Warak enab- juicy, tangy, herby, packages of goodness, these meat and rice stuffed grape leaves are a show stopping family favourite.

Jump to Recipe

Stuffed grape leaves, known in Egypt as warak enab, and elsewhere as warak diwali, warak areesh, dolma, dolmades, and many other names, is one of my all time favorites foods.

It is part of class of foods known in Arabic as mahshi- stuffed stuff. We love to stuff all types of vegetables with either meat and rice fillings, or vegan rice and herb options.

Among these dishes, warak enab is considered a top tier fan fav.

Time consuming to make, and are rapidly consumed, stuffed grape leaves are these perfect little juicy packages of love; Herby rice and ground meat enveloped in a tangy grape leaf and simmered in flavorful stock until tender.

Making stuffed grape leaves

Making stuffed grape leaves takes a good amount of time, but can be thankfully broken up into a few separate tasks:

• Making the stuffing, known as hashwa in Arabic;
• Preparing the grape leaves;
• Rolling the grape leaves; and
• Cooking the grape leaves

Making the stuffing

Making the stuffing for grape leaves is one of the quicker steps.

The stuffing here is made with rice, ground beef or lamb, chopped onions, garlic, and parsley, tomato paste and spices.

To expedite the process, I usually use my food processor to quickly mince the onions, parsley and garlic.

Then, combine that with your washed, short-grain rice, meat, tomato paste, and spices.

Mix well.

Preparing the grape leaves

This recipe uses jarred grape leaves. These grape leaves are picked then jarred in brine.

To prepare the leaves for cooking you will drain them of the brine and transfer to a large bowl. Cover with water and separate the leaves to clean them each from the brine. Swish the water around and dump it out a few times. Drain them once clean.

If you are lucky enough to have fresh grape leaves, you will blanch them for a minute in boiling water to soften them in preparation for stuffing.

Rolling your warak enab

Rolling the leaves is also pretty simple, once you get the hang of it.

Luckily if you are making a whole pot of these you will be getting lots of practice as you go!

Begin by placing a grape leaf shiny side down on your work surface, and trim off the stem. Don’t discard the stem we will toss those into the cooking pot later.

Place about a teaspoon of stuffing on the leaf, like so:

Then, tightly roll the bottom of the leaf upwards over the stuffing.

Now, tuck in the sides in the same way.

Finally, roll it up upwards tightly.

Stuffed grape leaves are best made small and tightly wrapped. It can take a bit of practice to get them uniform and tight, but it will taste great regardless!

Preparing the pot

Once you’ve rolled all your grape leaves, you can prepare your cooking pot.

If you have extra grape leaves, lay a few down on the bottom of the pot. This helps to prevent your warak enab from burning and sticking to the pot.

You can also line the pot with thinly-sliced vegetables.

Here, I lined the pot with thinly sliced potatoes, which I dusted lightly with salt.

On top of your leaves and veggies, begin arranging your stuffed grape leaves. Arrange them so they fit snuggly in the pot, in a spiral shape or whatever arrangement you prefer.

Keep adding the grape leaves in layers one over the other.

Add the stems and some garlic between the grape leaves for extra flavor.

Cooking stuffed grape leaves

If you have extra leaves you can cover the rolled leaves with a few, then pour broth over the leaves until they are just covered. If you don’t have enough broth just top it up with water.

Next, find a plate or pot lid that fits just inside the pot and lay it down over the grape leaves. The plate will weigh them down so they do not float and unroll.

Bring to a boil, then cover and cook over low heat for about an hour.

They are done when the leaves are tender and easily pull apart with a fork. Once they seem done, add lemon juice to the pot and cook for another 10 minutes.

Turn off heat and let them sit 10-15 minutes.

For serving you have two options. You can remove and arrange the grape leaves on a platter (retain the cooking liquid for reheating leftovers). If you’d like to invert the pot onto a platter instead, carefully pour off most of the cooking liquid (but don’t discard it!), cover the pot with the platter and quickly put carefully flip it

Serving stuffed grape leaves

For serving you have two options.

You can remove and arrange the grape leaves on a platter. Always retain the cooking liquid for reheating leftovers.

Or, if you’d like to invert the pot onto a platter instead, carefully pour off most of the cooking liquid into a bowl (but don’t discard it!), then cover the pot with a platter and quickly but carefully flip it upside down.

We love to have this with cucumber and yogurt salad, but is great with plain regular yogurt for dipping as well.