More dolmas

I realized a few days ago that the leaves on the half-dozen grape vines that grow in our yard (they're table grapes) were still bright green and perfect-looking. On Friday I went out and cut four dozen of the best ones and blanched them in a steamer pot.

Then I made a rice filling for them to make grape-leaf dolmas — feuilles de vigne farcies in French. The filling is based on this recipe, but I adapted it by using crushed pistachios instead of pine nuts, chopped raisins rather than currants, and dill instead of mint. I put in less cinnamon than called for, and I added some spices including ground fennel seed and cayenne pepper. I also added two beaten eggs to the stuffing to make it "stickier" and easier to work with.

Rice stuffing for Dolmas

1¼ cups (150 g) raw rice
1 onion, finely chopped
2 Tbsp. olive oil
2 cups chicken broth (or water)
½ cup toasted pine nuts
¼ cup dried currants (tiny raisins)
¼ cup (or more) chopped fresh parsley
¼ cup (or more) chopped fresh mint
1½ tsp. cinnamon
½ tsp. allspice
3 Tbsp. white wine
salt and pepper to taste
1 lemon (for the juice and the rind)

Cook the onion in olive oil until it softens. Add the rice and cook it in the olive oil for a couple of minutes. Add the broth and cook on low heat until the liquid is absorbed, stirring occasionally. The rice doesn't need to be completely cooked at this point, because it will cook later for quite a while inside the grape leaves.

Toast the pine nuts and add them to the warm rice along with with the currants (raisins), herbs, and spices. Mix well and and add the juice of a lemon and a little white wine — save the lemon rind to cook with the stuffed leaves. Season the rice mixture with salt and pepper, stir well, and let cool before filling and folding the grape leaves.

The stuffed leaves cooked for about an hour in a 160ºC / 320ºF oven, covered with some olive oil, chicken broth, and lemon juice. Vegetable broth or just water would be a good cooking liquid too, but don't leave out the olive oil and lemon juice. And don't let them boil too hard. We ate the dolmas warm but not hot, after they came out of the oven and cooled down. They're good with a yogurt-cucumber sauce like Greek tzatziki. See this post from 2010.