What and how to cook in tandoor at home: the best recipes and recommendations

Dishes cooked on the grill are especially delicious. Smell of smoke penetrates into every piece of shish kebab or fish, which from this get their own special flavor. But the weather conditions are not always favorable. In addition, a limited number of dishes can be prepared on the grill: you can not bake bread on open coals, and a large piece of meat, for sure, will turn out to be damp inside. Here the tandoor will come to the rescue.

What it is?

Tandoor is an Asian or Oriental ceramic oven designed for cooking. According to some sources, tandyr appeared more than 3000 years before Christ in India, and according to other sources, it was invented in Uzbekistan. It happened due to the Sart tribe who lived at that time in this area. They also came up with the idea of preparing food in a clay pitcher. For this and firewood it was required a little, and heat was saved longer.

Outwardly the tandoor resembles a large clay pot with a double lid made of chamotte fireproof clay - a natural, environmentally friendly material. In the lower part, there is a blast furnace for igniting coals and scraping ash with a small scapula. The height of a ceramic oven without a lid is 70 cm, and with a lid - 105 cm, the diameter of the neck of the pot is 25 cm. The steel frame with forging elements adds reliability to the design.

In the main cover there are special holes for hanging in the vertical position of the skewers. In addition, the kit includes a special grill, on which you can cook fish in tandoor, as well as vegetables, like a grill. But this is not the whole list of possible dishes.

What can you cook in tandoor

Before buying such a ceramic oven, you need to know in advance the list of dishes that can be baked in it. What and how to cook in tandoor? In fact, the list of dishes is much wider than the one used for the brazier, and the process of cooking is much faster.

Shish kebab from beef, pork, mutton or chicken, game and poultry, vegetables, bread and flat cakes, fish and seafood - all this becomes especially juicy and fragrant in tandoor. Thanks to the special cooking technology, the walls of the oven evenly warm up the food, so the meat will never remain moist inside, but it will not burn, as often happens on the grill.

Advantages of cooking in tandoor

The process of cooking in the tandoor is due to heat transfer and infrared radiation from the inner walls of the furnace. Thus, even if there is absolutely no coal in it, the dishes will still be baked at the expense of stored heat.

Among the advantages of cooking food in tandoor can be noted the following:

• Unique taste qualities - dishes cooked in a clay oven are distinguished by a special taste and have a slight smell of smoke.
• Saving time - in just 15-25 minutes you can get a delicious, juicy and well-baked shish kebab, poultry or fish.
• Ease of use - do not need to turn the skewers, make sure that the meat is not burned, because the miracle stove will do everything itself.

Now it remains to learn how to properly cook in tandoor, and start pickling shish kebab. And you can not doubt that it will turn out much more delicious than on the grill.

How to cook in tandoor at home

The process of cooking begins with the firing of coals. To do this, pre-chopped firewood is laid out on the bottom of the tandyr and ignited. Their burning takes place under the lid. Immediately after ignition, the walls of the tandoor are covered with black soot, but as they form coals, they again become white. This will mean that the ceramic oven is ready for cooking.

After the firewood is burnt, you can hang the skewers that are included in the kit. Due to the thick ceramic walls of the tandoor it cools down very slowly. And this means that after the meat you can cook and garnish without additional incendiary coals.

The recipe for cooking shish kebab in tandyra

A win-win option for choosing meat for shish kebab is pork. It's better if it's the neck. Then the shish kebab will turn out to the best of fat, juicy and appetizing. A special technology of cooking, which is characteristic for a ceramic oven, will also contribute to this. How to cook shish kebab in tandoor?

To begin with, the meat should be marinated. For 3 kg of pork, cut into medium pieces, you need to take 4 tablespoons of Adzhika, 1 kg of onion salt and pepper to taste. Prepare deep dishes. Mix the meat with adjika and salt, and then lay out layers, alternating pork with sliced onions. Leave in the refrigerator for 4 hours, and preferably at night.

One hour before the expected cooking time, steam the tandoor. To do this, open the ash-pit, lay the firewood on the bottom of the stove (about two-thirds of the total volume) and set them on fire. When the walls of the tandyr become white, some of the coals are removed, the ash-pit is closed, and the barbecue can be suspended in an upright position. The cooking time of pork is 20 minutes.

Tortillas in tandoor

Tandoor cakes are made from fresh dough. It is kneaded from a glass of water, 0.5 kg of flour, salt (teaspoonful) and dry yeast (tablespoon). The dough is cooked without any debris, but before the molding of the products it should increase in volume by 2-3 times. Then it will need to be divided into balls weighing 300 g each and hands to stretch into a flat cake. Before sending products to the oven, they are punctured in the center so that they do not deform. How to cook scones in tandoor? Right on the walls of the stove. Thanks to a special technology, cakes will stick to them, as if stuck.

Before laying the tandoor wall test, sprinkle with water. To cakes kept on the walls of the oven, one side should be moistened with salt water. Then using a mitten to take a piece of dough and stick it to the wall. When cakes are browned, they can be extracted from the tandoor. The approximate cooking time is 10 minutes.

Lamb in tandoor

Prepare a leg of lamb better than a tandoor, will not work anywhere. But before it needs to be well marinated, withstood in the spices in the refrigerator for at least 8 hours. To prepare marinade for a two-kilogram leg you need 6 heads of garlic, a tablespoon of dry mustard, juice of one lemon, rosemary and salt. Garlic is divided into teeth, peeled and tamped into notches previously made in the leg. From the lemon juice, mustard, salt and rosemary prepare a marinade, which rub your foot from all sides. Then put it in a bag or wrap it in a food film and send it to the refrigerator.

How to cook meat in tandoor next? To do this, you need to kindle firewood, wait for the walls in the oven to turn white, and install a suspension grid. On top of it lay a leg of sheep and leave to bake for 2 hours. After the time has elapsed, open the ash bath and prepare the foot for another 15 minutes before the crust is formed.

How to cook a ball in a tandoor

Due to fatty layers, the pork shank rarely turns dry. But in tandoor she comes out especially juicy and only 40 minutes are prepared. Here, on the side dish, you can bake potatoes, which are soaked with meat juices and will turn out to be tender and crumbly.

Rulk should be carefully rubbed with salt and pepper, and also stuffed with garlic, making small pockets in meat. Send to the refrigerator for 2-3 hours. At this time, melt the ceramic oven.

How to cook in a tandoor rulk with potatoes? Potato with peel is laid out on a suspended grate. The handle is threaded on the skewer. Now it needs to be suspended so that the juice flows directly to the potatoes. So for 40 minutes both the main course and the garnish will be cooked at once.

Fish in tandoor

Steaks of salmon or any other red fish marinate in lemon juice and salt for 2 hours. Meanwhile, chop finely 2 cloves of garlic, dill greens, grate a little cheese and mix these ingredients with two tablespoons of cream. This will be a sauce for fish. But how to cook steaks from salmon in tandoor?

So that the fish does not turn dry, it can be cooked in foil. But then it will not be possible to achieve that special aroma that distinguishes dishes cooked on the grill from all others. The second option is to scrape out all the coals from the oven, when its walls gain enough heat, and the wood will completely burn out. So the fish can evenly bake for 10 minutes, but do not dry. Similarly, you should prepare and whole carcass, but the cooking time to increase to 15-20 minutes.

Duck recipe for tandoor

A duck in tandoor is prepared on a suspended grid for 1.5 hours. During this time, she manages to bake evenly and soak with apple juice. To prepare the dish takes a duck weighing about two kilograms. It should be washed, dried with a paper towel and rubbed with a mixture of salt and pepper inside and outside. For the filling, cut into sour-sweet apples, chop ½ cup of walnuts. Stir all the ingredients together, add a teaspoon of honey and cinnamon. Stuff the bird with the received mass, sew it with threads and send it to the oven.

How to cook a duck with apple stuffing in tandoor? Smoldering embers in the center of the oven. Install the grille. On top of it lay a duck. Close the tandoor with a lid - and you can rest for 2 more hours. Miracle oven will do everything yourself. 15 minutes before the end of cooking, open the lid and ash pan. An additional air flow will promote the formation of a crust on the bird, and the duck will get even more fragrant.

Skewers of vegetables in tandoor

This option of cooking shish kebab is a real find for vegetarians. But the baked vegetables turn out so tasty, that from them to not tear off and meat eaters. Vegetarian shish kebab can be served as a side dish to the main course. No less tasty is a warm salad prepared from grilled vegetables.

From people who grew up not in Asia, often the question is: how to cook meals in tandoor? In fact, there is nothing complicated. In tandoor you can bake almost any vegetables, mushrooms and even fruits. They are cooked directly on a grate or stringed on a skewer and left in a suspended state for 7 minutes. Very tasty vegetarian shish kebab is obtained from champignons, tomatoes, zucchini, eggplant, onion, etc.

The way of kindling the tandyr remains the same as in the previous recipes. Coals from the oven before cooking is better to scrape out.

Ceramic stove, or tandoor, will become a real gourmet find and ideal as a gift to respected people.