Films by Gaidai with the participation of Georgy Vitsin. The complicated life of Georgy Vitsin

Of course, meat. It is desirable that it be lamb, that is, lamb meat no older than one year. True oriental gourmets prefer to let the lamb eat kebab in April, when it eats young green grass. Then its meat is particularly tender.

When buying lamb at the market, keep in mind that the flesh of lamb is pale red in color with light streaks of fat and has almost no smell. In a grown animal it is red and has a specific smell. Also, be careful when choosing fat tail fat. If you make a mistake and buy a low-quality one, then even a small addition can ruin it.

To prepare lula kebab you will need: for 1 kg of lamb (well, in extreme cases, young lamb) - 5 onions, 50-70 g of fat tail fat (it can be replaced butter or lard, unless, of course, there is a prejudice against pork), salt, pepper, lemon, herbs and spices to taste.

So, the ingredients for making lula kebab have been prepared, let’s begin.

The pulp of young lamb must be cleaned of tendons and films, washed and dried. Now the meat needs to be chopped. By classic recipe and the meat and fat tail fat along with the onion should be chopped very finely with an old dagger. If you don’t have it in your kitchen utensils, then a simple sharp knife will do. Supporters technical progress can grind these ingredients in a meat grinder or blender.

Mix the minced meat thoroughly with your hands, season with salt, pepper, squeezed lemon juice, chopped herbs and other spices. Pass the resulting mass through the meat grinder again and knead again. Photo: Depositphotos

To prevent lula kebabs from falling apart during cooking and sliding off the skewer, as often happens with inexperienced cooks, there are several proven techniques. First, you need to carefully beat the fresh one on a board for several minutes (if there is a lot of it, divide it into portions). Then the prepared mass will become viscous and elastic and will stick well to the skewers. But it’s still too early to string the cutlets onto sticks. The minced meat should stand for two hours in the cold, i.e. in the refrigerator.

Do not give in to the temptation to “strengthen” the minced meat by driving a raw egg into it, as you would for regular cutlets. Real oriental chefs never do this.

We begin the process of preparing lula kebabs. We make oblong sausages from minced meat, tapering towards the ends. Thread them carefully onto skewers. If this does not work, you can press the skewer into the side surface of the workpiece to its center and seal this axis tightly, bringing the edges of the minced meat together. It will be easier to make sausages if you periodically wet your palms with water.

The classic lula kebab should be baked over hot coals until an appetizing crust forms. Do not forget to turn the skewers often. If you pierce the finished lula kebab with a pointed match or toothpick, clear, aromatic juice should come out of it. This is a signal that the dish is ready. Lula kebab must be removed from the heat, otherwise the meat will dry out.

If there is no barbecue, then lula kebab can be cooked in the oven, having first warmed it up thoroughly, so that the surface of the minced meat immediately sets and hardens.

Kebabs are served hot, with pita bread, flatbreads and rings onions and no side dish in the form of fried potatoes or pasta.

Anyone who wants to feast on steaming, aromatic meat should go to the nearest market to buy a young lamb.

People's Artist of the USSR, actor Georgy Vitsin is probably known to every Russian moviegoer. His most popular screen image was the Coward from four comedies by Leonid Gaidai, starting with the film “Barbos the Dog and the Unusual Cross” and ending with the unforgettable “ Captive of the Caucasus" In addition, Vitsin starred in more than one hundred and fifty film projects, most often in comic roles, not counting voice acting. animated films and duplication of foreign, radio plays and theatrical roles. He was a great comic actor and will be remembered by the public forever. The cause of death of Georgy Vitsin was heart disease.

He was born in 1917, in the Finnish city of Terijoki, which has now become the territory of St. Petersburg. In infancy, he was transported with his family to Moscow, where his mother, who worked as an usher in the Hall of Columns of the House of Unions, often took the boy with her. From the age of 12, Georgy began to play school plays, more often - negative heroes. In 1933, he graduated from the Moscow seven-year school No. 26 and entered the Theater School at the Maly Theater, but was expelled “for a frivolous attitude towards educational process" In 1934, Vitsin resumed his studies at theater school at the Vakhtangov Theater, in 1935 he moved to Theater studio Moscow Art Theater Acting activity young Georgy Vitsin began at the Studio Theater under the direction of Khmelev, then, from 1936 to 1969, he worked on the stage of the Moscow drama theater named after Ermolova.

The actor’s film debut, as he admitted, was a role in Yutkevich’s film “Hello, Moscow!” in 1945, and not an episode in Esenstein’s film “Ivan the Terrible,” as his biographers believed. Already in the sports comedy “Replacement Player” in 1954, in the role of Vasya Vesnushkin, Vitsin attracted the attention of the audience, and in addition, he had serious roles as Gogol in the dramas “Composer Glinka” and “Belinsky”. In the theater they predicted a career as a dramatic actor, and Grigory Kozintsev invited him to audition for the film “Hamlet”. Everything changed by chance: filming with Leonid Gaidai took place earlier and Georgy Mikhailovich was cast in the role of the Coward. After that, he specialized only in comic roles, which, at times, many found almost brilliant.

IN privacy Georgy Vitsin was not at all the same person as he played on the screen. He never drank or smoked and was a vegetarian. He seriously practiced yoga and looked much younger than his age: he played 17-year-old Vesnushkin at the age of 37, and 25-year-old Balzaminov at 45. At the age of 19, he had an extraordinary romantic relationship with actress Dina Topoleva, a 35-year-old beauty who left her director husband for their love. Talented artist, Vitsin once created it sculptural portrait. Later, as the husband of the niece of the famous breeder Michurin, theater costume designer Tamara Fedorovna, Vitsin helped his ex-lover whatever I could: I went shopping, got medicine.

Vitsin had a sharply negative attitude towards his fame and said: “If fame creeps up, hide!” He was a conflict-free and pleasant person to talk to, but remained closed even to his colleagues. And they only learned about his heart disease in the theater when he had a heart attack on stage. By the year of his death - 2001, when he was 84 years old, Georgy Mikhailovich began to complain about his liver. He always ate little and loved nuts, which he fed to his pet parrots. The actor was upset when someone offered him help: “I can’t take it, because people give away their last.”

He fed stray animals in his yard and was always greeted near the entrance by a whole pack of dogs. Dogs and birds, to whom he also regularly carried bread crumbs, accompanied his coffin to the cemetery. After the death of this wonderful actor, ridiculous rumors appeared among the people about why Georgy Vitsin died: they said that he died of hunger. This was not true, because Georgy Mikhailovich’s daughter Natalya never left her father. He himself moved to an old “Khrushchev” in Starokonyushenny Lane, leaving Natalya a 3-room apartment in the center of the capital, and lived modestly, diligently avoiding other people’s attention and curiosity.

He is buried on Vagankovskoe cemetery Moscow.