What is matbuha, how to cook at home. Nutritional value, beneficial properties and possible negative effects on the body. Use in cooking, recipes.
Matbuha is a spicy vegetable sauce of Moroccan cuisine, the main ingredients of which are peppers and tomatoes. It is now considered Israel's national sauce. The texture is pasty, the structure is heterogeneous, there are pieces of vegetables; color - red, orange; the taste is spicy and pungent; aroma - peppery, sweetish. The name "matbuha" is also used to refer to a vegetable stew.
How is matbuha sauce made?
There is no single recipe for seasoning. Every family and every cook has its own way of preparing matbuha. If absolutely all compositions contain fleshy tomatoes, then the types of pepper change. You can take Bulgarian sweet varieties or juicy, Californian ones, add paprika or chili.
Surely, initially the sauce had a very spicy taste. The purpose of the seasonings, the recipe of which was developed in the era of the lack of refrigerators, was to prevent spoilage and suppress pathogenic flora, if it had already been introduced into the dish. Later, when the possibility of long-term storage appeared, they began to experiment with the taste of matbuh sauce, making it sweeter or more spicy.
How to cook matbuha:
- Homogeneous sauce … The stalks, partitions and seeds are removed from bell peppers, and only the stalk is removed from chili. All vegetables are washed with running water, 2 tomatoes and 4 red bell peppers are interrupted with a blender until mushy and the contents of the bowl are poured into an enamel saucepan. Fried in a pan in sunflower oil 4 chili, cut into rings, and garlic teeth of one head, cut into wedges. The roast is chopped in a blender and also poured into a saucepan, everything is boiled over low heat until almost all the liquid has evaporated. It is imperative to stir, otherwise it will burn. Before turning off, add sugar (1 tbsp. L.), Salt and paprika powder to taste. Other seasonings can be added, especially if long-term storage is not planned.
- Hot sauce … If the seasoning is served as a side dish, matbuha is prepared as a stew. 2 kg of tomatoes are dipped in boiling water for 1-2 minutes to remove the skin, and cut into cubes. The stalk is removed from the bitter chili, 3 pods are cut and also sent to the saucepan to the tomatoes. Garlic (4 tablespoons) is crushed with a crusher and everything is evaporated on the fire until a pasty state for at least 1 hour. Californian crunchy peppers (2 pcs.) Cut into large squares, after removing the partitions and seeds, pour in 2 tbsp. l. tomato paste and 1 tbsp. l. olive oil. Stir and stew until the vegetable pieces begin to soften. Immediately turn off, remove from heat. Salt and, if necessary, pepper, just before serving.
- With onions … To prepare matbuha with a bitter taste, add onions to the ingredients. Onions or white onions are used, the taste has to be determined empirically. In a thick-walled cast iron, sunflower oil is heated and half-rings of onion (200 g) are fried until golden brown, adding paprika powder (1 tsp). Pour pieces of Bulgarian hot juicy green or red pepper (200 g) into the same saucepan, stir for 5 minutes. Pour 4-5 chopped tomatoes and 4 cloves of crushed garlic, chopped hot pepper. When all the vegetables become soft, the container is removed from the heat, brought to a homogeneous state with a hand blender, salt and pepper. The seasoning is served cold.
- With chicken broth … It takes quite a bit - 4 tbsp. l. Fry all types of peppers in sunflower oil, pre-cut into cubes (3 Bulgarian greens, 1 green bitter without a stem, 1 red paprika) for 3 minutes, add halves of overripe tomatoes (3 kg), without removing the skins, a large garlic head (after cleaning husks and cutting the slices in half), all seasonings - 2 tbsp. l. paprika, 0.5 tsp bitter black pepper, 1 tsp. salt, 1 tbsp. l. Sahara. Cook covered until all the vegetables are tender, and then evaporate, stirring constantly, over very low heat so as not to burn. When the spoon turns with difficulty, pour in the broth, mix again, remove from heat and cool. Store in the refrigerator.
- Sauce for the winter … To prepare matbukha, you can use recipe number 3. Only in this case the number of ingredients is increased, otherwise there is no need to contact. Tomatoes need 2 kg, bell peppers - 4-5 pcs., Bitter - 3 pcs., Onions - 1 kg, a head of garlic. Vegetables are not just brought to softness, but boiled; not only salt and pepper are added as flavor enhancers, but also spices - cumin and coriander. After grinding with a blender, bring to a boil again. Seasoning is laid out hot on sterilized jars, the surface is poured with sunflower oil.
Matbuha sauce is made by small private companies. The production lines are equipped with devices for cutting and washing vegetables, mixers, vacuum chambers for heat treatment and devices for packaging. They are laid out in flat jars made of food-grade plastic with a capacity of 250 ml. Minimum ingredients: 2 types of pepper - Bulgarian and chili, tomatoes, tomato paste, sugar, salt. The types of preservatives and stabilizers are indicated on the label. The structure is pasty, completely homogeneous.
It is very difficult to buy matbuha in supermarkets outside Israel. The seasoning is not in great demand. But private suppliers take orders over the internet. Whether it is worth the risk and ordering a product, not knowing how it was stored, everyone decides for himself.
Composition and calorie content of matbukh sauce
Pictured is matbuha sauce
The vitamin and mineral composition of the sauce depends on the recipe, proportions and type of ingredients. Low nutritional value. The seasoning made by stewing in tomato juice has a calorie content of 60 kcal per 100 g.
The calorie content of matbuha with vegetable oil is 79 kcal per 100 g, of which:
- Proteins - 1.5 g;
- Fat - 1.5 g;
- Carbohydrates - 10.3 g;
- Dietary fiber - 1.2 g;
Vitamins prevailing in the seasoning: ascorbic acid, choline, lycopene, nicotinic acid, beta-carotene. The mineral composition of matbuha contains a large amount of sodium, potassium, phosphorus, magnesium, silicon, iron, zinc, manganese. Despite the fact that the product is not related to the sea, it contains a small amount of iodine - due to the sweet pepper. There are 12 types of irreplaceable amino acids with a predominance of leucine, nonessential - 8, most of all glutamic and aspartic acids. And also the sauce contains organic acids (malic, citric), pectins, tannins.
Useful properties of matbuha
Spicy seasoning activates the digestive processes, increases the speed of peristalsis. The salt used in cooking helps to retain precious moisture and maintain water and electrolyte balance, which is very important in the regions where the sauce was made.
The benefits of matbuha for the body:
- This tasty product stimulates the production of happiness hormones - norepinephrine and serotonin, prevents the development of depression, helps to cope with nervous excitement, stabilize the emotional background, and improves falling asleep.
- Suppresses the activity of pathogenic microorganisms, reduces the likelihood of developing inflammatory processes - stomatitis and periodontal disease.
- Increases the general tone of the body, accelerates blood circulation. Blood pressure stops “jumping” and becomes stable.
- Improves impulse conduction, memory function and coordination.
- Due to the high amount of ascorbic acid, it increases immunity, reduces the incidence of diseases during the season of epidemics, and replenishes the vitamin and mineral reserve of the body.
Women who regularly introduced matbuha into the daily menu noted that PMS began to bother less often, and the menstrual cycle returned to normal. For men, the products that make up the sauce - hot peppers and tomatoes - are aphrodisiacs. The stimulating effect increases sexual desire and stimulates the production of semen.
It is worth noting the antioxidant effect of matbuha due to lycopene, a substance that is found in tomatoes and does not decompose during heat treatment. The removal of free radicals traveling in the lumen of the intestine and in the circulatory system is accelerated, malignancy is suppressed and the risk of developing intestinal cancer in all parts and mammary glands is reduced.
