Mtsvadi — Authentic Georgian Shashlik
Main Dishes • Georgian
Description
Mtsvadi — Authentic Georgian Shashlik
Ingredients
- Meat 5 lbs
- Vegetable Oil 5 fl oz
- Onion 30 oz
- Salt 0 oz
- Paprika 0 oz
- Mild Chili Spice 0 oz
- Pomegranate Seeds to taste
- Herbs to taste
Step-by-Step Guide
Step 1
Clean the meat (beef — chuck or brisket, pork — hind leg) from membranes and tendons, and cut into pieces of 4–5 cm.
Step 2
Chop the onion coarsely, place it in a bowl, and mash it with your hands.
Step 3
Add the meat and spices.
Step 4
Drizzle the shashlik with oil and mix well.
Step 5
Cover with plastic wrap or a lid and refrigerate for at least overnight (about 8 hours) or up to a day. During this time, it is advisable to take it out a few times and mix again.
Step 6
Choose a location and set up the grill; first, let the coals burn down. The best fuel is fruit tree wood, and if you can use grapevines, that would be ideal. Let them burn until they reach the right state for shashlik — the so-called gray coals — which will take about 30 minutes. This will be enough time to skewer the shashlik.
Step 7
Carefully shake off all pieces of onion from the meat — otherwise, they will burn and turn into unsightly charred bits. Skewer the meat so that you start and end the skewer with smaller irregular pieces, placing larger and more uniform pieces in the middle. It is better to place the skewers with meat not on a flat tray but on the edges of a bowl so that they are exposed to air rather than sitting in their own juices. This will help the crust to form better over the fire. Once assembled, press the meat tightly with your hand from all sides to ensure more uniform pieces.
Step 8
Break the burnt logs into small pieces with a poker and evenly spread them across the bottom of the grill to the width that the skewers will occupy. Prepare a bottle of water or wine in advance, making a few holes in the cap to extinguish any flames.
Step 9
Place the skewers on the grill just as the open flames are dying down. The coals will be very hot, and at high heat, the meat will sear immediately, keeping all the juices inside.
Step 10
After a minute, turn the skewers to the other side. The meat will cook for 10–15 minutes, during which time you should rotate the skewers approximately every 2 minutes and occasionally switch their positions to ensure even cooking. Also, extinguish any flames by spraying them from the side with the bottle.
Step 11
The doneness of the shashlik can be judged visually, but for reliability, you can make a cut with a sharp knife in the meat to check if it is cooked through.
Step 12
About 3 minutes before it is done, you can brush the meat with vegetable oil and sprinkle it again with ground hot pepper.
Step 13
Serve the shashlik with red onion (which can be marinated in wine vinegar for about 10 minutes), herbs, and pomegranate seeds.
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