Sour Cherry Apple Stew

(Khoreshte Albaloo va Sib)

This was the first time in my life trying this combination in a stew. I have never had it anywhere, and didn’t really follow any recipe. I just made the recipe on spot, based on my taste.

My mom used to make apple or quince stew, and it was a sweet sour stew (more sweet than sour). So since I am not big fan of sweet food, I didn’t like it much. But sour cherries and red sour plums, make this stew sour, and delicious.

I found this dish tasty and full of flavor, and textures . I will definitely try making it with chicken next time.

Using seasonal ingredients and coming up with new recipes is fun and it will give me an opportunity to add new dishes to our family routines.

I hope you give this recipe a chance and enjoy it as much as I did.

Serving 4-6

Prep and cooking time 2.5 hours

Ingredients:

Lamb 250g

Sour Cherries 2 cups

Apple 2 (best to use Granny Smith)

Dried red sour plums (Alou Bokhara) 1 cup

Onion 1

Tomato Paste 2 Tbsp

Fresh tomatoes 2

Spices: black pepper, 7 spices, turmeric 1 tsp each

Salt 2 tsp

Cinnamon 1/4 tsp

Prepared saffron 2 tsp

Directions:

🍒Clean and wash the cherries, remove the seeds, also cut the tomatoes and set aside

🍏Peel and dice the onion and use a big deep pot to sauté the onion

🍒Add the meat to the sauté onion and keep stirring in high temperature till the meat color completely changes

🍏Then bring the temperature down to medium high and add turmeric, black pepper, 7 spices, tomato paste and mix, add few drops of oil and keep stirring so it doesn’t stick to the pan

🍒Add the sour plums, diced tomatoes and enough water to cover the ingredients, then put the lid on, increase the temperature to high again till stew starts boiling ,and cook on medium low temperature for one to 1.5 hour

🍏While waiting wash and dice the apples , 2x2 inch cubes. (I didn’t peel the apples because I like the look better, however you can peel them if you prefer. Also if you are serving the stew with rice this is the best time to start preparing it)

🍒After one hour check the meat and if it is cooked you can add the cherries, apples, saffron, salt and cinnamon. Then cover and cook on very low temperature for 45 minutes to 1 hour.

Note:

🍒The key to making the perfect stew is using the right temperature at the right time. Overall any stew cooked slowly for a longer time is much more delicious. Also if you cook the cherries or apples on high temperature for too long, you are going to end up with a over cooked, ugly looking stew

🍒To make a sour sweet version, add two tablespoons of sugar on top of cherries after the seeds are removed and the set it aside

I served this stew with saffron basmati rice, my homemade organic plain yogurt and sour cherry pickle. I added few fresh cherries and coconut flour to the bottom my pot to see how my #tahdig will look. Using coconut made my tahdig sticky so I wasn’t able to use the flipping technique and get a nice looking tahdig. Also the cherries slightly burned, but overall it was tasty.