Armenia

Today I am making borek. Boreg. Burek. I’m not going to argue about the spelling, it’s amazing not matter how you spell it anyway.

Borek has many different preparations – meat, cheese, spinach, a combination thereof, etc. I will be making a meat and cheese combination Borek.

I am adapting my preparation from a combination of two recipes, Heghineh’s Armenian Cooking blog and the Armenian Kitchen’s Detroit-style recipe.

You will need a baking dish and frying pan for this prep.

LET’S DO THIS:

  • 1 package of filo dough, thawed (you will use one or both rolls in the box depending on whether you are going for a more impressive prep*) (*it’s only impressive if you don’t mess it up…)
  • 1/4 pound ground lamb
  • 1/2 pound ground beef
  • 1 large onion, finely chopped
  • 2 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley
  • salt, black pepper, cayenne pepper, cinnamon, and paprika to taste
  • about 6 ounces of fresh mozzarella, shredded
  • 2 cloves of garlic, pressed
  • 2 ounces of crumbled feta cheese
  • 2 ounces of farmer’s cheese (an be substituted with Neufchâtel if farmer’s cheese is not readily available)
  • 1 egg
  • 2 tablespoons plain yogurt
  • About half a stick of butter, with two tablespoons reserved and the remainder melted

Total prep time for me was about 30 minutes (19:00 to 19:30), but your time may vary.

Here’s what you’ll do:

  • Preheat your oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit
  • Cook the onions and half of your garlic to soft and browning with 1 tablespoon of your reserved butter. Drain off any remaining moisture and set aside
This level of browning took from about 19:35 to 20:00
  • Cook the lamb and beef with the other tablespoon of reserved butter, drain off most of the excess fat
  • Mix back in the onions/garlic as well as the spices you are adding to taste and the parsley, remove from heat
  • Make the cheese mixture by combining the remaining garlic, three cheeses, egg, and yogurt in a bowl
Seriously difficult to not eat a spoonful of this
  • The next stage you have a bit of prep leeway on – you can make a pan of borek cut into squares or you can roll the dough to make spirals. If you’re doing a pan, place several layers of filo one at a time on the bottom, brushing melted butter between each (aa little less than half of one pack). First place the meat layer on top, then the cheese layer, then repeat the filo-butter layering process for the top. If you are rolling, DO NOT THROW AWAY THE PLASTIC SHEET the filo is rolled up with in the package, as you will need it for the spiraling. Arrange layers of filo and butter as so:
  • Place meat in a line on the bottom, then the cheese. Roll slowly, brushing on butter along the way, and spiral slowly as well to prevent breaking
  • IF YOU ARE ROLLING you have enough filling to make two rolls and you should use a whole pack of filo per roll. I made the mistake of using a half pack each and as you can see, both of my spirals split (one much worse than the other):
  • Bake about 30-45 minutes until golden

That’s it! Total time for prep and cook was about one hour (19:00 to 21:00).