Echpochmak

Echpochmak is the everyday food of Tatarstan, a triangular pastry filled with raw meat, potato and onion, baked so the filling cooks in its own juices within the dough. The name means 'triangle' in Tatar. The meat is cut into small cubes (not ground), so each bite has visible pieces of beef or lamb alongside soft potato and sweet onion. The dough is a yeasted wheat dough, the triangle shape achieved by folding a round of dough into three sides pinched shut. Echpochmak is eaten across the Tatar and Bashkir regions of Russia, sold in bakeries and markets, and served at home with a bowl of broth (shulpa) on the side. It is one of the most ancient foods of the Turkic peoples of the Volga, predating the Russian conquest.

Golden, soft pastry shaped into a triangle, the filling a juicy mix of tender meat cubes, soft potato and sweet onion, cooked in their own steam within the dough. Eaten hot with a bowl of clear broth.

The technique uses raw filling that cooks inside the pastry. The dough is flour, milk, egg, butter and yeast, proved and rolled into rounds. The filling is raw meat cut into 5mm cubes, raw potato cut the same size, and chopped onion, mixed with salt, pepper and a little butter. The filling is placed on the dough round, which is folded into a triangle by bringing three edges up to meet at the centre, pinched shut leaving a small opening. A spoonful of hot broth is poured through the opening midway through baking, basting the filling from within. Baked at 200 degrees C for 35 to 40 minutes, the pastry browns while the filling steams in its own juices and the added broth. The small opening is what distinguishes echpochmak from sealed pies.