to some ideas, gnomes are divided into ordinary (home, barn, forest, etc.) and Christmas ones. The fairy tale I quoted also talks about this. And I highly advise those who are interested in these mythological images to watch the film "Magic Silver". A wonderful modern film that I once talked about. If I have a free minute, I will review it myself (see).

In some regions, the tradition of Christmas porridge as it is is still maintained, in other regions, porridge or a similar cereal dish has been transformed over time into something else ( different types pastries, pudding, fruitcake/cake, casserole or similar). By the way, the tradition of leaving cookies for Santa... don't you think it has the same roots? After all, baking is made from ground grain, from flour.

Porridge dishes, dishes with porridge, dishes that look like porridge, as well as dishes that have turned from porridge into something else over time

After baptism, they were given honey as a symbol of the sweetness of spiritual gifts. Now steamed raisins and nuts (most often walnuts) are added to Christmas kutya. Some cook with all sorts of dried fruits and even chocolate. The second is publishing the simplest recipe for Christmas kutya, which everyone can cook at home. For cooking, you have to do just a couple simple actions. So, the recipe for wheat kutya with candied fruits.

Kutia for Christmas from wheat with candied fruit

Main christmas dish kutya should always be on family table. It is made from wheat grains, raisins, poppy seeds, nuts are added there and be sure to pour honey over it.

What we need:

2 cups wheat
50 g candied fruits
½ cup walnuts
honey

Kutya for Christmas from wheat with candied fruit: how to cook

1. Wash the wheat. Boil in water over low heat for 2 hours. In 4 tbsp. l. water stir honey to taste, pour wheat honey syrup for 30 min. Chop nuts a little and fry. Add candied fruits, nuts to wheat and mix well.

Christmas wheat kutya with raisins

• 250 g wheat grains,
• 150 g seedless raisins,
• 150 g chopped fig fruits,
• 100 g honey.

Cooking: Boil wheat grains until softened, but so that they remain intact. Rinse raisins and figs well, pour cold boiled water and let it swell. Then combine everything, add honey and mix.

Rice kutya for Christmas

Ingredients:

• 250 g rice
• 100 g raisins,
• 100 g almonds
• sugar,
• cinnamon,

Preparation: Rinse the rice, add water and cook until tender, without stirring. Throw in a colander and rinse with boiled cold water. Scald the almonds and raisins with boiling water, chop the almonds a little. Dissolve sugar in a small amount of water, mix rice, almonds, cinnamon, raisins and pour over sugar syrup.

Kutya Christmas barley

• 200 g pearl barley,
• 150 g poppy,
• 50 g shelled nuts
• 50 g raisins,
• honey and sugar to taste
• 1/2 cup cream.

Cooking: pearl barley rinse, pour water in a ratio of 1 to 3 and cook until tender. Strain and chill. Poppy brew with boiling water and cook until it is easy to rub between the fingers. Carefully drain the poppy (you can use a sieve) and twist through a meat grinder. Steam raisins with boiling water. Poppy mix with pearl barley, add chopped nuts, raisins, honey and sugar to taste. Mix everything with cream.

Kutya for Christmas from barley groats with poppy seeds

Ingredients:

• 2 glasses barley groats,
• 3 liters of water
• 1 a glass of milk,
• 0.5 - 1 glass of poppy,
• 2-3 tbsp. spoons of honey,
• 2 tbsp. spoons of cranberry or currant jam.

Preparation: Rinse the cereal, boil in water over moderate heat, removing the foam. As soon as the cereal begins to secrete mucus, excess water drain, transfer the porridge to another bowl, add milk and cook until the cereal is ready, stirring all the time. Mack pour it boiling water, leave for 5 minutes, then drain the water, rinse the poppy seeds, pour boiling water again and, as soon as droplets of fat begin to appear on the surface of the water, immediately drain it.

Grind the steamed poppy in a mortar, adding 1 teaspoon of boiling water to 1 tbsp. poppy spoon. Mix prepared poppy seeds with porridge, add honey and, stirring constantly, heat over low heat for 5-7 minutes. Then remove the porridge from the heat and season with jam.

Best for Christmas, Merry Christmas!

If you carefully study the history of the holiday from the point of view of cooking, it turns out that the hostesses prepared two tables: lenten for Christmas Eve and plentifully fast for Christmas morning.

On Christmas night from January 6 to 7, a festive Divine Liturgy is celebrated. On the very day of the Christmas holiday, believers break their fast (they do not eat lean, but fast food). The twelve following days after Christmas are called holy days, or Christmas time. This is probably why, according to legend, there should be 12 dishes on the Christmas table. Some of them passed to the morning of January 7 from Christmas Eve - these are kutya and zvar. The rest, modest, dishes were waiting in the wings.

Christmas Eve: First Star

The holiday begins on the evening of January 6 - Christmas Eve comes. According to church rules and folk tradition, on this day they do not eat until the first star appears in the sky - in remembrance of the Bethlehem star, which showed the Magi the way to the place of the Nativity of Christ.

They also say that Christmas is not celebrated alone - this family celebration. It was customary to gather either with parents or with the whole big family the eldest in the family. Before the first star, the hostess had to prepare several lenten obligatory Christmas dishes. The main items in this menu were kutya, or sochivo, and vzvar (uzvar).

Sochivo, or Kutya

An indispensable dish, without which pre-revolutionary Russia Neither Christmas nor Easter was celebrated. Christmas Eve - from Sochiva, or Kuteinik - from Kutia, as they called the day before Christmas. And all of it passed in anticipation of the miracle of birth. It was believed that the richer and tastier the sochivo, the more fruitful the next year would be.

The products from which kutya was prepared were endowed with special significance: grain was considered a symbol of resurrection to life, honey was a symbol of health and a prosperous (sweet) life, and poppy promised prosperity in the family.

Pre-revolutionary writer A.A. Korinfsky wrote: “In the evening, on the eve of the Nativity of Christ, Russian people who invariably adhere to the old pious customs do not break the fast: according to the Church Charter, only sochivo is allowed to eat at this time. coming from November 15 (28) until the cheerful joyful Christmas time.

However, wheat was not always the basis of kutya. In the southern regions of Russia, rice was more often cooked. However, nuts, honey and dried fruits remained an unchanged part of the recipe.

Traditional Sochi Recipe
wheat grains - one glass,
poppy - 100 g,
peeled walnuts, hazelnuts, cashews - 100 g,
honey - 3 tablespoons,
dried fruits.

Crush the grains in a wooden mortar, adding a little warm water so that the wheat shell comes off. Then the kernel must be separated from the husk, sifted and washed. Cook crumbly lean porridge on the water, adding 2-3 cups of water to the cereal.

Grind the poppy seeds until poppy milk is obtained, add honey to it, mix and put in wheat porridge. At the very end, add crushed nuts and dried fruits steamed with boiling water.

Rice juice

rice - 1 cup,
raisins - 50 g,
prunes - 50 g,
dried apricots - 50 g,
almonds or walnuts - 50 g,
honey - three tablespoons

Rinse rice, cover with cold water and bring to a boil. Drain in a colander and rinse again with cold water. Then pour 1.5 cups cold water and cook until tender without removing the lid. Steam in hot water dried fruits (15-20 minutes).

Cut prunes and dried apricots. Crush the almonds. If all the water has not boiled away, it should be drained, the rice should be cooled. Add dried fruits, honey and nuts to the rice.

blast

Second obligatory dish christmas table. Prepared a broth from dried fruits but honey was added instead of sugar. The most popular was apple broth with the addition of dry or soaked berries cranberries, cranberries or raspberries.

In the south of Russia, smoked pear was always added to the drink. Mint, oregano, currant leaf, thyme and other fragrant herbs are often added. It is not necessary to boil the broth: it is enough to pour fruit with boiling water and leave to infuse. A thermos is perfect for this purpose. Often juicy is diluted with a boil and eaten in the form of liquid sweet porridge.

Lean pancakes

Christmas Eve was not complete without Lenten dishes. But if kutya and vzvar were obligatory, then pancakes, vinaigrette, cabbage rolls, fish pies, vegetable stews or kashi remained welcome guests on the last day of fasting. Among this menu, pancakes were common. They wonderfully complemented boiled fish or caviar, jam or honey. Only they were made without milk and butter. For example, on potato broth or mineral water.

The vinaigrette

Lenten vinaigrette or with herring was served very often on Christmas Eve. The recipe is simple, but the dish turns out tasty and inexpensive, which made it possible to cook it in poor families. And in the houses of the wealthy, sturgeon or white fish could be added to the Christmas vinaigrette.

Christmas goose with sauerkraut

Christmas: a plentiful break

When the night passes and after the service the family returns to the house, the long-awaited Christmas holiday comes. The post is left behind, and on the table appear meat dishes, milk and butter pies, oily fish and sumptuous desserts.

It was believed that a baked goose (or other bird) and pork dishes should be an indispensable attribute of the Christmas meal. Of course, on the eve of Christmas, millions of geese, ducks, turkeys and chickens were brought to the country's bazaars.

"Christmas in Moscow was felt for a long time - a cheerful, business hustle. They just started talking in Filippovka, on November 14, for the Christmas post, and at the freight stations, especially in Rogozhskaya, geese cackle day and night - "goose trains", to Germany: before it was, to the glaciers-wagons, a live load. Do not believe it - hundreds of trains! A goose went through Moscow - from Kozlov, Tambov, Kursk, Saratov, Samara ... I don’t remember Poltava, Poland, Lithuania, Volyn: the paths from there are different. And the duck , and a chicken, and a turkey, and a black grouse ... capercaillie and hazel grouse, bacon-brisket, and ... - what the soul only requires for Christmas, "wrote Ivan Shmelev.

little goose,
cabbage - 800 g,
bulbs - 4 pcs.,
cumin - 0.5 tbsp.,
salt,
oil.

If the carcass is frozen, let the goose lie down in the refrigerator for a day. Then wash the goose, rub it inside and out with salt and cumin. If possible, you can boil the goose in red wine - whole, about 40 minutes. Wine will give the bird softness.

Stew sauerkraut with oil and onions in a saucepan, covered. Stuff the goose with this cabbage and fry on a baking sheet, pouring a little broth on it and pouring it over the goose. Then goose fat will be melted - you will water it.

Cold pig with horseradish

Pig on the table

Not less than traditional product there was pork on the Christmas table. According to legend, when Jesus was born, in the manger all the animals joyfully met the divine baby - except for the pig. She grunted annoyingly and prevented the baby from sleeping. That is why, as a punishment, the pig became an indispensable dish of the Christmas table.

Even during Lent, they began to bring to the capitals, to central fairs, whole carts with pork - there were huge carcasses, and barrels of corned beef, and suckling pigs. “Bad, bad, but two or three carcasses of pork are necessary, and black pigs, fry with porridge, three dozen, and white pigs, for aspic, moloshnichki, two dozen, so that there is enough for plots,” wrote Ivan Shmelev in “The Summer of the Lord”.

Many dishes were prepared from pork, but in every wealthy house the table was decorated with suckling pig with porridge or cold with horseradish.

Recipe from Ekaterina Avdeeva's book "Handbook of Russian experienced hostess"simple: boil the whole pig in salt water With fragrant herbs- thyme, dill - and onions. Then cut into pieces and pour horseradish with sour cream. Serve cold.

pork belly, stuffed with cabbage and apples

In the old days, porridge was served with pork feet, but you can make pork belly with cabbage and apples for buckwheat porridge. It will turn out very juicy.

Pork belly - 800 g,
cabbage - 400 g,
apples - 5 pcs.,
butter- 1 tbsp.,
bulb - 1 pc.,
salt and pepper.

Chop fresh cabbage, salt, squeeze. Add finely chopped cabbage sour apples, oil, mix. pork belly wash, chop the bones in several places, cut a large hole between the bones and meat with a knife.

Put the prepared minced meat there, sew it up, place it on a frying pan or baking sheet, sprinkle with finely chopped onions, add 3 tablespoons of water and fry in an oven heated to 200 ° C until cooked. Serve with crumbly buckwheat porridge.

Jellied pig and rooster

Rinse the knuckle and legs of the piglet well and cut into pieces. Put in a saucepan, pour cold water so that it covers the meat by a few centimeters, boil and remove the foam. After an hour, add the carcass of the rooster.

Boil aspic over very low heat for 6-8 hours, so that the water boils away to half the volume. 20 minutes before the end of cooking, add to the broth Bay leaf, peppercorns and salt to taste. Remove the meat from the broth, separate from the bones and cut into pieces. Strain the broth. Pour chopped garlic on the bottom of the dish, put the meat, pour the broth, mix gently with a spoon and refrigerate until it hardens.

rye pie with fish

For test:
rye flour - 1 cup,
wheat flour - 1 cup,
milk - 1 glass,
dry yeast - 1 tsp,
sugar - 2 tsp,
salt - 1 tsp,
vegetable oil - 1 tbsp. l.

For filling:
pikeperch fillet - 500 g,
mussels, peeled - 200 g,
onion - 1 pc.,
carrots - 1 pc.,
brine pickles- 500 ml,
vegetable oil- 2 tablespoons,
dill - 1 bunch,
salt and white pepper taste.

We knead the dough, for which 1 tsp. dry yeast pour 5 tsp. warm water, let stand for swelling for 10-15 minutes. Sifting wheat and rye flour, pour in vegetable oil, milk room temperature, add sugar and salt, add yeast, knead.

Let the dough rise in a warm place. The dough should rise twice and be folded twice. We divide it into 2 parts.

For filling in cucumber pickle boil the mussels and fish, put them in a colander. Peel and finely chop the onion and carrot. In a frying pan, fry vegetables with fish and mussels. Let's salt and pepper. Turn off, add chopped dill. In a baking sheet we will form a cake, spread the top egg yolk and bake for 50 minutes at 170°C.

ginger pie

butter - 100 g + another piece for lubrication,
dark unrefined cane sugar- 100 g,
flour with baking powder - 175 g,
ground ginger - 4 tsp,
light molasses - 175 g,
ginger wine - 3 tablespoons,
eggs of any size, can be beaten - 2 pcs.,
finely grated fresh ginger the size of a hazelnut
finely chopped canned ginger- 150 g,
powdered sugar - 75 g,
ginger root for decoration - 1 pc.

Preheat oven to 160°C, grease a 23 cm baking dish. Beat butter and sugar with a pinch of salt until the mixture is fluffy. Sift flour and ground ginger together.

Pour in light molasses (for convenience, use a spoon pre-lubricated with oil and a silicone kitchen spatula), 1 tbsp. wine and mix everything together. Beat in the eggs one at a time, then gradually add the flour.

Mix everything with fresh and canned ginger. Spoon the resulting mixture into a baking dish. Smooth the surface and bake for about 50-60 minutes until the surface wooden skewer, lowered into the middle of the pie, the dough will not stick. Leave the cake to cool in the mold. After the cake has cooled completely, make the frosting by mixing powdered sugar and the remaining ginger wine, and drizzle over the top of the pie. Cut the ginger root into thin pieces and decorate the cake.

Russian custard soufflé

any berries - 500 g,
water - ½ cup,
sugar - 2 cups,
egg whites - 5 pcs.

Make a puree from the berries, add water and boil. Add sugar (about the same amount as the puree). Beat egg whites into stiff foam. Add to puree. Put the puree in baking dishes, put for 30 minutes in an oven heated to 170 degrees.

Bon appetit!

It's time to talk about cooking one of the traditional Christmas Eve dishes. It is with him that the Orthodox begin the meal on Christmas Eve and finish it with him, remembering the dead and exchanging wishes. Christmas kutia, no matter what it is made of (wheat, rice, pearl barley, lentils), should be meatless dish, since the fast lasts until the holiday itself.

The process of its preparation is simple, but there are a lot of nuances that you need to know and remember - the presented recipe will tell about this. After all, the right and rich taste ritual dish is considered a guarantee of well-being and high prosperity of the family.

Each hostess, thinking over the menu for Christmas Eve, meticulously selects her most best recipes. And although there are a lot of options for preparing Christmas kutia, any of them are based on grain and honey, symbolizing eternal life and health.

If desired, nuts, poppy seeds, dried fruits, raisins or even marmalade and frozen berries are added to them. The dish turns out to be sweet and high-calorie, but tradition is tradition, and no matter how you follow your figure, you simply must try at least a spoon!

Ritual kutya "Rich"

Ingredients

• Wheat (grains) - 1 cup + -
• - 2.5 cups + -
• - 3 tbsp. l. + -
• - 4 tbsp. l. + -
• Poppy - 100 g + -
• Walnuts (peeled)- 100 g + -
• Raisins (pitted)- 100 g + -
• Dried fruits (plums, apricots, pears and apples)- 150 g + -

Step by step cooking Christmas kutya

Kutya from whole wheat grains is especially fragrant, crumbly and healthy.

The first step is to prepare the wheat

• We sort through the grains, separating the bad from the good. To do this, pour them into a shallow bowl and select low-quality grains from there one at a time.
• We thoroughly wash the sorted wheat, fill it with water and leave it for at least 12 hours.

Since kutya is traditionally prepared for the evening of Christmas Eve, it is possible to soak the grains overnight.

• By morning, the wheat will swell and become not so hard, which will reduce its cooking time by about half. WITH
• pour the unabsorbed water from the dishes with grain, transfer it to a deep thick-walled pan and fill it with fresh water, observing the proportion - 1: 2.5.

We put the pan on the fire and quickly bring to a boil, after which we reduce the fire as much as possible and cook the wheat for another two hours until fully cooked.

* Advice from Cook
An ideal dish for cooking wheat is a cast-iron cauldron, in which it will turn out crumbly and definitely will not burn.

How to cook barley (barley porridge) on water correctly and how long

In old times barley porridge served to royal table. In men, it is associated with a tasteless army mess. We offer an algorithm for how to cook pearl barley in order to save it beneficial features and make the porridge fluffy.

Let's start cooking

• We wash the dried fruits, put them in a saucepan and fill with water so that it completely covers the fruits.
• On big fire Bring the water to a boil and cook for another 20 minutes over low heat.
• A couple of minutes before turning off, add 2 tablespoons of sugar.

* Advice from Cook
To make the taste of the uzvar more intense and bright, you need to let it brew for 4 hours. This must be taken into account and begin to “brew” dried fruits on the morning of January 6th.

• After insisting, we separate the uzvar from dried fruits, filtering it through a sieve.
• Dried fruits cut into small pieces and put it aside, we will return to them a little later.
• Raisins for kutya choose pitted. We separate the ponytails from the raisins, rinse with cold water and pour boiling water over. After half an hour, drain the water and squeeze the berry with your hands. Thanks to steaming, the raisins swell and become soft and juicy.
• Steam poppy seeds with boiling water and leave to cool for about half an hour. Drain the water, add 2 tablespoons of sugar to the poppy seeds and pass it through a meat grinder. If you do not want to mess with a meat grinder, you can grind poppy seeds with a blender.

We extract walnuts from the shell and chop the kernels

You can do this with a blender, you just need to make sure that the nuts do not turn into crumbs. If there is no blender, then you can chop the nuts by hand. To do this, we translate them into plastic bag, but do not tie it, as it is necessary that the air in the process come out freely.

Then we pass several times over the package with a rolling pin until the nuts are crushed into pieces of the required size.

It's time to combine the prepared ingredients

We need a large deep container. We spread the already cooled wheat, raisins, poppy seeds, nuts and pieces of dried fruits into it. Fill with knots and add honey. We mix everything thoroughly.

* Advice from Cook
If you want the kutia to turn out to be more liquid or sweeter, feel free to add more uzvar or honey to it to your taste.

When calculating the amount of Christmas porridge that you plan to cook, do not forget that you cannot store it for a long time, because honey, combined with other ingredients, can ferment after a while.

Kutya "Rich" can be served in a large beautiful dish. Traditionally, it is decorated with fruits, for example, mandarin slices, berries - raspberries and cranberries, or marmalade. And you can lay out kutya in bowls and decorate already in portions for each guest.

Both types of presentation are good in their own way. But if you want your Christmas kutia to make a special impression, then it is better to serve it in a wide and deep dish. And before putting the dish on the table, put a star formed from boiled rice on top. It will personify the Star of Bethlehem - a symbol of the Nativity of Christ. And a meal served like this original way, will surely bring good luck to your family and will be remembered by everyone for a long time!