Machanka (Pork Stew in the Minsk's Style)

http://www.marga.org/food/int/belarus/machanka.html

Machanka is a very traditional Belarusian dish of meat stewed in broth. It's traditionally eaten with pancakes. I found several versions of the dish, but decided on this one (Machanka in the Minsk's style) because I liked that it incorporated sour cream to the stew. Sour cream is a very traditional Belarusian staple, and I wanted to make sure that something I made featured it.

This stew if very rich so count on only being able to eat a little bit of it. It was surprisingly tasty, though, and we both very much enjoyed it.

Ingredients:

• 1 lb stewing pork
• 2 tbsp. butter
• 1 cup + 2 tbsp. beef or pork stock
• 1 onion
• 1 tbsp. flour
• 1 cup sour cream
• 2 bay leaves
• salt to taste

Instructions:

• Cut pork into bite-size pieces. Melt butter in a saucepan and fry the pork until dark. Add 1 cup of stock, bay leaves and salt, cover and cook for about 20 minutes or until the pork is half done.
• Meanwhile, in a separate saucepan, saute the flour for a couple of minutes. Add 2 tbsp. of stock and mix well. Strain and return to saucepan. Add sourcream and salt to taste. Mix well and cook over low heat for 5 to 10 minutes.
• Heat oven to 350F.
• Put pork in baking dish, cover with sour cream sauce and bake in oven for about 20 minutes or until done. Serve with pancakes.