Georgian · Dessert
Churchkhela
- Advanced
- 45 min
- roughly 1 of 4 for cost
- Vegetarian
- Vegan
Leads with an earthy, grounding base, toasted, nutty warmth throughout, melting away silken.
Ingredients
- 2 litres fresh unfermented red grape must, from Saperavi or another dark grape
- 200 g plain white wheat flour
- 400 g walnut halves, thoroughly dry
- strong linen thread and a long needle
The skills inside
Tempering a custardStraining & passing through a sieveSkimming: foam, fat and a clear broth
The words inside
Allergen screen
Found: gluten · nuts
Screened for: gluten, dairy, egg, nuts, peanuts, fish, shellfish, molluscs, soy, sesame, celery, mustard, lupin, alcohol. Not screened: sulphites.
Screened by keyword from the ingredient list, not reviewed by a person; check every label for what the list cannot show.
Method
- Thread the walnut halves flat face to flat face into strings 25 cm long, knotted at the bottom and with 10 cm of bare thread left at the top.
- Boil the must down by about a third, skimming, until it tastes concentrated rather than fresh; this is the badagi.
- Slake the flour into 500 ml of cooled badagi until there is not a single lump, then pour it back into the hot pan through a sieve, whisking hard.
- Cook this tatara at a low bubble, stirring constantly, for 15 minutes, until it turns glossy, coats the spoon like thin custard and no longer tastes of raw flour. 15 min
- Dip each string, hang it to drip, and once the surface is dry to a light touch dip again; three or four coats build the sheath.
- Hang the strings in a dry, shaded, airy place until the outside is leathery and no longer tacky anywhere.
How to tell it is going right
This dish has no standard of its own yet. It is judged on the techniques it exercises: checked at the pan, while there is still something to be done about it.
Tempering a custard 59 recipes
- The hot liquid went into the eggs a little at a time with constant whisking, and only then did everything go back to the pot.
- The heat under it stayed gentle throughout and it was never allowed to boil.
- Stirred continuously and right into the corners of the pan, where it thickens first and sets unnoticed.
- Judged by behaviour: it thickens enough to coat the back of a spoon and hold a clean line when a finger is drawn through it.
- Taken off before it looks finished, and strained. Residual heat carries it the rest of the way, and a custard held on the heat until it looks right arrives past right.
Where it goes wrong The hot liquid went in too fast, or the pot went back over full heat to save time. The yolks set into threads before they could thicken smoothly, and a scrambled custard does not come back; straining hides a little of it and nothing hides the rest.
Skimming: foam, fat and a clear broth 73 recipes
- It is held below a rolling boil for the whole time. Agitation drives fat and fine protein into the liquid as an emulsion, and nothing skimmed afterwards will take them back out.
- The grey foam that rises in the first minutes is lifted off and discarded rather than stirred back in.
- Fat is taken from the surface where it gathers, the pot moved off the centre of the heat if that is what it takes to collect it in one place.
- The liquid is visibly clearer at the end than it was at the start: it is possible to see down into it.
- Nothing lifted off goes back in. What was skimmed is discarded, not tipped back once the ladle is full.
Where it goes wrong The pot was allowed to boil, usually while something else was being attended to. Fat and protein emulsify into the liquid under agitation and cannot be lifted off afterwards, so the finished broth stays cloudy and greasy however patiently it is skimmed from then on.
At the Table
- The Pour
- Sauternes
- Also Right
- Demi-sec Champagne
- From the Taps
- Belgian tripel
- Zero-Proof
- Jasmine tea
The sweetness rule is absolute: the pour must be sweeter than the plate, and acid keeps it from cloying.
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