Fried Rice Kibbi-Kubbat Halab. كبة حلب

Have you thought of what you could do with leftover cooked rice? This is a traditional appetizer recipe that we make with boiled long grain rice, and we add saffron or turmeric to it while rice is boiling to give it a yellow color. We also add golden raisins and almonds to the filling. Sometimes, we add chopped parsley to the filling when cooled.

I was able to alter the recipe a little since I am using leftover rice, and the result was very delicious and successful.

Dough:

3 cups cooked rice, leftover, room temperature

2 eggs

Filling:

1 tablespoon vegetable oil

½ pond ground lamb or beef

½ cup onion, chopped

1 teaspoon salt

½ teaspoon Arabian spice (bahar)

¼ cup pine nuts, toasted

2 cups vegetable oil for frying

Heat oil in a sauté pan, and add the meat. Cook the meat for 5 minutes and add the onions, salt and spices and stir. Lower the heat to simmer and cook until onions are soft. Add the pine nuts and set the meat filling aside to cool.

Put rice and one egg in a food processor and process for a few minutes until rice becomes a soft dough. If the rice is still hard, add the second egg and pulse to make nice smooth dough. If dough has a lot of moisture, add cornstarch to the dough and mix.

To form the kubba, or kibbi, have a small bowl with vegetable oil to wet your hand for shaping the bubba.  Take a small piece of the dough the size of small egg. Roll it in your hands and make a hole in the middle to form a cup. Fill the hole with one teaspoon of the filling and seal it. Shape it like a football.

Heat 2 cups of oil in a small deep pot.  Drop 4 kubba in oil, and fry for about 3 minutes. Remove them with a slotted spoon and drain on a paper towel.

Serve them with pickles. You can freeze them, and reheat them in the oven when needed to serve.
For a vegetarian filling, saute onions and add peas and chopped mushrooms. Add salt and spices.
Cool before filling the dough. Drain the filling from any liquid.