Make a double batch of these lamb and rice-stuffed grape leaves (dolmas) because they require some time and work to prepare. These are typically vegetarian in restaurants, but I adore the lamb in them. Whatever you choose to use, the amount of rice you use will determine how much liquid you require.
| Prep Time: | 45 mins |
| Cook Time: | 45 mins |
| Total Time: | 1 hr 30 mins |
| Servings: | 8 |
| Yield: | 32 stuffed grape leaves |
Ingredients
- ½ pound ground lamb
- ½ cup uncooked long grain rice
- ¼ cup olive oil
- 2 tablespoons chopped fresh mint
- 1 tablespoon dried currants
- 1 tablespoon pine nuts
- 1 ½ teaspoons kosher salt
- 1 teaspoon ground black pepper
- ½ teaspoon ground cumin
- ¼ teaspoon ground cinnamon
- ¼ teaspoon dried oregano
- 1 large egg
- 1 (16 ounce) jar grape leaves
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- juice of one lemon
- 4 cups hot chicken broth
- 2 teaspoons olive oil, or as desired
Instructions
- Place ground lamb, rice, 1/4 cups olive oil, mint, currants, pine nuts, salt, pepper, cumin, cinnamon, oregano, and egg in a bowl. Mix together thoroughly with a fork. Cover and refrigerate until ready to use.
- Gently unroll and separate grape leaves. Rinse in cold water to remove brine. Drain. Reserve broken or less-than-perfect leaves to line pot.
- Place grape leaves on work surface with smooth side down (ribs of leaves up). Place a rounded tablespoon of lamb-rice filling near bottom-center of grape leaf. Fold bottom sections of leaf over mixture, fold over sides, and roll toward the top of the leaf into a firm cylinder. Don’t roll too tightly or leaves may burst when rice cooks.
- Drizzle 1 tablespoon olive oil into pot; line bottom of pot with 1 or 2 layers of reserved grape leaves. Place dolmas in pot by arranging them along the sides, then working toward the center to cover the bottom. Leave enough space between dolmas to allow for expansion, but close enough to hold their shapes when cooking. If necessary, stack another layer on top of the first so they all fit. Pour in lemon juice and 2 teaspoons olive oil.
- Invert a small plate and then a larger plate over the dolmas to weigh them down while they cook and prevent them from shifting. Pour in hot chicken broth. Bring to a simmer, uncovered, over medium-high heat. As soon as liquid is heated through and starting to bubble (2 to 4 minutes), reduce heat to low, cover the pot, and cook 35 minutes. Remove plates and check for doneness. Dolmas should look a bit puffed up, and a fork should pierce them easily. If not quite done, continue cooking without the weights: cover the pot and simmer until rice is tender, 10 to 15 minutes longer.
- Serve warm or chilled. Garnish with curls of lemon zest, if desired.
- You’ll have more grape leaves than you have filling for, so just choose the biggest, most perfect leaves for your dolmas. Use the extra leaves to line the pot for cooking.
Nutrition Facts
| Calories | 250 kcal |
| Carbohydrate | 18 g |
| Cholesterol | 45 mg |
| Dietary Fiber | 0 g |
| Protein | 10 g |
| Saturated Fat | 3 g |
| Sodium | 2485 mg |
| Sugars | 2 g |
| Fat | 16 g |
| Unsaturated Fat | 0 g |
Reviews
I begrudgingly made these after discovering I bought only the vine leaves, and not the stuff leaves at the supermarket. Made plenty of mistakes and substitutions along the way, and was very pleasantly surprised at how good these tasted in the end! Notes: Instead of lamb, I used beef. Doubled the recipe by accident and had too much filling left over. Didn’t have mint, so used frozen cilantro. Didn’t have oregano, so I used herbs de Provence, parsley, and paprika. Used whole cumin seeds instead of ground. Included more sultanas than the recipe called for. Guesstimated the stock entirely. Found I had to use a medium heat to keep the liquid boiling, so cooking time was much longer than expected. Stopped cooking when things tasted cooked.
In the past I would sautee the lamb, spices, herbs, and I would also add onion, which, this recipe has no onion, fully cook, then stuff the leaves and bake in a minimal amount of broth. With this recipe, the dolmas came out like they were boiled and I didn’t taste all the seasonings I had added. Otherwise, the ingredients are wonderful and it is a wholesome dish. I needed to add a yogurt sauce to spice it up.
These are amazing and I will definitely make them again. I made these using leaves from a grape vine in our garden, brined them for the day and then substituted them for the store bought leaves. I had too much filling vs leaves so rolled the leftover meat mix into meatballs and braised them alongside the dolmas. I needed to cook the dolmas for about ten extra minutes, probably because I didn’t soften them enough after picking them. This was such a delicious dish. Thank you for sharing! (Meatballs were great too).
I loved this recipe. I was a little hesitant and first about the rolling but once you do one or two you get into a rhythm and it goes much faster. I double the recipe because I could only buy 1 LB of lamb. This was my only problem. I thought, double the dry ingredients, double the wet. When the grape leaves were done, they were sitting in a soup of broth. But honestly, the plate on top kept everything together and I just fished them out and they were fine. Fantastic flavor and easy to make. Will make this again soon!
Loved it! I couldn’t find dried currants so I used Craisins. Time consuming but worth it.
Followed other reviewer and doubled up on filling – could have used more lemon juice – I added 2 lemons but think more would’ve been better.. but tasty as expected.
deliosos
what a Wonderful recipe, the only thing that did different was the pine nuts. “allergic” Fantastic.
This is my new “GO TO” for lamb and rice stuffed grape leaves. I’ve been making stuffed grape leaves for 50 years. Being a young bride, who was learning to cook, a lovely Lebanese lady shared her recipe and taught me to make them. Never thought of adding currants or cinnamon….yummy addition.
Excellent!
Excellent start for this standard recipe and thanks to Chef John. I added one onion and a couple of garlic cloves. Also added some dill. Could not find currants but will next time. Seems like there is so much flexibility with this because of the multitude of flavors which are endless. Also did not use olive oil because of previous comments from others about the fat from the lamb and they were correct. I need to add a little more time to creating the sauce that goes on this. Traditional sauce is an egg, lemon and broth juice which is whipped and spread over all.
Wow they were really good! I did a couple changes, tho. Since I had to grind the meat off some lamb chops for the ground lamb, I added in 2 cloves of garlic, 1/2 of a small onion, and 1/2 of a preserved lemon and ground them together. The lamb meat I used was fatty so I left out the olive oil. I had to cook them for 2 hours.
Excellent recipe I have made this a lot and my family and friends loved.
Good but I didn’t necessarily like it more than the vegetarian dolmas.
These had the most amazing flavor!
It was great! My middle eastern husband loved it! Didn’t have pine nuts or currants. Precooked the rice a bit and the meat a bit too. Doubled recipe. Had extra and not enough grape leaves ( was using the rest that we had) so stuffed gutted tomatoes and pepper. Cooked it for 45 minutes on low, as directed. About the grape leaves: I rinsed them but soaked them in a sieve with water in pan for a couple hours to get rid of the sour taste. I wasn’t in a hurry and this took me about 2 hours but it was my first time. They taste awesome! So proud!
Delicious! I did not use the currants, but kept to the recipe otherwise. Really nice flavors! I am no stranger to making/eating grape leaves and these were some of the best, BUT not better than my mom’s, lol. Thanks for another great recipe, Chef! 🙂
This is the first recipe I tried when I began making dolmas, and it was such a good one that it has remained the only recipe I’ve used since. I double the ingredients so there is enough filling for the entire jar of grape leaves. What I do differently from the recipe is I finely chop some onion and saute it in olive oil along with the rice before adding it to filling ingredients. I’ve found this reduces the cooking time needed for the rice. I consider this my definite go-to recipe for anytime I’m planning to make dolmas.
hands down the best stuffed grape leaves! it was hard to find a recipe that used lamb and an authentic spice mix. these were spot on! the only thing I would say is double the stuffing because you’ll have plenty of grape leaves in a jar.
This is a wonderful and flavorful recipe! MashaAllah! I did not have lamb and used halal beef instead. I also used Black Rice instead of processed white rice. It was great! MashaAllah! I will make sure to make a double batch in the future. InshaAllah
I added a little more mint, and less olive oil. They were so delicious!!