Sweet rice with raisins for funerals (kutia)

Sweet lean porridge with dried fruits (with raisins), which is served at funerals, is called kutia. Kutya can be prepared not only from the usual rice, it is also prepared from wheat grains: they are washed, soaked in water overnight, boiled until tender and mixed with honey or sugar diluted in a small amount of water, raisins, dried fruits, poppy seeds and nuts . Kutya from rice is prepared in the same way. Boil fluffy rice, then add diluted honey or sugar and raisins (washed, scalded and dried with a towel). Kutya at the funeral table is obligatory - it’s a tradition. In the first recipe, we suggest covering cooked rice with a sweet mixture with raisins heated in a frying pan. In the next two recipes, if the honey is liquid, we suggest simply pouring the mixture over the cooked rice and kneading. So, kutia recipes:

Recipe No. 1: Sweet rice for a funeral with raisins - the easiest way to prepare

Ingredients
: rice - 2 cups, water - 4 cups, butter - 70 grams, olive oil (optional) - 0.5 tablespoons, raisins (seedless) - 100 grams, sugar - 2 tablespoons, salt - a pinch.

Pour 4 glasses of water into a saucepan, add salt to this water (1.5 - 1 teaspoon of salt) and bring to a boil. Sort the raisins, remove stems and stems, wash them and pour boiling water over them. Raisins, of course, should be taken without seeds. Rinse the rice in cold water until the water runs clear.

When the water boils, throw the washed rice into the boiling water, cover the pan with a lid and place in the oven. Keep the rice in the oven for 20 minutes at 200 degrees.

Meanwhile, heat the frying pan. Keep the heat to low. Drizzle olive oil on it (0.5 tablespoons) and place the melted butter in the olive oil. Olive oil will protect the butter from burning, and it will also allow the butter to retain its flavor. And drain all the water from the steamed raisins (they should have swollen and softened well by this time). Pour the steamed raisins into the melted butter and stir, hold the raisins in the frying pan in the butter, stirring for 5 minutes.

Kutia recipe No. 3. Rice kutia

You will need:

250 g rice,
100 g raisins,
100 g almonds,
sugar,
cinnamon.

How to cook:

Wash the rice, add water and cook until tender, without stirring. Place in a colander and rinse with boiled cold water.

Scald almonds and raisins with boiling water. Grind the almonds a little.

We dilute sugar in a small volume of water.

Mix rice, almonds, cinnamon, raisins and pour sugar syrup.

Recipe No. 2: Sweet rice for a funeral with raisins, walnuts and honey

Ingredients

: rice - 2 cups, water - 4 cups, butter - 50 grams, honey - 4 tablespoons, raisins (seedless) - 100 grams, walnuts - 1 (or 2) cups, salt - a pinch.

Cooking method

: Cook the rice as indicated in recipe No. 1. Pour boiling water over the raisins and let them stand for 10 - 20 minutes. Next, everything is very simple: slightly heat the honey, if it is thick, dilute it with water - it should be liquid, it should flow in a stream. Chop the nuts finely with a knife. Combine honey, nuts, melted butter and raisins (drain raisins). Stir this mixture into the rice until it is evenly distributed.

Christmas kutia (sochivo) made from wheat

Our family’s favorite has always been just this one, real wheat kutia, which we happily prepare before every Christmas, and then spend several days finishing it, smacking our lips with pleasure. You can’t eat a lot of it, it’s very filling, so don’t cook too much.

Products:

0.5 liter jar of wheat (usually exfoliated wheat is specially sold on the market for this purpose);
1.5 liters of water;
a bag of poppy seeds;
a couple of guests of nuts;
a bag of raisins;
honey to taste.

How to cook juicy:

So, the wheat was washed, poured with water and set to cook like regular porridge. Chop the nuts (it’s tastier to fry them a little in the oven), dilute the honey with warm water, steam the raisins, grind the poppy seeds with a drop of water and sugar until white. Mix everything and the dressing is ready.

Boil the wheat very well so that the grains open up, otherwise it will be difficult to eat. When the wheat is cooked (it will still be semi-liquid), you can leave it to cool. I usually don’t season it all, so as not to sour, I take as much as necessary from the cauldron, add dried fruits to the soup (I like it to be in the soup, someone makes it thick, like colivo), add honey, poppy seeds, nuts, raisins (you can and without raisins), I dilute it to the desired sweetness and leave it for half an hour so that the wheat grains are well soaked. And that’s it - the treat is ready, invite your household to kutya - it’s delicious!

Cooked by Olga Bar

The basis of kutya - a funeral Orthodox dish - is any peeled grain. Most often, funeral porridge is prepared using wheat, barley or rice. Additives should be sweet. Most often, our ancestors used honey and water as an additive, but now you can safely add candied fruits and nuts, raisins, and poppy seeds to this type of porridge.

It is used to prepare rice for funerals, as well as on the Orthodox holidays of Christmas Eve and Epiphany. Why does funeral porridge take place on the table during these major religious holidays? This is how the ancestors paid tribute to the deceased and prepared food especially for them. It was believed that funeral porridge on these holidays would bring happiness and good luck to the house for the whole year. Plus, kutia is a symbol of immortality and eternal life.

Important! On Christmas Eve before Christmas, January 7, there should be sweet kutia on the table with a lot of additives. You can add more honey, nuts and raisins to the porridge. This should be a delicacy that will help you end the strict period of fasting with dignity. Epiphany kutia is traditionally not so sweet and rich, but still generous.

Rice kutia with raisins (funeral recipe)

Ingredients required: Half a glass of rice, two glasses of water; A handful of raisins, poppy seeds, dried apricots and prunes, candied fruits; A tablespoon of honey (can be replaced with sugar);

Soak the rice in water for two hours, then drain the water. Also soak the dried fruits that you decide to add to the porridge in water. They should stand for about thirty minutes, and then the dried fruits should be further boiled and the water drained. Finely chop the dried fruits and chop the nuts.

The rice must be boiled in a thick-bottomed pan; you can even use a frying pan. Bring the water to a boil, then turn the heat to low and cook the cereal until tender, do not stir, do not cover. When the water has evaporated, add dried fruits and a boatload of honey. Wait another two minutes, turn off the heat and add the nuts. It is recommended to bless the finished porridge in church and start the meal on Christmas Eve with a handful of porridge, immediately after prayer.

Read also: Mushroom spaghetti sauce

Cooking kutia in a slow cooker

Ingredients required: Two multi-cups of rice; Six multi-glasses of water; A teaspoon of sugar and a pinch of salt; 100 grams of almonds; Half a glass of poppy seeds; Half a glass of seedless raisins; Two tablespoons of sugar for rubbing the poppy seeds;

The cereal should be washed and soaked in water in the multicooker bowl. Add salt, close the lid and cook in the “Rice” or “Buckwheat” mode until cooked. Next, take out the porridge and transfer it to a regular saucepan, wait until the porridge cools down. Boil water and pour poppy seeds into it, let stand for an hour. Then drain the poppy seeds and grind with sugar. Soak the raisins in water for 30 minutes, then remove the moisture and roast the nuts. Add all this to the porridge and mix with honey. You can additionally decorate the kutia with candied fruits.

This with raisins, a funeral recipe in a slow cooker will allow you to cook the porridge quickly and not spend a lot of time on it. The saved minutes should be spent usefully: go to church before Christmas, prepare gifts for relatives, think about other traditional dishes of the Christmas Orthodox table. The kutya must be blessed at the morning service in church; if this did not work out, then, before serving, the porridge must be sprinkled with holy water. If there is no holy water at home, then when preparing a meal, you should pray.

Important! Sometimes there is kutya left after a meal, what to do with it in such a situation? You cannot throw away funeral porridge; if it remains, then eat a spoonful of porridge at your next meals, remembering your deceased ancestors. Do this until the porridge is over. In general, half a glass of cereal to two glasses of water is the amount of porridge designed for about thirty people.

Other subtleties of preparation and serving

In order for the grains of porridge, which is used to prepare kutia, to be thoroughly boiled, you must use only dishes with a thick bottom. Otherwise, the cereal may burn, which will ruin the entire taste of the dish. After combining all the components of the porridge, you can warm it up for another ten minutes. Our ancestors prepared a funeral dish in a clay pot, in which they heated it.

If the porridge turns out to be very thick, then it can be diluted with compote or even ordinary warm water. It is important to bring the porridge to the required consistency, otherwise it will lose its taste.

Traditionally, for kutia on Christmas Eve or Epiphany, it was customary to serve lean milk poured into a gravy boat. You can add milk to the dish as you wish. Remember that kutya is passed around the table in a circle, and everyone should eat a small teaspoon. Pay attention to the selection, which others can be prepared.

At Christmas, every housewife is obliged to prepare a dish called Kutya, the recipe for which is different in each region and family. The main ingredients of kutya are cereals, poppy seeds and honey. Initially, this festive dish was prepared from wheat, but now cereals such as pearl barley, rice, millet, barley and even peas are widely used. It is believed that the richer the ritual porridge, the more prosperous and generous the whole year will be. Therefore, various dried fruits, nuts, marmalade, candied fruits, cream and jam are often added to kutya. Rice kutia with raisins, the recipe for which is quite simple, turns out very tasty and is one of the most popular.

In order not to spoil the main Christmas dish, it is important to know how to cook kutia from rice correctly. We have compiled several important tips, following which you will get the desired result:

Cooked rice should be crumbly and in no case turn into a lump. Therefore, choose high-quality, not the cheapest, long-grain cereals (polished). This rice does not tend to stick together and acquires the necessary consistency.
Rinse the kutya rice thoroughly with cold water until the water runs clear. Usually you need to do this 4-6 times, sometimes more.
First, pour less liquid than indicated in the kutia recipe. This will prevent the rice grains from sticking together. Taste it and, if the middle is still cheese, add a little water or uzvar.
Honey must be liquid. The candied honey must be dissolved in a small amount of warm (NOT hot!) water and only then added to the kutya.
Always pour boiling water over raisins for a while to make them soft and juicy. It tastes better this way.

Recipe No. 3: Sweet rice for a funeral with raisins, dried apricots, honey, almonds and poppy seeds

Ingredients

: 2 cups of rice, 4 cups of water, 70 grams of butter, honey - 3-4 tablespoons, 0.5 cups of poppy seeds, 1-2 cups of almonds, 1 cup of dried apricots, 1 cup of rice.

This is the most complex recipe, it contains the most ingredients, but at the same time, it is the most delicious and most unusual. You can cook such rice even without being guided by such sad events as a funeral, but just like that, because it really is very tasty and healthy. In addition, this is a very bright dish. Almond shards and bright orange pieces of dried apricots look very attractive and very appetizing.

Cooking method

: Cook the rice as indicated in recipe No. 1. Wash the raisins, sort them and pour boiling water for 15 minutes, let them become soft. Also pour boiling water over the dried apricots - they also need to be softened. Finely chop the almonds into pieces with a knife. Honey should be liquid, you can warm it slightly and dilute it with water. Mix honey, poppy seeds, melted butter, raisins, chopped almonds, chopped dried apricots. Place this mixture on the rice and mix everything thoroughly. Can be served.

Rice kutia with raisins, simple recipe

For the funeral, you need to prepare kutya (kolivo) from rice, add raisins and honey to it, the rest is up to your wishes and financial capabilities. The better quality the rice is chosen, the more components are included in the composition, the tastier and juicier it is. The main thing is not to overcook it or turn it into a mush, add everything in the right order.

1.2 liters of water
600g round rice
200g raisins
3-4 spoons of honey

How to cook kutya (kolivo):

Be sure to thoroughly rinse the rice several times using running water. Pour rice into a thick-walled casserole, pour boiling water, add a little salt and set to cook. After boiling, simmer over low heat for about 10 minutes. During this time, wash the raisins, steam with a little boiling water to soften, and drain the water.

Pour a little hot water into the honey, dissolve it there, mix with raisins. Open the lid, pour in the contents, mix and cover for about 10 minutes. Then you can open the cauldron and cool thoroughly. Serve heaped on a plate and garnish with raisins.

This is the simplest recipe for funeral kutia; we’ll tell you how it can be improved and made tastier and more beautiful in the next recipe.

To prevent the grains of rice from sticking together, pour a spoonful of odorless vegetable oil or a piece of butter into the water when you cook;
for the same purpose, you can pour in more water, and after cooking, rinse through a colander with water;
If you doubt that rice can stick together, take long-grain rice, it definitely won’t stick together, but kutia tastes better with round rice.

TIPS FOR PREPARING KUTIA:

1) How to make rice for kutya crumbly

– Choose the right variety of rice.

Rice for kutya should not stick together into a solid lump. Therefore, you need to take rice that will remain crumbly after cooking. This is, firstly, long-grain rice (it is more likely to remain crumbly than short-grain rice), and secondly, it is not the cheapest rice. Good fluffy rice will not be cheap.

– Rice for cooking in bags is guaranteed to be perfect and fluffy.

If you buy rice for cooking in bags for kutya, it will definitely turn out crumbly. This rice is sold in packages that need to be cooked in a saucepan directly in plastic bags, just cook it according to the instructions on the package.

– Wash the rice thoroughly before cooking

under cold running water. This also helps make the rice fluffy. The water washing the rice should be clear, it should not be white.

– Pour a little less water.

In all the recipes we have given the ratio of water and rice during cooking: 2:1, that is, for one glass of rice we take 2 glasses of water, twice as much. And you take a little less water than in the indicated proportion, and in no case more. This will also make the rice more fluffy.

2) Honey for kutya should be liquid

– Crystallized honey can be slightly heated in a water bath - it will melt and become liquid. Just remember that you cannot boil honey or heat it too much in general - it then loses its beneficial properties.

– Honey can be replaced with sugar. If there is no honey, you can indeed replace it with sugar, as shown in recipe No. 1.

Basic principles of preparing funeral kutia

Funeral kutia is a sweet porridge that is prepared for the funeral of the dead. It also has the name “kolivo” - crumbly porridge. The more liquid one is called “sochivo” . It is prepared from cereal grains, and then dried fruits, nuts, poppy seeds, honey, etc. are added. Such kutia must be consecrated at a church service - a memorial service.

From time immemorial, the Orthodox Church has personified cereal grains as the deceased themselves, who must be interred so that their souls will be reborn and rise with new life. Just like grains.
Sweeteners in the form of honey and dried fruits mean the moral and spiritual stability of the living soul.

Combining together, porridge and sweet syrup characterize the entire essence of the immortal soul, maintaining the balance of the living and the dead. When one soul dies, it is resurrected and reborn again.

For funeral kutia, the cereal is cooked until cooked , it is advisable to make it crumbly.
The softened drying mixture is mixed with sweets, then with porridge. The basic algorithm is this.
Memorial kutia should always be sweet with the addition of dried fruits.
It is correct to cook cereals for kutia using uzvar - dried fruit compote.
Such a kutya must be consecrated in church ; if this is not possible, then at least sprinkle it with holy water with your own hands.
Kutia is always served cold.
Before eating this ritual dish, you need to say a prayer .
Kutya is prepared in small quantities and the dead are commemorated with it; until it runs out, it is strictly forbidden to throw away this funeral dish .