Tongue in prune sauce

Tongue in prune sauce

Ingredients: 1 beef tongue, 4–5 bay leaves, 3 tbsp. l. sugar, 1 tbsp. l. 9% table vinegar, 10 peas of allspice; for the sauce: 200 g pitted prunes, 100 ml sweet red wine, 1 tbsp. l. 9% table vinegar, 1 tbsp. l. (heaped) starch, coarsely crushed black pepper and salt to taste.

Boil the tongue until soft for quite a long time, at least two hours. Then check if it is ready. To do this, you need to scratch the skin of the tongue with the tip of the knife: if it cracks easily, the tongue can be removed from the water. And clean it right away - it’s easier to do this under running cold water. The finished tongue should be cut crosswise into slices two centimeters thick.

But first you need to cook the sauce, for which you need to heat the sugar in a thick-walled pan until it caramelizes. As soon as you get a light brown syrup, pour a glass of water into it and let it simmer slowly until all the sugar has dissolved.

Pour in vinegar and starch diluted in wine. The sauce will thicken, and at this time we add prunes. Cook for no more than 3-4 minutes: the prunes should not be boiled.

So the sauce is ready and we'll go back to the tongue. Pieces of it can be fried in a steak frying pan - then stripes will appear on it, like after a grill grate. Place the prepared fried pieces of tongue on a plate and pour the sauce over them.

You've seen how easy it is to prepare, but it's also so delicious that you'll definitely want to repeat it.

Tongue in caper sauce

Ingredients: 1 beef tongue, 2 tbsp. l. olive oil, 100 g salted capers, 3-4 bay leaves, a few allspice peas, 1 tbsp. l. sweet paprika, 1/4 tsp. turmeric, 2 tbsp. l. tomato paste, 3 cloves crushed garlic, 1 tbsp. l. starch.

Boil and peel the tongue in the same way as in the previous recipe, then cut it in half lengthwise. As you can see, there is a minimum of action with the language itself - except wait until it cooks. But since the tongue is usually boiled in advance, no problems arise with this.

The caper sauce isn't too complicated either. Finely chopped or crushed garlic is fried in olive oil. When it is slightly browned, tomato paste is added and everything is fried with the addition of sugar. One and a half glasses of water are poured in, and as soon as the sauce boils, sweet paprika and turmeric are added - diluted in water so that there are no lumps.

Let the sauce simmer for 10 minutes over low heat, then add the capers—you can add them along with the brine in which you bought them. The sauce will only taste better with it.

The final touch: thicken the sauce with starch diluted in water - half a glass, no more. And don't forget to add spices.

Please note that capers with brine are already salty, so be very careful with salt.