Skip to content
Handiہانڈیاردو
BBQ & kababsKarachi recipes

Gola Kabab Recipe

گولا کباب بنانے کا طریقہ

Karachi gola kabab: finely ground beef paste with fried onion and roasted besan, moulded on skewers, grilled soft and smoked with ghee.
WhatsApp
Illustration of Gola Kabab

Prep

30 min

Cook

20 min

Marinate / soak

4 hr

Serves

5

Difficulty

Takes practice

Spice

Hot

Gola kabab is the soft, melting kabab of Karachi's food streets, shaped into rough cylinders on skewers and grilled over coals. Unlike seekh kabab it is meant to be almost buttery inside, so the mince is ground twice to a smooth paste and rested for hours with tenderising ginger and spices. Fried onion and roasted besan give the flavour and hold it together, and a final coal smoke with ghee finishes it.

Ingredients

5 servings

For 5 servings

Measures

To finish

Method

  1. Fry the sliced onion in the oil on medium heat, stirring, until deep golden brown and crisp. Lift out, drain and cool. Keep the oil.

    ⏱ 12 min

  2. Dry-roast the besan in a pan on low heat, stirring, until it smells nutty and turns a shade darker.

    ⏱ 4 min

  3. Put the mince, fried onion, roasted besan, ginger-garlic paste, grated ginger, green chillies, salt and all the spices in a chopper. Grind to a smooth, sticky paste, in batches if needed.

  4. Add 2 tbsp of the onion frying oil and knead the mixture with your hand for a few minutes. Cover and refrigerate for at least 4 hours so it firms up and the flavours settle.

    ⏱ 240 min

  5. Light the coals and let them settle under white ash. Keep a bowl of water nearby to wet your hands.

    ⏱ 20 min

  6. With wet hands, press a lemon-sized ball of mince around a thick flat skewer into a fat cylinder about 4 inches long. Press firmly so it grips the skewer.

  7. Grill the skewers over the coals, turning gently every minute at first so the kabab sets on all sides, then every 2 minutes, until browned and just firm.

    ⏱ 10 min

  8. Slide the kababs into a pot, set a burning coal on foil in the middle, pour the melted ghee over the coal and cover tightly for the dum.

    ⏱ 5 min

  9. Serve hot with onion rings, lemon wedges and chutney.

Tips for the best result

  • Karachi kabab makers add 1 tbsp of raw papaya paste to the mince for extra softness. If you use it, rest the mixture no more than 3 hours.
  • Ask the butcher to grind the mince twice with some fat. Lean mince will not hold on the skewer and turns dry.
  • No coals? Shape the kababs without skewers and cook them on a hot greased tawa, turning often, then give the coal dum.

Common mistakes

  • Skipping the rest in the fridge. Warm, freshly ground mince is too soft to hold its shape and drops into the coals.
  • Overcooking. Gola kabab should be just set and soft inside; cooked until hard it loses the whole point.

How to serve

Serve with paratha or naan, imli chutney or hari chutney and plenty of onion rings.

Storing and reheating

Cooked kababs keep 2 days in the fridge. The raw mixture freezes well for up to 1 month; thaw overnight in the fridge before shaping.

Nutrition and cost

Worked out from the ingredients, not measured in a lab. Treat both as a rough guide.

Per serving Estimate

Calories
835kcal
Protein
37g
Fat
70g
Carbs
14g
Fibre
2.6g
Sodium
840mg

Estimated from USDA FoodData Central, SR Legacy (April 2018), public domain values for the raw ingredients (100% of the recipe by weight had data). Deep-frying oil is counted at 20%; bones and water lost in cooking are not subtracted, so bone-in and fried dishes can read high. Not medical advice. Method

Cost per servingEstimate

≈ Rs 285

Whole dish ≈ Rs 1,430 · 90% of ingredients by weight priced

From the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics weekly SPI, week ended 29 Oct 2026. Spices, herbs and some vegetables are not in the SPI and are left out unless you add your price, so the real cost is a little higher. How this works

Gola Kabab: questions people ask

Why does my gola kabab fall off the skewer?

The mince is too warm, too wet or not ground fine enough. Grind it to a sticky paste, chill it well, press it firmly onto a flat skewer and turn it quickly in the first minutes.

What is the difference between gola kabab and seekh kabab?

Seekh kabab is firmer, with a coarser mince and chopped onion. Gola kabab uses a very fine paste with fried onion and is cooked to be soft and melting.

Serve it with, and similar recipes

All BBQ and kabab recipes

Read this recipe in Urdu: گولا کباب بنانے کا طریقہ

https://handi.danixsoft.com/recipes/gola-kabab · Handi, DanixSoft