While the Mediterranean and Greek dolma uses grape leaves, Azeri Iran's signature dolma uses small whole eggplants — hollowed, blanched, and stuffed with a rice-lamb-herb mixture, then braised in a tomato-pomegranate sauce. Tabriz claims the dish; it is typically cooked together with stuffed pepper and tomato as the 'three sisters', stuffed with lamb, chickpeas and herbs (cilantro, mint, dill) and served with a yogurt-garlic sauce. The trio of three different stuffed vegetables — eggplant, pepper and tomato cooked together — is the classic Azeri 'üç bacı' (three sisters).
Whole baby eggplants hollowed out and stuffed with rice and lamb, simmered in saffron-tomato until the eggplant skin turns silky. The filling stays grainy; the eggplant melts at the touch of a spoon.
Salting hollowed eggplant for 30 minutes draws out the bitter solanine compounds — without this step the dolma tastes harsh. Saffron's crocin pigment is water-soluble, so the broth stains the eggplant skin a deep red-gold from the outside in.
Variations
Azeri dolma bademjan uses lamb and saffron; Iranian Tehrani version uses beef and turmeric; Caucasian Azerbaijan version adds dried mint to the rice — three rice fillings.
On the Palate
Where Dolma Bademjan sits in the Persian flavor cloud
Ingredients
How it's made
5 steps · 1 hour 30 min
- 115 min
Trim tops off 8 small eggplants (10cm long). Hollow with a thin spoon, leaving 5mm walls. Salt insides, drain 15 min, pat dry.
Watch outSalt the hollowed eggplant and let it drain the full 15 minutes, then pat dry — this pulls the bitterness out; skip it and the finished dolma tastes harsh.
- 23 min
Mix filling: 200g ground lamb, 100g rinsed basmati rice, 1 grated onion, 1 small bunch each chopped tarragon, mint, parsley, dill, 1 tsp salt, ½ tsp pepper.
- 35 min
Stuff each eggplant tightly; cap with reserved top.
Watch outStuff the rice-lamb filling in firmly but leave a little room at the top — the rice swells as it cooks and an over-packed eggplant will burst.
- 43 min
Arrange in a heavy pot. Mix 2 chopped tomatoes, 2 tbsp tomato paste, 100ml pomegranate molasses, 1 tbsp sugar, 600ml water. Pour over eggplants.
- 560 min
Cover and simmer over low heat 45-50 minutes until rice is cooked and eggplants are tender. Serve in bowls with the sauce ladled over.
Watch outSimmer low and covered until the rice is fully cooked and the eggplant gives to a spoon — the pomegranate broth should stain the skin deep red-gold from the outside.
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