Guest blogger! Nick the Dolmas Maker!

Meet Nick P.

He is my friend, and he makes stuffed peppers, too. But not the way I do. He makes them the way he makes dolmas. Apparently, Nick likes stuffing foods inside of other foods. He also thinks it's cool when people teach other people how to stuff stuff. So. Here is Nick making dolmas:

In the fine Greek tradition of stuffing things inside of other things, I bring you....

Dolmas / Dolmathes, a tasty treat. They are grape leaves stuffed with various things, such as meta, rice, pine-nuts, couscous, whatever you happen to have around really. When making these with meat, you can choose any ground meat. When I was younger, we always ate venison, and these are a delicious vehicle for ground venison. Traditionally, you'll often find them made with ground lamg. This recipe uses beef, but you can pick your favorite meat, or you can forego the meat entirely and substitute pine nuts.

We will be using:
- 1 jar of grape leaves
- 1 lb. of ground meat
- 5 stalks of celery
- 2 med. onions
- 3 tbsp. butter or olive oil
- 1/2 c. uncooked rice (I used brown, but you can use white or even couscous)
- chicken stock or bouillon (enough for ~ 1 1/2 c. stock)
- 1/8 c. white wine (sake works in a pinch)
- 4 tbsp. lemon juice
- 1/4 c. parsley
- 1 1/2 tbsp. dried mint
- salt and pepper to taste (a pinch!)

First, let's get that rice going. I'm using a rice cooker because I am lazy and it makes brown rice perfectly. Set up shop and chop those onions with a medium chop.

Add your butter into a large skillet on low heat. Add the onions into your skillet, chop up your celery. Put the celery into the skillet, stir around, and continue to saute on low heat til the onions become slightly translucent.

When your onions get that succulent, clearish color, it's time to add your meat. I like to push the celery and onions toward the sides and make a "well" for the meat. Brown the ground meat and stir. The onions and celery are going to suck up the liquids.

Add in your parsley and mint once the meat has come to a nice brown. Stir, stir, stir on low heat...

Ding! Rice is done! Time to add it into our mix. The rice will generally soak up any remaining juices in the mix.

It's time to get your chicken broth/stock/bouillon going at this point. I usually have some frozen chicken stock cubes hanging around in the freezer (make stock every time you cook a chicken, it's worth it!). In the pot they go! You want to get your chicken broth/stock/broth to boil only for a second and then turn it off.

While your chicken juice is getting ready, go ahead and take your grape leaves out of the jar. You want to drain them of the brine they come in. Some people are adamant about washing them; I think the flavor out of the jar is pretty tasty.

Unroll the wads of grape leaves carefully. Pick a nice, big leaf and lay it out on your work surface. You want the "stem" to point up towards you, with the veiny side of the leaf facing up (the shiny side down.)

Put in about 1-2 spoon scoops of the meat mixture into the center of the leaf. Fold the sides in. Roll up! Congratulations, you've made a dolmas! Now, do it 40-more times and put them in a pan (or 2).

You aren't done yet, though. Once you have used up all your stuffing, wrapped your dolmas, and put them into a pan, you need to pour the chicken stock/broth/bouillon over the dolmas. Then, pour the white wine onto them and then, the lemon juice.

A quick note, you will always have more grape leaves than stuffing, so when going through the grape leave, pick out the biggest ones without holes in them for the actual dolmas. You will use the reject grape leaves to cover the stuffed ones in the pan. Put the pans in a 225 degree oven for about 1 hour.

After an hour, take out the dolmas. Remove the top layer of grape leaves that have now dried out. What you are left with is unadulterated delight. You may have the occasional dolmas that have dried out a big, but no worries, they are still good.

Enjoy!

(Me, again: Thanks, Nick! You are good at exchanging things! Swapping! Barter! Trade! I want to make these and nom them with the wine you gave me for the books I gave you and if you want to make a recipe I gave you and nom that with me with the books I gave you for the.... whoah. I am dizzy. Bye.)