Stuffed Grape Leaves

1 1/4 lb ground turkey (or ground beef)
1 1/2 cups long grain rice (or Minute rice)
salt/pepper to taste
1 1/2 tsp cinnamon
6 tbsp melted butter or margarine (depends on how fatty the meat is, use less if more fat in meat)
Juice of 3 lemons
1 jar California grape leaves
1 28 oz can whole peeled tomatoes

Combine the ground meat, rice, salt/pepper, cinnamon and butter until well mixed.

Getting the leaves out of the jar can be tricky. If you squeeze some of the brine out of them while twisting the jar and pulling, sometimes that helps. The main thing is to try to not tear the leaves . Rinse them under lukewarm water and drain to remove any of the excess brine. Cut the tail off the leaves.

To fill the leaves: open a leaf until it is completely unfolded with the non-veiny side down (I don't know how else to describe that!) put a small amount of the meat mixture in the bottom center of the leaf, right above where you cut the stubby tail off. The amount you put in each leaf should be proportional to the size of the leaf so you don't over or under fill it. This takes a bit of practice, I would say rule of thumb would be 1-3 tbsp of the mixture, depending on the size of the leaf. Then fold the left and right sides over toward the center and roll up from the bottom until you get a little oblong shaped "package".

Put each filled leaf seam down in a large pot as close to each other as possible, you will get a couple layers.

Add the juice of the 3 lemons, then pour enough water to cover only the 1st row of the leaves. Add the juice only of the tomatoes from the can.

You will need a plate that fits into the pot to weigh the rolled grape leaves down, once all of the grape leaves are in the pot, place the plate on top of them now and give a little push. Add enough water to cover 1/4 to 1/2 inch above the top layer. Then add the tomatoes around the rim of the plate and cover the pot.

Bring to a high boil for 8 minutes
Then a medium boil for 15 minutes
When done, turn off heat and let set for 5-10 minutes.

Yield: 6-8 servings

Source: My mom's boss way back in the day. I've been making this basically my whole life, so I'd call it an "old family recipe"

Thoughts: This is my favorite dish of all time, hands down, and since it takes kind of a lot of time to make, I only really do it every once in a while. This was the first time I tried it with turkey instead of beef, and the taste wasn't too bad, but the turkey was definitely much drier than the beef usually turns out. Everyone should make this and pass along the recipe! Spread it like wildfire, people!!

Rating: 5 (of course!)