Cholent (also known as Hamin) is a traditional Jewish stew which is simmered for 12 hours or more in the oven or crock pot . Cholent is eaten on Saturday for lunch and is a magic one-pot meal that can feed a big family.
The origin of Cholent comes from the Jewish traditional law that does not permit any labor on the Shabbath, which includes cooking. By preparing the stew on Friday and allowing it to slowly simmer, the family has a marvelous hot meal without working for it during the holy rest day.
There are many verisions for preparing Cholent. The basic includes beans, vegetables, brisket and barley. Also, it is common to add eggs on top. The stew and eggs get a deep brown color, and the house is filled with a wonderful comforting scent.
Personally, you will never find my cholent without potatoes, sweet potatoes, white and red beans, lots of pearl barley and a few chunks of brisket as well as two or three marrow bones (found at your local butcher), in my family the marrow (arguably the best part) was always saved for my mom who absolutely loves it.
Some people however add chicken, chickpeas, dried fruit, cinnamon, different vegetables and many other variations.
It’s important to let the dry beans soak in water for atleast a night before using them for this dish, this way they can absorb the water and soften up, as well as help your body to digest them better. To make it easier, I just freeze them after soaking and use them whenever I get to earge to spotaniously make some Cholent.
Sometimes, I also like to add some dough on top made from flour, oil, salt & pepper, this is cooked in the juices all night and gets an incredible flavour.
Here’s a close-up of the inside of the dough, see that beautiful orange color that absorbed all the flavors that floated all night in the pot?
Since the cooking is on low temprature for many hours, you might need to occasionally top it off with some more water to avoid it drying out.
Next to the Cholent, I like to serve a simple chopped salad, tomatoe, cucumber, red onion chopped small with some olive oil, lemon juice salt & pepper.
Most importantly, don’t make any plans for after lunch, other than a good long nap.
- 1 Cup red beans (soaked in water for 12 hours)
- 1 Cup white beans (soaked in water for 12 hours)
- 2 Cups pearl barley (washed until water runs clear)
- 3 Large onions, cut into cubes
- 2 Large onions, cut into thick rings
- 1 small onion, peeled and kept whole
- 10 Garlic cloves, peeled and kept whole
- 1 Garlic head, unpeeled and washed
- 2-3 (Orange) Sweet Potatoes, peeled
- 4-5 Large Potatoes, peeled
- 900g Brisket, cut into 4 pieces
- 4 Eggs
- 2-3 Marrow bowns
- 3 Dried majool dates, pit removed
- ¼ Cup vegetable oil
- 1.5 Tbsp powedered chicken bulion
- 1 Tbsp sweet paprika
- 1 Tbsp cumin
- 6 Tbsp tomatoe paste
- 2 Tbsp Date Honey
- 1 Tsp pepper
- 1 Tbsp salt
- 3 Cups of flour
- 1 Cup of water
- 1 tsp salt
- ½ tsp pepper
- Make ahead: Soak beans in warm water in seperate bowls, for 12 hours. Change water atleast twice.
- Preheat oven to 180 degrees celsius
- In a large, heavy pot that is oven safe, fry onion cubes until transparent, set aside
- In the same pot, brown meat from all sides, set aside
- While pot is still hot, add one cup of warm water and deglaze while scraping the brown bits with a wooden spoon. Remove the juices to a seperate bowl and add chicken builon, sweet paprika, cumin, tomatoe paste, date honey, pepper and salt. Mix well.
- Cover the bottom of the pot with the onion rings, this will prevent burning. On top add two poatoes, one sweet potatoe and two pieces of brisket. In between sprinkle a few garlic cloves and fried onions.
- On top of that, on one side the red and white beans, and next to them the pearl barley. add remaining poatoes, sweet potatoe, brisket, small peeled onion, marrow bones, whole garlic head, dates and fried onion. On the top add the eggs.
- If you're not adding dough, this is the time to pour the gravy, and fill water all the way to the top.
- If you are adding dough, mix ingredients, add water if needed, to get a wet sticky dough. Place it on top of everything and add gravy and water until half way of the dough is covered.
- Place in the pre-heated oven for 1.5hours and then lower the temperature to 100 and continue to cook for another 11 hours at least. Make sure to check if more water is needed every couple hours to avoid it from drying out.
- Serve warm from the oven and dig in!
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