Recipes with dried savory

9 recipes that use dried savory, with photos, step-by-step instructions and cook times. The quickest, Princesi, takes 25 minutes. It is most often cooked with onion, sweet paprika and parsley.

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Chomlek

Rhodope housewives once set the chomlek pot in the embers of the hearth in the morning and came back from the fields at dusk to a supper that had cooked itself. Chunks of beef, or pork in some villages, go into the pot with whole small onions, carrots, potatoes, garlic and tomato, seasoned with paprika, allspice, black pepper, bay and savory. Hours of gentle heat make the beef spoon-tender and turn the onions sweet and jammy in a thick red gravy. It is a whole meal in one pot; add pickles or a cabbage salad on the side. Many old recipes pour in a glass of red wine; here a spoon of red wine vinegar gives the same lift with no alcohol. A common mistake is browning in a crowded pan, which leaves the gravy pale, so brown the beef in batches until dark. Chef's tip: soak the small onions in boiling water for two minutes and the skins slip right off.

185 min

Bulgarian Meat

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Princesi

Bulgarian children grow up on princesi, the 'princesses' that parents slide into the oven for a quick Saturday breakfast or a late supper, and Sofia cafés sell them by the plateful. Slices of bread are spread with a thin layer of mince, usually half pork and half beef, seasoned with grated onion, cumin, savory and paprika, then baked until the meat is browned and the bread underneath turns crunchy; grated kashkaval cheese on top is a popular extra. A meat-free version uses egg and white cheese instead. Serve hot with a tomato and cucumber salad or a glass of ayran. Where most people go wrong is spreading the mince too thickly, so the top browns before the meat is cooked through; keep it to about 5 mm. Chef's tip: spread the mince with a wet spoon right to the crust edges, which stops the exposed bread from burning.

25 min

Bulgarian Fast Food

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Kapama

In the stone houses of Bansko, beneath the Pirin mountains, kapama is the dish of the winter holidays, carried to the table in its clay pot at Christmas, New Year and the masked Kukeri carnival. Pork shoulder, chicken on the bone and fresh pork sausage are layered with sauerkraut, rice and paprika, then sealed and baked for hours until the meat falls apart and the rice has soaked up the tangy, smoky juices. Old cooks seal the lid with a rope of dough; this version uses foil under a tight lid, which keeps it gluten free. Serve with extra sauerkraut and pickled peppers. The usual slip is lifting the lid too often, which lets out the steam and dries the top layer. Chef's tip: taste a strand of the sauerkraut first and rinse it only if it is very salty; its sourness is the backbone of the dish.

295 min

Bulgarian Meat

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Kurban chorba

On saints' days such as St George's in May or St Dimitar's in October, Bulgarian villages set big cauldrons over fires in the churchyard or square, and the kurban, the shared offering, is ladled out as a rich lamb soup to everyone who comes, neighbours and strangers alike. Lamb on the bone simmers gently with onion until tender, then the meat is pulled into pieces and returned to the broth with rice, carrot, red pepper, tomato, paprika, dried mint and plenty of parsley. It tastes deep, meaty and herby, sharpened with a squeeze of lemon, and bread on the side is traditional. The usual slip is skipping the skimming at the start; grey foam left in the pot muddies the broth. Chef's tip: rub the mint and savory between your palms over the pot in the last five minutes, so the herbs stay bright.

150 min

Bulgarian Soups

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Cheverme

At summer festivals in the Rhodope villages around Smolyan and Chepelare, lamb for cheverme is turned slowly on a spit over beech embers for hours until the outside crackles and the meat slides off the bone, and the carved meat is shared with bread and spring onions. Few home cooks have a spit or a fire pit, so this recipe brings the same idea to a bone-in lamb shoulder or leg: rubbed simply with salt, savory, black pepper, garlic and oil, then roasted low and slow in the oven or in a covered barbecue over indirect heat. The result is crisp-edged, juicy and tender enough to pull apart with a spoon. Serve with spring onions, radishes, a tomato and cucumber salad and bread. The usual slip is too much heat, which tightens the meat instead of melting it. Chef's tip: cheverme is always well done; cook until a probe in the thickest part reads about 90 °C and the bone wiggles loose.

330 min

Bulgarian Meat

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Westfälisches Blindhuhn

Blindhuhn, "blind hen", is a late-summer pot from the farms of Westphalia and the Münsterland, made when the garden and orchard give green beans, carrots, apples and pears all at once. It is called blind hen because, as farmers joked, even a blind hen finds a grain in it: the pot holds a bit of everything. White beans, vegetables and fruit cook together with smoked streaky bacon into a sweet-savoury one-pot supper. Leave out the bacon and add a spoon of smoked paprika for a vegetarian pot. Chef's tip: add the apples and pears only for the last 15 minutes so they stay in soft pieces instead of melting away.

90 min

German Curries

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Kavarma

Up in Bulgaria's Rhodope mountains, around Smolyan and Chepelare, kavarma is cooked in individual glazed clay pots and brought to the table still bubbling, often with an egg baked on top. This one is made with pork shoulder (chicken thighs work too), browned and then stewed slowly with a mountain of onion, peppers, mushrooms, paprika and savory. It traditionally includes a splash of dry white wine; the ingredient list gives an alcohol-free swap. Eat it with crusty bread and a shopska-style tomato and cucumber salad. A common slip is cutting the pork too small, so it dries out before the sauce is ready; keep the pieces bite-size but chunky. Chef's tip: let the onions cook down with the meat until almost jammy before the peppers go in; that is where kavarma gets its sweetness.

120 min

Bulgarian Meat

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Tourtière

Tourtière is the meat pie of Quebec, served after midnight mass at the Christmas Eve réveillon and through the holidays, from Montreal to the Saguenay–Lac-Saint-Jean region (where a deep, layered version is also called tourtière). This dish contains pork. Minced pork and beef cook slowly with onion, a little potato and warm spices — cinnamon, cloves, allspice and savory — then are baked in a flaky double crust and served with ketchup or fruit chutney. The mistake is a wet filling that makes the bottom crust soggy; cook it until the liquid has almost gone and cool it before filling. Chef's tip: a grated potato in the filling soaks up the juices and holds the slices together.

120 min

Canadian Baking

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Gyuvech

Gyuvech takes its name from the glazed clay pot it is baked in, and in late summer in the villages of the Rhodopes and the Thracian plain it is slid into the bread oven packed with peppers, aubergine, okra, green beans, potatoes and tomato, seasoned with paprika and the herb chubritsa (summer savory). In the last minutes, eggs are often cracked over the top and baked until just set. It is served straight from the pot with bread to scoop up the juices. Unlike Greek briam, the vegetables stew in a paprika broth under a lid rather than roasting in oil. Chef's tip: put a clay pot into a cold oven; heating it first is the usual mistake and can crack it.

100 min

Bulgarian Vegetarian

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Goes well with dried savory