Bulgar and spinach pilau with mint, lemon and rare…
This pilau is a super-easy throw-together one-pot dish discovered on a busy weeknight, but such an incredible feast of subtlety, it will surprise and delight you mouthful after mouthful.
A wonderful take on classic ingredients, serve this alone with a blob of yoghurt for a simple weeknight supper, or have it as part of a middle eastern feast with falafels, baba ganoush, grilled meat, spreads, flatbread and mint tea.
Bulgar wheat pilau with mint, spinach, lemon and rare beef
This will go well with some pomegranate seeds and fresh coriander, and you can substitute the bulgar wheat for couscous or rice. Don't skimp on the mint - you need fresh mint, and lots of it.
Servings 4 as a side, 2 as a main
Ingredients
- oil for frying
- 200g Beef, cut into strips
- 1 onion, chopped
- 2 carrots, chopped
- 3 cloves garlic, chopped
- 1 red chilli, deseeded and chopped
- 1 bunch spinach, washed very well, stalk removed, chopped.
- 1 cup Bulgar wheat
- 1 tbsp miso (optional - leave out if you are using stock instead of water below)
- Water (or stock, see above)
- Finely grated rind of 1 lemon
- Juice from 1/2 lemon (about 1 tbsp)
- Salt, pepper and olive oil
- 4 sprigs of mint, leaves pulled off and chopped - about half a handful of leaves.
Instructions
- Heat the oil in a heavy pot until very hot and flash fry the beef until just coloured on the outside, but still raw inside, stirring constantly - about 30 seconds. Remove and set aside on a plate.
- Fry the onions, carrots and chilli for 10 minutes in the same pot, until the carrots are soft, adding water as necessary to deglaze the beef protein from the bottom of the pan. Add the garlic and bulgar wheat, stirring constantly to stop the bulgar wheat sticking, and fry for another 1-2 minutes to coat the bulgar wheat in flavours.Add the miso, if using, at this point.
- Add the spinach in batches and stir until wilted. Add more water or stock as necessary to keep the bulgar wheat from sticking. Add the lemon rind after all the spinach is in.Cook until all the spinach has wilted and the bulgar wheat is cooked al-dente, then add the lemon juice, mint and reserved meat. Season with salt and pepper, heat through and serve with big blobs of yoghurt and a drizzle of olive oil on top.
2 COMMENTS
Definitely my most favourite recipe of all time. I keep all ingredients on hand at all times in case the whim catches me. At university, I would make this the weekend before, keep the toppings separate and take it in my food thermos to class for lunch every week day. Sustaining, filling, ticks all my nutritional boxes and tastes flipping incredible. I honestly cannot praise this enough
Reviews like these keep us posting recipes 🙂 Try using harissa next time instead of the chilli!