Hedgehogs are a very juicy and tender variation on the theme of meatballs. This dish is literally made for family dinners, suitable for even the smallest eaters. It owes its name to its appearance; the “needles” of the dish are provided by the addition of rice to the minced meat. True, they will stick out funny only if you put the cereal raw, otherwise you will end up with ordinary-looking, but still very tasty meat balls. Moreover, the rice should be long, not round.
For minced meat, you can choose absolutely any type of meat or fish. The main thing is its juiciness. Therefore, we recommend not using beef in its pure form, but diluting it with pork or chicken. To keep the hedgehogs in shape and increase their satiety, bread crumbs, flour, and breadcrumbs are often added, and carrots and onions will help make the taste fresher. This dish is usually not pampered with spices, limiting itself to the classic salt and pepper.
Minced hedgehogs with rice in the oven - step-by-step photo recipe
The good thing about hedgehogs is that you don’t need to prepare a side dish for them. After all, they already contain rice. Many people confuse this dish with meatballs. However, the latter differ in that the rice is pre-boiled before mixing with minced meat. When cooking hedgehogs, this need disappears.
We will need the following ingredients:
- Minced meat (it can be beef, chicken, or mixed) – 400 gr.;
- Rice – 300 gr. (it’s best to take long-grained, but not steamed);
- Onion – 1-2 pcs.;
- Carrots – 1 pc.;
- Sour cream - a couple of tablespoons;
- Tomato paste - a couple of tablespoons;
- Cheese – 70-100 gr.;
- Egg;
- Salt and spices.
Cooking hedgehogs in the oven
As mentioned above, rice does not need to be boiled. Mix it in a cup with minced meat and finely chopped onion. Add one egg for viscosity. If the mixture sticks to your hands, wet them with cold water. Don't forget to add salt and pepper.
After obtaining a homogeneous mixture, we begin to form the hedgehogs. Choose their size as desired. Some people like large balls, and after eating one of these, you can already get enough. For some, small hedgehogs are preferable.
After forming the rice and meat balls, we begin preparing the filling. Chop the onions and carrots and mix them. Add sour cream and tomato paste to the mixture. The latter can be replaced with ketchup. Pour the mixture with boiled water or prepared meat broth. The amount of prepared dressing (sauce) should be enough to ensure that the hedgehogs are almost completely closed.
Cover the container with the dish with foil and place it in an oven preheated to 180-190 degrees. The baking time for minced hedgehogs with rice depends on their size, and, as a rule, is about 40-50 minutes.
10 minutes before readiness, remove the pan with the dish from the oven and remove the foil. We grate the cheese, sprinkle it on the surface of the hedgehogs, and put them back to bake. We no longer cover the mold with foil. The cheese will melt and create a delicious crust. Serve meat hedgehogs with herbs and sour cream.
Rice hedgehog recipe
A wonderful dish of meatballs baked in the oven is called “minced meat hedgehogs.” The rice that is added to the minced meat sticks out from the meat balls and resembles hedgehog needles.
This recipe will allow you to diversify your daily menu and bring a rich, aromatic taste. For preparation you will need:
- 0.6 kg minced chicken;
- 1 chicken egg;
- 2 tomatoes;
- 70 g carrots;
- 150 g rice;
- 70 g onions;
- 0.3 kg broth;
- 30 g vegetable oil;
- spices, salt to taste.
The cooking time for hedgehogs is one hour, and the energy value per 100 g of dish is only 120 kcal.
Thaw the finished minced meat, or grind the juicy pieces of chicken in a meat grinder. Boil the rice until half cooked, rinse and cool.
Peel all vegetables - carrots, tomatoes, onions, finely chop and sauté in vegetable oil. Then place them on the bottom of the pots for baking in the oven.
Drive an egg into the minced meat, add rice, spices and salt, and then mix thoroughly and “beat” to add viscosity.
Form it into hedgehogs - round meatballs the size of a small chicken egg. For sautéed vegetables, place 4-5 of them in each pot and fill with warm broth three centimeters from the bottom.
Cover everything with foil or lids and place in an oven preheated to 180° for half an hour. This incredibly tender and juicy dish goes amazingly with a side dish of potatoes, cauliflower, and hot and spicy sauce.
How to cook meat hedgehogs with gravy?
Although hedgehogs and meatballs are very similar to each other, we do not forget that these dishes are still different. Therefore, in this case, the meat balls should not be fried, thereby depriving them of their very essence - the protruding needles. To make tomato gravy, you can use ground tomatoes, homemade juice or tomato paste.
Required ingredients:
- 0.5 kg minced meat;
- ½ tbsp. rice;
- 1+1 onion (for hedgehogs and for gravy);
- 1 cold egg;
- 3 tomatoes;
- 1 medium carrot;
- 1 tbsp. flour;
- salt, sugar, pepper, herbs.
Cooking steps:
- Boil the rice until half cooked.
- To form “hedgehogs” we take twisted meat, finely chopped onion, cooled rice, egg, add salt and pepper, mix thoroughly.
- We roll the resulting minced meat into small balls, which should be placed on the bottom of a thick-walled saucepan or pan. There will be quite a bit of gravy, so whatever the container you choose, its sides should be high. Ideally, lay out all the meat balls in one layer, but if this doesn’t work out, then it’s not a problem, we place them on the second floor.
- For the gravy, fry grated carrots with chopped onions in a frying pan; when the frying is ready, add tomatoes pureed in a blender or paste diluted in water. After a couple of minutes, add flour, mix and continue frying for about 30 seconds, pour in about 3 tbsp in a thin stream. boiling water, stir immediately, allowing the flour to disperse evenly, bring to a boil, continuing to stir.
- Add salt, dried herbs, spices and sugar to the gravy to your taste. The last ingredient is required, otherwise our sauce will lose much of its taste.
- Pour the sauce over the hedgehogs and simmer covered for up to half an hour.
How to cook meatballs with creamy gravy
Meat dishes are an integral part of a healthy diet. You can diversify your daily menu with minced hedgehogs with creamy sauce.
The rich, rich taste and wonderful combination of ingredients will delight loved ones and guests. To create this dish you need the following ingredients:
- minced meat (pork and beef) – 0.6 kg;
- chicken egg – 1 pc.;
- cream (fat content more than 20%) – 100 g;
- rice – 100 g;
- butter – 40 g;
- tomato paste – 50 g;
- carrots (large) – 120 g;
- flour – 30 g;
- broth – 0.5 kg;
- garlic – 1 clove;
- onion – 200 g;
- pepper;
- salt.
When choosing mixed minced meat, the cooking time takes about 70-80 minutes, and the calorie content of 100 g of hedgehogs is 165 kcal.
To prepare the meat part of the dish, you need to boil the rice until half cooked and cool. Drive an egg into the minced meat, sprinkle with salt and pepper. Chop one onion and garlic and add to the meat mixture along with the rice.
Mix everything well, form meat pellets (approximately 50 g each) and place in a baking dish at a slight distance from each other.
For the creamy gravy, cut the onion into half rings and simmer in butter in a frying pan for five minutes. Then add the carrots cut into thin strips and simmer for another five minutes.
Add tomato paste, stir, add flour and stir constantly for a couple of minutes. Slowly pour the broth over the vegetable mass, simmer for another ten minutes and, adding cream, remove from the heat with a little salt and pepper.
Pour the gravy over the meat hedgehogs prepared in the mold, cover with foil and place in an oven preheated to 180° for forty minutes.
The resulting hedgehogs in creamy gravy just melt in your mouth and have a delicate and satisfying taste.
Do you know how to cook minced chicken cutlets with oatmeal?
Unusually tasty and juicy chicken gizzards cooked in a slow cooker are very quick and easy to prepare. Step-by-step recipe with photos.
Microwave pizza recipe - even kids can do it.
Hedgehogs in a slow cooker - recipe
Required ingredients:
- 0.5 kg headlight;
- 1 carrot;
- 1 onion;
- 1 bell pepper;
- half a multi-cooker measuring cup of rice;
- 40 ml tomato paste;
- 2 tbsp. l. flour;
- 100 g sour cream;
- salt, spices, herbs.
Stages of cooking hedgehogs in a slow cooker:
- We prepare cleanly washed and peeled vegetables: grate the carrots on a medium grater, finely chop the onion, cut the pepper into thin strips..
- Diligently and tastefully beat the minced meat on the table for a couple of minutes, add half of the prepared onion, rice, and spices to it.
- Saute the remaining vegetables on the “Baking” for about a quarter of an hour.
- While the vegetables are being cooked in the slow cooker, mix sour cream with tomato and flour, pour 400 ml of boiling water into them, stir until smooth.
- Place rice and meat balls on the vegetables, pour the resulting sauce and cook on “Stew” for 1.5 hours.
If you cook “hedgehogs” in the double boiler mode, you get a dietary or children’s version of the dish.
Recipe for hedgehogs in a frying pan
Required ingredients:
- 0.5 kg minced meat;
- 1 onion;
- 2 garlic cloves;
- 1 egg;
- 30-40 ml of tomato sauce or paste;
- 1 carrot;
- a bunch of greenery;
- 100 g rice;
- 2 tbsp. flour;
- 100g sour cream;
- ½ tbsp. water.
The procedure for cooking hedgehogs in a frying pan:
- Grind the peeled carrots, garlic cloves and onions in a blender or by hand.
- Finely chop the greens (dill, parsley), you can add basil to give the dish a Mediterranean touch.
- Mix the minced meat with vegetables, add raw or semi-cooked rice, herbs and egg. Stir, add salt and pepper. The resulting mass should be homogeneous, thoroughly mixed, and soft.
- We make neat koloboks, roll them in flour to give an appetizing crust.
- Fry the meat balls in oil on all sides. Our hedgehogs are ready! If desired, you can prepare the sauce.
- Mix sour cream, preferably homemade, tomato sauce, a little salt and hot water, mix.
- Pour the gravy over our “urchins” and simmer over low heat until the sauce thickens. Usually this action takes no more than half an hour.
Hedgehogs - recipe for cooking in a saucepan
This recipe is dedicated to all connoisseurs of simple, but very tasty and satisfying dishes.
To prepare it you need:
- 0.9 kg minced meat;
- 100 g rice;
- 1 onion;
- ½ tbsp. homemade cream4
- 2 tbsp. milk;
- 100 g butter
- 2 garlic cloves;
- 2 yolks.
Cooking steps:
- Grate the peeled onion on a coarse grater or pass it through a blender.
- Mix the minced meat with rice and onions until smooth.
- From the rice-meat mass we form cones 5 cm in diameter.
- Place a small piece of butter on the bottom of a thick-walled pan, after it has melted, place the meat balls on top, fill them halfway with water, cover with a lid and bring to a boil. After which the fire can be reduced to a minimum. The total simmering time is about 45 minutes, while the “hedge” should be turned periodically.
- Prepare the cream sauce in a small saucepan. Melt 50 g of butter at the bottom, fry chopped garlic on it, after a minute add cream, and after another couple - milk. Do not bring the mixture to a boil, simmer over low heat for about 5 minutes.
- Beat the yolks thoroughly, pour in the sauces, and continue to simmer for another 10 minutes. The main thing is not to let it boil! Add salt to taste.
- Remove the finished meat balls from the heat, pour in the sauce and let it brew.
Cooking hedgehogs with rice in tomato sauce in a slow cooker (frying pan)
Level the vegetable-tomato pillow. Place meat balls on it. During the cooking process, the rice will swell, and, accordingly, the products will become larger.
If you are planning a second layer, then cover the balls with the reserved frying and distribute the remaining hedgehogs on top.
Pour boiling water over them so that they are completely hidden under the liquid level. You can add more salt on top, if desired. But I didn’t do this anymore. There will be enough salt in the minced meat and sauce. Place a couple of bay leaves on top.
If you cook in a slow cooker, close the lid tightly and set the “Stew” mode for 50 minutes. We will simmer in a frying pan, covered, over low heat for 40-50 minutes.
During this time, you can prepare your favorite side dish and set the table. Immediately after cooking, you can serve our delicacy. I cooked them all at once for lunch. It turned out 2 dense layers in a slow cooker. A family of 4 devoured all this deliciousness with the addition that by the evening not a trace of it remained.
Hedgehogs in sour cream sauce
Required ingredients:
- 0.5 kg minced meat:
- 0.1 kg rice;
- 1 egg;
- 1 carrot;
- 1 onion;
- 100 g butter;
- greens, salt, pepper;
- 50 ml tomato sauce;
- 200 g sour cream;
- 0.5 liters of low-fat broth;
- 1 tbsp. premium flour.
Stages of cooking “hedgehogs” in sour cream filling:
- We rinse the rice until it is clean, boil it, place it in a colander and rinse again, letting the excess liquid drain.
- Peel and chop the onions and carrots by hand or in a blender, fry them in half the oil.
- Beat the egg.
- Finely chop the greens.
- Add cooled rice, fried vegetables, tomato, egg, chopped herbs to the minced meat, add salt, pepper and mix thoroughly by hand.
- We form balls from the minced meat and fry them a little.
- Pour flour into a clean and dry hot frying pan, fry it until it acquires a golden hue, remove from heat, and cool. Separately mix sour cream with warm broth, pour the resulting mixture into the flour, stir until smooth, add salt.
- We put the “edges” in a deep form, not close to each other, and fill them with sauce. Bake in the center of a hot oven for about 45 minutes. Serve sprinkled with herbs, accompanied by vegetable salad.