Tatar balish - step-by-step recipes with photos. Balish with meat and potatoes

Today we want to tell you how to properly cook balish with meat and potatoes. A step-by-step recipe for this famous Tatar dish with a detailed description and photo can be found in this article.

This large covered pie is traditionally considered a national holiday dish. However, Tatar housewives prepare it on weekdays for guests or their family. Delicious baked goods can replace a full lunch, a hearty dinner or breakfast. Read how to cook zur balish with meat and potatoes. The recipe is as follows:

First, let's prepare the dough. To do this, pour one glass of curdled milk into a deep bowl, add 100 grams of butter, 100 grams of refined sunflower oil, one egg and flour (enough to make an elastic dough). Knead the base for the pie, gather it into a ball, place it on the table and cover with a bowl. The dough should rest for half an hour.
To prepare the filling, cut the peeled potatoes and meat (lamb, beef, chicken or turkey) into cubes. Chop the onion with a knife and mix with the rest of the ingredients. Don't forget to salt the filling and season it with ground pepper.
Divide the dough into two parts. Roll out most of it into a circle and place it in a frying pan. The workpiece should fit tightly to the bottom and sides of the dish, and its edges should hang down by 10-15 centimeters.
Place the filling and pinch the edges of the dough closer to the center, leaving a round hole in the middle.
Roll out the second part of the dough, place it in the center and connect its edges to the base. To do this, pinch them together in a “pigtail”. Place a small dough ball in the center of the lid.
Place the balish in the preheated oven and cook for ten minutes at maximum heat. After this, the heat should be reduced and the cake should be left in the oven for two or three hours.

When the aroma of fresh baked goods notifies you that the balish is ready, you should take it out, remove the bun and check the readiness of the filling. If the potatoes are still raw, then add a glass of boiling water inside the pie, close the hole with a kolobok and put the pie back in the oven. When the balish is ready, let it sit in the oven, then cut off the lid with a knife and serve the dish.

Vak balish with meat and potatoes. Step-by-step recipe with photos

The name of this delicious pastry can be translated from the Tatar language as “small pie.” Read how to cook vak balish with meat and potatoes using kefir:

Knead the dough from one egg, one glass of low-fat kefir, 100 grams of soft butter, 100 grams of sunflower oil (unflavored) and salt. At the end add enough flour to make a soft and sticky dough. Leave the finished product to rest under the bowl while you work on the filling.
Cut the meat, peeled potatoes and onions into very small cubes. If you wish, you can use minced meat instead of a whole piece of meat. Salt and pepper should be added to the filling immediately before cooking. Otherwise, the potatoes will yield juice and the dough will be spoiled.
Divide the dough into balls (about 80 grams) and roll it out into round shapes. Place the filling (about 100 grams) in the middle and pinch the edges of the dough towards the center, leaving a small hole.
Place the pies on a baking sheet lined with baking paper, and then brush them with vegetable oil or egg. Bake the balishi in the oven for 30 to 50 minutes, depending on the type of meat.

Ready baked goods can be served with chicken broth or hot tea.

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Vak balish (small pies with meat and potatoes).

“Vak balish” is a traditional Tatar dish, literally translated “small pie” (vak - small, balish - pie). You will need: Flour - 700 gr., Butter - 250 gr., Kefir - 500 ml., Tea soda - 1 tsp., Salt - 1 tsp. Filling: Beef (pulp) - 0.5 kg, Potatoes (medium) - 7 pcs., Onions - 3 pcs., Salt, ground black pepper - to taste For the broth: Water - 300 ml., Butter - 50 gr. Salt - 1/3 tsp. For greasing pies - 1 egg. How to cook:

1. Pour 700 g into a cup. flour. Grate cold butter on a grater. Grind the butter with flour until crumbly. Salt. Stir 1 tsp in kefir. soda so that the kefir boils and sizzles, and pour it into a cup with flour. Knead the dough. The dough should not be sticky and soft, like an earlobe. Place the finished dough in a food bag and leave to rest for about twenty minutes. I knead the dough in a kitchen machine, with the “hook” attachment 2. While the dough is “resting”, let’s make the filling. Cut the beef and potatoes into cubes, 1 cm wide. I cut them in a food processor with a cube attachment, it’s very fast and makes the work much easier. Finely chop the onion. Mix meat, potatoes, onions, salt and pepper to taste. The filling is ready.

3. Let's start making pies. Knead the dough with your hands again and divide into two equal parts. Place one part in a bag (so that the dough does not dry out while we work with the first part). Divide the first part of the dough into 9 identical pieces, rolling them into balls. Roll out a piece of dough into a round cake, the size of a saucer. Place the filling in the middle of the dough, raise the edges of the dough to the top and pinch it in a circle, leaving a hole in the middle - we need it in order to pour the broth into it. We do the same with the second part of the dough. 4. Place the pies on a baking sheet lined with baking paper, brush with beaten egg and place in a preheated oven at 180 degrees. for 20 minutes. Then, remove from the oven, pour 1-1.5 tbsp into the hole of each pie. broth, put back in the oven and bake for another 40 minutes.

5. For the broth: pour 300 ml into a saucepan. water, add 50 gr. butter, salt, bring to a boil, simmer for 1-2 minutes and remove from heat. (if you have chicken or beef broth, you can use it) Serve Wak-balish hot, as an independent dish, you can serve it with chicken broth, or just with sweet tea. It’s good to take with you to work for lunch, and give to children at school for a snack. Extraordinarily tasty, bon appetit!)) Store in the refrigerator in a closed cup, it will keep quietly for 3-4 days, you can warm it up in the microwave before eating, or you can eat it cold - it’s also delicious!) PS Divide the dough into 2 parts at once (each 9 pieces in each), and I also visually divide the filling into 2 equal parts, and spread each part evenly onto 9 pies, so in each pie we get the same amount of filling, and no leftovers. And everything fits on two baking sheets at once, which I bake together. Bon appetit!

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Balish with meat and potatoes in a slow cooker

In ancient times, this traditional dish was cooked in an oven, but in modern kitchens we can make some changes to this delicate process. How to cook balish with meat and potatoes in a slow cooker? Read the step-by-step recipe below:

Knead a dense dough from 500 grams of flour, one egg, one glass of kefir, salt and 100 grams of butter.
For the filling, cut into cubes seven peeled potatoes, 500 grams of meat and two onions. Place the prepared products in a deep plate, add salt and pepper to taste and stir. Transfer the filling to the pan and simmer together until half cooked.
Grease the multicooker bowl with oil.
Divide the dough into two unequal parts. Roll out the larger one and place it in the slow cooker, leaving the edges hanging down freely. Place the filling and pinch the edges.
Roll out the second part of the dough, cover the middle of the pie with it and connect the edges. Make several punctures on the lid with a fork.
Cook the pie in the “Bake” mode for 90 minutes. After this, the balish should be turned over and cooked for another 20 minutes.

Vak balish with minced meat

To quickly prepare delicious Tatar pies and please your loved ones with them, you can use minced meat for the filling. How to quickly bake balish with meat and potatoes? A step-by-step recipe will help with this:

Prepare yeast dough according to your favorite recipe or buy ready-made dough at the store.
For the filling, peel and dice six potatoes. Grind three onions using a blender. Mix the products with minced meat (500 grams will be enough). Salt and add ground pepper.
Divide the dough into small balls and make round pieces out of them.
Place the filling in the center of each circle and pinch the edges, leaving a small hole in the center.

Bake the pies in a preheated oven and then serve hot with tea.

Unleavened dough balish with chicken

If you have never tried this treat, try cooking balish with meat and potatoes with us. The step-by-step recipe is as follows:

Prepare unleavened dough (like dumplings), cover it with film and leave to rest for 20 or 30 minutes.
For the filling, we will need to take one chicken fillet and cut the meat into large pieces.
Peel four onions and finely chop. Cut two kilograms of peeled potatoes into cubes.
Combine the meat and vegetables, salt and pepper them and add a bay leaf.
Form two round pieces from the dough and assemble a large pie in a frying pan as described above.

Cook the dish for an hour and a half in a preheated oven.

Tatar balish - photo

Today, on the Internet you can find simply a huge number of recipes for large and small Tatar balish pies, the very sight of which evokes an indescribable desire to try to make such a masterpiece with your own hands.

Tatar balish is a national dish that has long become a cultural heritage and calling card of the country. It is not difficult to prepare such a culinary masterpiece in your kitchen; the main thing is to strictly follow all the rules of Tatar cuisine.

How to serve zur balish

Properly preparing balish with meat and potatoes in the oven is only half the battle. It is very important to serve it to guests correctly. Therefore, read the instructions and act:

When the balish has cooled sufficiently, remove it from the oven and cut off the top crust.
Place the filling on plates and serve with part of the pie “lid”.
This dish is eaten with forks, helping with the crust.
After the filling is finished, the most delicious part should be divided among everyone - the bottom of the pie, soaked in broth, fats and juice. In the old days, this part was treated to the most honored guest.

Balish with meat and potatoes step by step recipe

Incredibly juicy, tasty and aromatic pies - Tatar vak balish. They somewhat remind me of meat and potatoes in pots, but at the same time, the pot is edible. Not only edible, but also very tasty! It seems that preparing wak balish is very difficult, but this is not at all the case. The dough is prepared in literally 5 minutes, the filling in ten. The pies are also easy to form. In general, be sure to prepare it - you won’t regret it!

Never skip the point where you need to take out the pies and pour water or broth into them. If you don’t do this, you will end up with ordinary baked goods, and not a juicy wak balish!

Ingredients

Flour – 350 g
Butter – 100 g
Kefir – 250 ml
Soda – 0.5 tsp.
Salt – 0.5 tsp. + in filling to taste
Meat – 0.3 kg
Potatoes – 0.4 kg
Onion – 1 pc.
Egg – 1 pc.
Spices, pepper - to taste

Step-by-step cooking process at home

To prepare delicious wak balish, you need to take good, fresh and high-quality meat. I had a neck with a little fat - it turned out just right. If you want to make pies with beef, then you need to take young - preferably veal.

Knead the dough - sift the flour into a deep bowl and grate cold butter there. You don’t have to rub it, but rather plan it with a knife. Add salt and grind everything into fine crumbs. In the photo the dough is dark because I ran out of wheat flour and added about a quarter of whole wheat flour.

Pour kefir into a container and add soda to it. Stir and wait until foam rises. Don't repeat my mistakes - don't do this in a 300 ml glass. Half will be outside, which will definitely upset you. Pour the “boiled” kefir into the flour and butter crumbs and make a soft dough. It should not be sticky, but soft enough. I heard somewhere the expression “like an earlobe” - well, this is exactly about the test for vak balish. Roll it into a ball, put it in a bag and leave for 20 minutes.

Meanwhile, peel and wash the onions and potatoes. Chop the onion finely, and the meat and potatoes into cubes with an edge of about 0.5 cm. Mix everything, add salt and pepper to taste.

Divide the rested dough into two parts. We hide one back in the bag, and roll out the second like a sausage for dumplings, only much thicker. Divide into 6 parts. Dip each piece in flour and roll it into a not very thin flat cake.

Place a couple of spoons of filling in the middle.

We form a pie: carefully lift one edge and hold it with one hand, and with the other we pinch the folds around it in a circle. In the end, you should get a design like in the photo (and this is not a standard! real Vac Balishis are very smooth and beautiful).

Place the formed products on a sheet covered with baking paper or greased foil. The suggested quantity should yield 12 pies. My eye failed me, so the last three Vak Balishiks suffer from gigantism. Whatever you get, in any case, carefully grease them with a loose egg.

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees and place a baking sheet in the center. After 20 minutes, remove and pour a tablespoon of boiling water or broth into the central hole of each pie. We set it for another 40 minutes.

Remove the finished vak balish from the sheet and serve. If all the pies are not used immediately, they can be stored in the refrigerator for several days and reheated as needed.

Recipe "Vak balish"

Vak balish - small pies made of unleavened dough filled with beef and potatoes - a traditional dish of Tatar cuisine. My family doesn’t really like beef, so I cooked with pork. You will definitely like the incredibly tasty, aromatic pies prepared according to this recipe. Crispy dough and juicy filling will not leave you indifferent. Be sure to try it!

Ingredients:

For the test:

kefir - 250 g;
butter or margarine - 125 g;
flour - 350 g;
salt - 0.5 tsp;
soda - 0.5 tsp.

For filling:

potatoes - 3-4 pcs. (average);
beef pulp (I used pork) - 250 g;
onion (small) - 2 pcs.;
salt, ground black pepper - to taste.

For the broth:

butter - 25 g;
water - 150 ml;
salt - a pinch;
egg for greasing pies - 1 pc.

Cooking steps

Sift flour into a deep bowl. Add pieces of cold butter or margarine.

Using your hands, rub the butter into the flour until crumbly. Add a little salt.

Add soda to kefir (room temperature) and stir vigorously until it sizzles. Thus, the soda is quenched in kefir.

Pour kefir with slaked soda into the butter-flour crumbs and knead the dough, which should be soft, tender, but not sticky to the table or hands. Roll the dough into a ball, wrap in cling film and leave at room temperature for 30 minutes.

Prepare the filling: cut the meat and raw potatoes into small cubes. Add chopped onions. Salt, pepper and mix everything.

Divide the “rested” dough into 9 equal parts and roll into balls.

Roll each part into a flat cake the size of a saucer. Place 1-1.5 tablespoons of filling in the middle of the cake.

Connect the edges at the top like a khinkali mold, leaving a small hole at the top.

Place the wak balish on a baking sheet lined with parchment. Beat the egg and brush the pies well with it.

Bake the pies in an oven preheated to 180 degrees for 20 minutes, then remove and pour 1-1.5 tablespoons of broth into the holes (If you have chicken or beef broth, you can use it. If not, add butter, salt, bring to a boil. Boil for 2-3 minutes, remove from heat.). Place the pies back into the oven and bake for another 40 minutes at the same temperature.

Serve delicious Vak Balish pies hot with broth or simply with sweet tea. Well, very tasty!

You can take Vakbalish with you to work, or you can give it to your child to school. Be sure to try it! Enjoy your meal!

Option 1: Classic balish with meat and potatoes

Recipe for real Tatar balish with meat and potatoes. It is advisable to use fatty beef for the filling. It is also very important to marinate the meat in advance, preferably overnight. In this case, it will bake perfectly and delight you with its taste.

Ingredients

1 kg beef;
500 g butter;
500 g onions;
200 g broth (meat);
1 kg flour;
500 g sour cream;
2 kg of potatoes;
salt, black pepper.

Step-by-step recipe for balish with meat and potatoes

Start with meat. The beef needs to be cut into small cubes. Also chop the onions. Combine everything in a bowl, add salt and pepper, stir thoroughly and wash. Cover the bowl with meat and leave to marinate.

The dough is kneaded with sour cream without eggs. Add a teaspoon of salt to the main product and stir. Place 250 grams of butter or margarine. You can simply soften it or melt it, but be sure to cool it. Stir these ingredients until smooth, add wheat flour.

Knead the dough. Separate about a third of it. She will go to the top of the balisha. The second piece will be the sides and bottom, cover them with a napkin.

Chop the peeled potatoes. Add to the meat, which has already been soaked in spices and has become softer. Add chopped or grated butter here and add salt. Stir one last time.

The Tatar balish is assembled in a large mold with a diameter of at least 30 cm. Roll out a flat cake from a large piece of dough and transfer. The edges should hang over the edges outward.

Place all the filling into the mold. Align the layer.

Roll out a flat cake from a smaller piece, transfer to the pie, trim off the excess. Twist the edges of the two layers together. We do this carefully so that nothing comes unglued during baking. Roll the cut pieces into a ball and place it in the center. This will be the lid.

Bake balish for 30 minutes at 200 degrees. Then reduce the temperature to 170, cook the dish for another 2-2.5 hours. If necessary, if the top starts to burn, you can cover with foil or parchment.

Sometimes the butter is not added inside, but the pieces are placed on top. You can do this too, the fat will melt and soak the pieces of vegetables and meat.

Ingredients:

For 18-20 pieces: For the dough:

Flour - 700 - 800 g (originally 700g, but I needed more than 800 to make the dough not sticky);
Butter – 250 g;
Kefir – 0.5 l;
Baking soda – 1 teaspoon;
Salt – 1 teaspoon.

For filling:

Beef – 0.5 kg;
Potatoes – 7 medium-sized pieces;
Onions – 2-3 pcs.
Salt, black pepper - to your taste.

For filling:

broth 300 ml (chicken, meat);
or boil 300 ml of water for a couple of minutes with 50 g of butter and 1/3 teaspoon of salt.

The dough turns out to be very interesting: something between shortbread and kefir. And the result is appropriate: soft, tender, lush!

Option 2: Quick recipe for balish with meat and potatoes

Traditional Tatar balish with meat and potatoes is very tasty, no one can argue with that, but it takes a lot of time to prepare. Here is a recipe for a quick puff pastry dish.

Ingredients

1 kg of dough;
7 potatoes;
600 g meat;
200 g onion;
100 ml broth;
120 g butter;
egg or water;
any spices.

How to quickly cook balish with meat and potatoes

Cut the meat. You can take beef, lamb or pork. Add seasonings, stir. Chop the onions there too. It needs to be chopped very finely so as not to delay cooking.

Peel the potatoes, place them in a pan of boiling water, and boil for 10 minutes. Place under the tap, cool quickly, dry, cut into cubes. Add potatoes to meat.

The puff pastry needs to be divided into two different sized pieces. If it consists of several plates, then roll it slightly and glue the pieces together. Transfer a large piece into the mold, hang the edges and only then carefully cut off the protruding corners.

Place the filling. Cut the butter into slices and place on top.

Roll out the remaining dough, trim evenly, cover with balish. Brush the edges with egg or water and twist together. Make a ball from the leftover dough.

Set the balish at 230, immediately reduce the temperature to 190 degrees. Bake for 1 hour and 15 minutes.

Remove the lid of the finished dish and pour in the broth. Leave for half an hour for the balish to infuse.

No broth? For pouring, you can use boiling water with spices. An alternative is to dilute a concentrated cube or take broth in granules, but do not forget that such products contain a large amount of salt and artificial additives.

Option 3: Balish with meat and potatoes made from yeast dough

A variant of airy and light balish, which is prepared from yeast dough. It is advisable to knead it at least two hours before forming so that the mass has time to rise well.

Ingredients

500 ml water;
12 g yeast;
25 g sugar;
50 ml oil;
500 g potatoes;
500 g meat;
350 g onions;
150 g broth;
130 g butter for filling;
1 egg;
spices.

How to cook

Heat the water, add granulated sugar and a teaspoon with a mountain of salt, stir, add yeast and vegetable oil. Knead it all with flour, put it in a large saucepan, cover with a towel on top. Leave for two hours.

While the dough is infusing, cut the meat and onion into small cubes, add spices, and stir.

Peel the potatoes, cut into small cubes, pour boiling water over them and boil for just a minute. Drain in a colander and let cool. If this is not done, then it may not bake in the yeast dough. After cooling, pour the potatoes into the meat.

Divide the dough and roll out two flat cakes. Place most of it in the mold and pour out all the filling at once. Cut the butter and scatter it over the meat and potatoes.

Cover the balish with the second part of the dough, twist the edges, place a ball of dough in the center. Brush with beaten egg.

Bake for approximately 75 minutes. At any time you can tear off the ball and check the readiness of the filling. At the end, add broth.

You can make the dough with milk or its mixture with water, it will turn out tastier, but you don’t need to add more sugar, otherwise the cake will burn quickly.

Option 4: Balish with meat and potatoes on kefir

Kefir version of dough for balish with meat and potatoes. Very often it is considered a classic, which is not prohibited. You can replace the base with homemade yogurt or another fermented milk product.

Ingredients

200 g kefir;
3 eggs;
5 tbsp. flour (approximately 650-700 g);
180 g melted fat or butter;
700 g potatoes;
800 g of any meat;
100 g lard or fat;
3 onions;
spices, broth.

How to cook

Finely chop the meat and lard. You can use lamb tail or other fat. Chop the onion, add spices, mix everything.

Peel and cut the potatoes, combine with other filling ingredients, stir.

Mix kefir with a teaspoon of salt, add eggs, whisk and pour in melted fat. Add flour, knead stiff dough. Immediately divide into two parts, roll out a large piece, and place in the mold.

Place the filling, cover with the second rolled out piece, glue, trim off the excess, and make a lid.

Balish is baked for a little over an hour at a temperature of 180 degrees.

Pour 0.5 cups of broth into the finished pie. Leave for a while so that the moisture is distributed inside.

If there is no fat or lard, you can simply grate a piece of frozen butter into the filling or place the slices on top, as in other balish recipes.

Delicious Tatar pie with meat and potatoes

Despite the fact that balish is a traditional Tatar dish, it is prepared exclusively on holidays. Traditional baked goods have an indescribable taste, which is why the pie is often a decoration for the holiday table.

Ingredients:

Potatoes - 14 pcs.
Lamb or beef - 1 kg.
Onions - 2 pcs.
Butter - 50 g.
Natural sour cream - 250 g.
Chicken egg - 3 pcs.
Premium wheat flour - 1 kg.
Salt - to taste.
Sugar - 1 teaspoon.
Boiled water or broth - 100 ml.
Ground black pepper - to taste.
Milk - 100 ml.
Mayonnaise – 2 tbsp.
Sunflower oil - 2 tbsp.

Cooking process:

First prepare the filling. To do this, raw potatoes are peeled, cut into several parts and cut into plates no more than 2-3 mm thick.
The onion is peeled, chopped into half rings and cut in half. The meat is washed under running water and cut into thin pieces. To obtain a richer flavor, you can add dried herbs, salt and pepper to the filling to taste.
To prepare the dough, you need to mix sour cream, milk, mayonnaise, sugar, egg, a pinch of salt and add flour a little at a time.
Coat the dough with vegetable oil after it is ready, then it will not stick to your hands. The mass needs to be mixed well. The dough should not be thick, but soft.
Place the dough on a floured surface, knead, and divide into two parts.
Roll out part of the dough on a dry surface to a thickness of no more than 5 millimeters, place it in the mold so that it covers its edges.
The filling must be laid out carefully so as not to break through the dough, this is very important, because the broth will leak into the mold during baking, the bottom of the baked goods will burn, and the filling will turn out dry.
Roll out the rest of the dough to a thin layer.
Make a small hole in the top, it is necessary so that water can be added. Roll a small piece into a ball and cover the hole with it.
Tatar pie is baked in a preheated oven at 210 degrees for at least an hour and a half.
After the balish has browned a little, you need to fill the filling with broth. Bake the dish with the broth for another 20 minutes.

Bon appetit.

Option 5: Wak balish with meat and potatoes

Vak balish are miniature round pies, which are many times smaller in size than the classic Tatar dish. They bake faster, which in some cases is very convenient.

Ingredients

250 g kefir;
120 g butter in the dough;
5 g soda;
350 g flour;
3 potatoes;
2 onions;
300 g meat;
spices;
150 g broth;
yolk;
50 g butter.

How to cook

Mix kefir with melted butter, add salt, add soda and knead it all with flour. Cover the dough and leave for a few minutes.

Cut the vegetables into small cubes and also chop the meat. Mix, salt and pepper.

Divide the dough into 9 pieces. First, round each one, then roll it into a flat cake. Spread all the filling at once.

You can make closed balishes, as in the original version, but it is better to leave a hole. Therefore, we raise the edges of the flatbread and form something like a khinkali, but with a hole at the top.

Transfer to a baking sheet. Brush the dough with yolk and place in the oven for 40 minutes. Bake at 180 degrees.

Boil the broth with butter, add a little salt. Remove the pan. Pour 2-3 tablespoons of broth into each balish and return to the oven for another 10 minutes.

Balish can be made not only with potatoes and meat; poultry is also often used. There are many interesting filling options with the addition of mushrooms, cabbage, various other vegetables, and rice. All this is a must try!

Features of preparing Tatar balish - basic rules

Traditional Tatar cuisine is incredibly diverse and the number of dishes in it is simply enormous. Traveling around the country, you may be surprised to discover that the Tatars in each region have different secrets and recipes for preparing certain dishes. Baked goods and meat dishes are the basis of the entire national cuisine of a given country, and pastries are not only sweet. One of the most original dishes, which embodies both baked goods and meat, is the Tatar pie balish. This is a classic traditional Tatar dish, which is most often prepared for major holidays. Many Tatar families consider the preparation of balish to be a kind of family tradition.

Tatar balish has several other names, including belish, belish, belish. All these are translation errors from the Tatar language. This baked pie got its name from the Tatar phrase “Zur Balish” - this is what the dish is called in its homeland. Translated, it means “Big Pie.” In reality, balish can be either small or very large, open or closed, and it also differs in filling. You can often find recipes for Wak Balish - this is a miniature copy of a large traditional pie, often called pirozhki.

Balish is essentially an ordinary pie, but everyone is surprised by its presentation. This dish can be described as follows: an edible baked cauldron, inside of which there is a juicy filling, closed with an edible lid. This pie is not served in portions, but rather served with a spoon. Traditionally, balish is baked in a tandoor, but if all the nuances of cooking are followed correctly, such a delicious pie can be prepared without much difficulty in a conventional oven. At the same time, the preparation of Tatar balish itself is quite simple, the main thing is to just get your hands full and the delicious national dish will turn out tasty and juicy.

Let's look at the main features of preparing balish:

First of all, it is worth distinguishing between two types of such pie: Zur Balish and Vak Balish. As described above, the first is a large pie, and the second is more of a pie made using the same technology.
This baked pie can be prepared from completely different doughs. Traditionally, in the homeland of the housewife, it is baked from unleavened dough in water, which can perfectly hold its shape to hold the filling. You can also use yeast dough, but in this case the cooking will take a little longer. You can make a Tatar pie from kefir or milk dough, using margarine or butter. In any case, the end result will be a very tasty and satisfying pie that will delight your household not only on holidays, but will also be an excellent dish for a regular family dinner.
The original classic recipe for Tatar balish uses beef and potatoes as filling. However, now you can see quite a lot of deviations from the folk recipe. Housewives began to put any type of meat into the pie as a filling, including goose or chicken, various cereals, for example, rice, as well as cabbage, radish, and pumpkin. You can also prepare sweet Tatar balish using raisins, dried apricots, and sweet rice in the filling.
What's unique about this pie is the presentation. The dough is used to form the base of a pie with a diameter of 15-25 cm, on top of which the filling is laid out, after which it is covered with another piece of dough and pinched along the edge. At the very end of baking, the lid is cut off at the top and the pre-prepared broth is poured inside the pie. The top part of the pie is divided among all family members and is used instead of the usual bread. The filling is served hot with a spoon or in portions after cooling. Serving such a pie is considered a very responsible matter, so in the homeland it is trusted to the most respected family members.