Bhopal's answer to the gola kebab: ultra-tender minced buffalo or mutton wound onto skewers with cotton string ('sutli') that is snipped away before serving. It is judged by whether it collapses at the touch of a piece of bread.
Also known as: sutli kabab, suta kebab, bhopali sutli kebab, सुतली कबाब
Watch it made
Ingredients
- 500 g buffalo or mutton mince, triple-ground
- 40 g raw papaya paste
- 50 g fried onion paste
- 20 g roasted chana (gram) powder
- 1 tsp Bhopali garam masala, heavy on black cardamom
- 1 tbsp ginger-garlic paste
- 40 g ghee
- 1.25 tsp salt
- cotton string (sutli)
- green chutney and sliced onion, to serve
How to make it
- 1
Whip the mince with every ingredient except ghee and string until it drops lazily off a spoon, then chill 2 h.
- 2
Press a thin coat of the mixture along skewers with wet palms.
- 3
Wind cotton string snugly around each kebab from end to end, like reinforcing a fishing rod.
- 4
Roast over low coals 10-12 min, painting with ghee at each turn.
- 5
Slide the string off and let the kebab collapse gently onto the plate beside chutney and onions.
Pro tip: The Bhopal doneness test: pulled off its string, the kebab should slump like custard; if it stands up proudly, it was overbound and you have lost the melt.
