How to Prepare Traditional Dolma (Grape Leaves Roll)

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Hello everyone and welcome to another post from my experiments being a food blogger. OK, for following recipe I wasn't actually preparing that tasty dolma, instead I experiment with new food photography technique.

About food photography: Today I decided to experiment with 100mm lens and used long exposures (obliviously from a tripod). Find more tutorials on Digital Photography School

About Dolma (Grape leaves roll)Dolma is a family of stuffed vegetable dishes common in the Middle East and surrounding regions including the Balkans, the Caucasus, Russia and Central Asia. Common vegetables to stuff include tomato, pepper, onion, zucchini, eggplant, and garlic. The stuffing may or may not include meat. Meat dolmas are generally served warm, often with egg-lemon or garlic yogurt sauce; meatless ones are generally served cold. Stuffed vegetables are also common in Italian cuisine, where they are named ripieni ("stuffed").

Today we are going to prepare traditional dolma with meat stuffing. Most of the ingredients will be available at your closest shop, but for grape leaves and yogurt you might need to head to specific store (which we actually did, here in Georgia, we bought leaves and yogurt (for dressing) at Turkish store in Didube (neighborhood of Tbilisi)

Stuffing for dolmas

Stuffing for dolmas

onions, garlic, species (on your taste), rise (not fully boiled), carrots, minced mix meat( lamb and pork)

Grape leaves

Grape leaves

Yoghurt sauce with garlics

Yogurt sauce with garlic

Now its time to put stuffing in grape leaves, wrap them up and put in the pot.

Wrapped dolma rolls in pot

Wrapped dolma rolls in pot

Pour some water over dolmas (about 3cm above) and cook slowly for some 45 minutes

Cook slowly

Cook slowly

It is a good idea to add some pressure over dolmas, so they don't destruct

Dolmas dressed with garlic yogurt sauce

Dolmas dressed with garlic yogurt sauce