Christmas Guruli Ghvezeli recipe1

The introduction

Hello everyone, I hope, that you are all doing just fine!

In this article I want to tell you about this recipe, which is called Christmas pie or Christmas Guruli Ghvezeli as they call it in Georgian.

Christmas Guruli Ghvezeli is a  traditional dish prepared on Christmas eve and it’s eaten on Christmas. It’s more popular in the western Georgia, than in the eastern one and you won’t usually see the Guruli Ghvezeli in the eastern Georgia on Christmas or on any other holiday feasts. It’s obvious, too, because it’s called “Guruli” and Guria is a region in the western part of Georgia and it’s said, that the pie is from there from the origin.

Well, anyways, I didn’t really know anything about this Guruli Ghvezeli until just recently, when my friend’s mother prepared it on Christmas and sent them to her and we tasted the Guruli Ghvezeli then. It’s a little bit strange, however, it’s still delicious in its own way. So let me tell you about the preparation of this Christmas Guruli Ghvezeli.

Christmas Guruli Ghvezeli recipe no.1

Ingredients:

• Egg yolk, 1 pc
• Hard boiled eggs, 1-2 medium for each pie
• Dough, 1 kilogramme
• Cheese, 800 grams

Preparation process

So, for the Christmas Guruli Ghvezeli you will need a normal yeast-based dough, which is sold in the bakeries in Georgia and you can just buy the dough there and the 500 grams of dough is about 50 tetris up to 1 laris cost. It all depends on where you buy the dough. If you buy it in the usual bakeries, you might get it as low as those 50 tetris, however, there are places, where it costs 80 tetris or 1 Lari, etc. well, you can either buy the frozen dough, however, there’s no usual dough sold frozen in the supermarkets, their dough is another type of dough, though if you are desperate, you can still use that dough.

Anyways, then comes the filling. The cheese you buy should be fresh and not very salty, just like you buy it for Khachapuri. And so, you can bake the Christmas Guruli Ghvezeli in some different shapes, however, people mainly bake it in oval shape or semilunar shape.

As they say, you should prepare that amount of Christmas Guruli Ghvezeli how many people there are in your house and the size doesn’t really matter, you can bake small ones or larger ones, however, the size is mainly normal and enough for one person as it should be.

Well, the bought dough is already  ready to be used, so that it doesn’t need anything, but to cut it into smaller pieces of dough. You should make some small balls from the dough and put them like that for about 10-15 minutes, so that they will kind of get larger in  a way.

In the meantime, you should boil the eggs. Well, it doesn’t need much time, you should just put the eggs into a small saucepan filled with water and wait until the water boils and then you should wait about 5-7 minutes until the eggs are ready, so that they are hard boiled.

Then you can spill the water out and have the eggs in cold water, so that they can get cold and it will be easier to peel them that way.

After you have peeled the eggs, you can cut them into halves or in those sizes and shapes, that you want them to be.

Meanwhile, you can shred the cheese on the shredder or in the chopper-blender, which I pretty much adore, because it makes everything easier to prepare.

Well, you should now roll the dough pieces out on the table. If you are preparing the semilunar shaped pies, then you should put the cheese and cut eggs on one side of the dough and then you should cover it with the empty part of the dough and seal them. For it to be easier, you can just prepare the Guruli Ghvezeli directly on the baking pan greased with oil, it’s more comfortable for some people, I guess. you should just take the rolled out dough pieces and put them on the baking pan and then put the fillings in them and seal them. If you are not preparing the semilunar shaped Guruli Ghvezelis, then you can just put the filling inside and seal them and make it shaped just like you want them to be.

After you have prepared all the Guruli Ghvezelis, you should just take that egg yolk and spread it on top of those Guruli Ghvezelis.

Then you can preheat the oven on 180 degrees Celsius and put the baking pan with Guruli Ghvezelis into it for about 20-25 minutes. And you should check them from time to time, so that they don’t get burned somehow.

Well, this recipe of Christmas Guruli Ghvezeli can be one of my favourites, because it doesn’t need the dough to be prepared by me, I mean, I can go and buy the already prepared dough in the bakeries or Tones, which are the clay things, where they bake Shoti and Lavashi and bread, in general, or I can go and buy that frozen dough, though I know , that it’s not exactly that yeast-based dough, which people usually use to prepare this Christmas Guruli Ghvezelis, however, it’s still a dough and if you don’t bake it on a very high temperature and if you bake it for less time, then the Ghvezeli will be just similar to that one prepared with the yeast-based dough.

Anyways, you should know, that this Christmas Guruli Ghvezeli is a traditional thing in Georgia and especially in the western parts of Georgia, so that if you happen to be there on Christmas, you should anticipate to taste it somewhere in some families. However, they are sold in many bakeries and large supermarkets and if you don’t have a chance to have it in families as a guest, you can buy those Christmas Guruli Ghvezeli in those bakeries and large supermarkets and taste them.

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