While everyone is sharing soup, muffins and pie recipe this pumpkin season. I have something very new for you to put your pumpkin to use.
A warm delicious dish with a Lebanese twist. It is the famous Lebanese shish barak but with pumpkin twist to it. You can call it Lebanese pumpkin beef dumpling soup or maybe Lebanese pumpkin ravioli whatever you choose to name it, it is a very delicious comfort meal perfect for autumn season.
Let’s talk first about the shish barak:
These Lebanese style homemade dumplings are stuffed with a meat mixture and cooked traditionally in a yoghurt garlicy creamy sauce and served with vermicelli rice aside.
Making the filling and the dough or the shish barak is very similar to making ravioli and it is very easy to make at home. And to make it even better these little dumplings freeze well, so you can make a big batch and store in the freezer to use later and prepare a quick meal for the family.
These shish barak dumplings are stuffed with ground beef or lamb with some middle eastern spices and some pine nuts as optional addition.
Before adding the dumplings to the sauce we usually fry or bake them until lightly browned but for me I usually air-fry mine it give the crispiness of the fried one but with much less oil.
Now about the sauce:
The base of this traditional meal is a creamy warm yoghurt sauce with fried garlic, mint and coriander and there are some recipes also that prepare those dumplings with a red tomato sauce also. But today I am going to prepare with you a totally new pumpkin creamy sauce with those delicious meat dumplings.
This Pumpkin shish barak stew is the ultimate comfort food this food, it’s:
- Creamy
- Pumpkin-y
- Savory
- Subtly sweet
- Tangy
- Perfectly spiced
- Warm
- Delicious
- Healthy
- satisfying
- Incredibly flavorful
This pumpkin shish barak make a delicious lunch or dinner and would be perfect served alongside some vermicelli rice and a hearty salad like my delicious winter green salad or my hearty wild zaatar hummus salad.
Make sure you check out my other delicious pumpkin recipe here!
If you give this recipe a try let me know by dropping a comment below and rating the recipe it would mean the world for me ! and don’t forget to snap a pic and tag me on my IG #annacookingconcept
Pumpkin Lebanese Shish Barak (Lebanese lamb dumplings)
Ingredients
For the shish barak dough: (make around 35 pieces)
- 1 ½ cup all purpose flour
- ½ tsp salt
- 3 tbsp olive oil
- ½ cup water
For the lamb filling:
- 250 g ground lamb you can use beef or mix of both also
- 4 tbsp pine nuts
- 1 small onion diced
- 2 garlic cloves minced
- 1 tsp seven spices
- 1 tsp allspice or sweet pepper
- ½ tsp cinnamon powder
- ¼ tsp black pepper
- 1 tsp salt
- 1 tsp smoked paprika
- 2 tbsp freshly chopped parsley
For the sauce:
- 3 tbsp butter
- 3 tbsp flour
- 1 cup milk cow, goat or any milk of your choice
- 2 cups vegetable broth or beef broth
- ¼ cup celery chopped.
- 3 cloves garlic minced.
- ½ cup pumpkin puree see notes
- 1 tsp dry sage
- 1 tbsp dry parsley
- ¼ tsp nutmeg
- ¼ tsp white pepper
- ½ tsp salt
- ¼ cup toasted pine nuts
Instructions
For the filling:
- Add little bit of olive oil and toast all your pine nuts until golden brown. remove from the pan and divide part for the filling and part for the sauce, set aside. In the same pan add the ground lamb and cook through breaking the big lumps with your wooden spoon, when the lamb is light brown add the onion and mix through cooking until onion is tender. Then add the garlic and mix it through until you smell the aroma of garlic, add all your seasonings and salt and mix and cook the mixture together on medium heat for couple of minutes until all water is evaporated, turn off the heat add the parsley and the pine nuts and mix it . set aside to cool down.
For the dough:
- First, we start by preparing the dough by combining all the ingredients and mix together in a mixer with the dough hook attached or by hand. Add the flour, salt and oil and mix, then add the water gradually and knead until you have a smooth and elastic texture. Wrap in plastic wrap and let it rest for around 30 minutes. (while the dough is resting you can start making the filling so I will have time to cool down)
- After the dough has rested, divide the dough into two parts. On a lightly floured surface, Roll out each part into a very thin layer (about 4mm thick). Using a cookie cutter or small coffee cup, cut small circles into the dough. Spread out each circle and add 1 tsp of the beef mixture on one side than close the other half pinching the sides to close them well. Then pinch the two ends of the dumpling together so it will look like tortellini. Repeat with your dough until it’s done.
- Now you can bake or fry your dumplings in three ways:
- Fry: fry your dumplings in deep pan with 2 cm oil on high heat until you have a golden-brown color. Remove and se aside on some paper towels to remove excess oil.
- Bake: place your dumplings into a non-stick baking pan sprayed with little bit oil. Bake in a 200C◦ preheated oven for about 12-15 minutes until lightly brown.
- After the dumplings are done set aside so we can prepare the sauce (see notes for freezing)
For the sauce:
- In a deep bowl whisk together the flour, milk and broth until you have a smooth mixture. Set aside.
- In large deep pan on medium heat, melt the butter then add the celery and stir for 3 minutes, then add the garlic and stir till it is fragrant. Add the milk mixture with the pumpkin puree and keep on whisking. It is really critical you keep on whisking the mixture until it start to boil and start to get a thick texture. About 10-15 minutes . add the seasoning, dry herbs and salt and mix well. Adjust to your liking.
- Add the cooked shish barak to the pot with the pine nuts and gently mix it together until everything is coated with the sauce. Cook the whole mixture together while gently stirring on low heat for 5 minutes.
- Turn off the heat and serve with some vermicelli rice. Enjoy!
Notes
- For the pumpkin puree: you can prepare the pumpkin at home by roasting them in oven or boiling with some water or even better steaming. Then after you remove the flesh and mash till you have a puree consistency. You can find it also in some grocery shops but make sure you buy the pumpkin puree and not confuse it with the pumpkin pie filling it is not the same.
- For freezing the dumplings: you can cook then freeze the dumplings, this way you only remove and dump in the sauce immediately. and you can freeze them in a tray raw then store them in a ziplock bag, and cook them whenever you need to use them in the recipe, bot ways works well, but I just prefer to freeze them without cooking it give a better crispy texture when I cook them fresh and put them in the sauce.
- Storage: you can enjoy this meal up to 3 days if stored well in the fridge but for the best result it’s better to enjoy it in the same day. When storing if you want to reheat it it’s better you add little bit of water just a splash to loosen up the sauce again.
- Lebanese vermicelli rice: this rice is a simple three ingredient staple Lebanese side dishes made with vermicelli pasta, basmati rice and some oil for cooking, if you want to know how to do it just check my Instagram story highlight under the name “vermicelli rice”.