TURKISH LENTIL SOUP

(Text in English is below. Türkçe tariff için burayi tiklayin)

This one is a real classic. Delicious yet so simple. 

Ingredients (serves 6 – 8 people):

1 glass of red lentil, washed and drained

1 medium onion, grated

1 small potato, grated

2 spoons of butter, 1 drop of olive oil

1 desert spoon of thick tomato paste (Turkish salça)

6 – 7 glasses of hot water (depending on how thick you would like your soup to be)

Spices to your liking: cumin, laurel, pepper, grounded red pepper

Juice of half a lemon (add more if you like sour)

Method:

1. Sauté the onions in the butter and olive oil for two minutes.
2. Add the salça and continue sautéing for a minute.
3. Add the potato, continue sautéing for a minute.
4. Add the lentil, the warm water, laurel (optional), lemon juice and boil till all the ingredients are soft, lost shape and mixed.
5. Once cooked, add the salt and the rest of the spices to your liking.

 

turkish lentil soup

LENTIL BALLS

This one is a classic...One of the favorites of the Turkish housewives as it is easy to make yet delicious. I always thought that it is so typical and known to everybody so I wouldn’t normally bother to post this but the other day a friend of mine told me that she’s never tried to make lentil balls at home because she always thought it is difficult to make. I decided to post then.

If you are vegetarian and haven’t heard of this recipe yet, I think it is something for you – I am sure you’ll love it!

Ingredients: (Serves 4 – 6)

1 glass of red lentil

1 glass of fine bulgur

2 medium sized onions, in small cubes

3 spoons of tomato paste (domates salçasi)

1 spoon of red pepper paste (biber salçasi)

Half a bundle of parsley, chopped fine

4 – 5 green onions, chopped fine

1 desert spoon of cumin

1 spoon of dried mint

Salt to your liking

4-5 spoons of olive oil

Juice of 1 – 2 lemons (depends on how sour you want your lentil balls to be!)

Method:

1. Wash the lentil, rinse and drain. Boil them in water which is just two fingers’ higher than the level of the lentils. The lentil should be very soft and loose its shape. However a bit of water must remain after the lentil is softened so that we can soak the bulgur in the soft lentil!! If the lentil has soaked all the water, add just a bit of warm water, let it cook for a minute or so. You can pour the bulgur in it, mix with the lentil and cover it and let it rest. Covering it is important for bulgur to get soft!
2. Sauté the onions till they turn pink in the olive oil.
3. Add the tomato and pepper paste to it and continue sautéing for two or three minutes more.
4. In the mean time, the bulgur and the lentils should be ready as well. 
5. With the help of a spoon mix the lentil, bulgur and the onion mix. You can also add the lemon juice, the salt and the spices at this moment. 
6. When the mixture gets a bit colder, you can add the legumes. Mix well. 
7. Time to give them meatball shapes!  

Step 1

Step 4

Step 3

a plate of lentil balls!

ready to be eaten! yummy yumm

MADIMAK (KNOTGRASS)

(English recipe is below. Madimak tarifi için burayi tiklayin)

I heard of its name but I have never tasted it before: Madimak, in Turkish and Knotgrass in English (I hope it is the correct translation for it). Two weeks ago, I have seen it in the open air market for the first time. And it was only last weekend that I bought some to try and make something of this plant. 

My mom who joined us to the market, said that her grandmother cooked this plant for them frequently and that they loved it. I was silly enough not to ask for its recipe but to be honest, I don’t bother anymore. I trust internet! Though, I have to admit that the number of recipes available out there becomes fewer, the more uncommon is the ingredient. I found that they make either dish or either soup of the knotgrass here in Turkey. Some add pastrami, some don’t. Some recipes talk about lentil some don’t. I added, again, carrot and pepper. And I added both lentil and pastrami. I was careful about the amount of the pastrami that I added but if you like you can add more.

All in all, the result was good!

One more thing that I would like to mention is that, I did not remove the stalk of the plant as no recipe I found on the net mentioned so. And I regret that because the stalks are quite rough and does not entirely become soft after half an hour cooking. Next time, I’ll remove the stem as much as I can and try to make soup of it. I think it is worth to try then! Indeed, the stalks need to be picked and thrown away as they do not get soft at all (I steam-cooked a handful of the knotgrass stalks separately in the pressure cooker for half an hour in order to see if they'd get soft at all, but they dont't). The lady at the bazaar also told me that the knotgrass dish made with the leaves only. So, the pictures you see below have the stalks which disturbed us while eating; but next time it'll be without! Anyway, I'd like to note that there's an alternative recipe (slighltly different) for knotgrass and it's with sujuk and bulgur. To see the recipe, please click here. 

Ingredients (serves 6)

Half a kilo knotgrass, the stalks are removed, the leaves washed and drained and chopped fine

knotgrass (madimak) chopped fine

Two medium sized onion, chopped

2 spoons of green lentil, boiled

1 carrot, sliced thin

1 green pepper, sliced thin

3 spoons of bulgur

5 slices of pastrami, chopped fine  

pastrami that needs to be chopped fine

2 glasses of warm water

3 spoons of olive oil

1 spoon of tomato paste (Turkish: domates salçası)

Half a spoon of or less pepper paste (Turkish: biber salçası)

Method:

1. Sauté the onions for 5 minutes in the olive oil. Add the carrot and pepper and sauté a few minutes more.
2. Add the tomato and pepper paste and sauté some more. Add the pastrami and continue sautéing.
3. Add the knotgrass, the bulgur and the green lentil by mixing it with the rest of the ingredients. Add warm water. Close the lid to cook for about half an hour.

step 2

step 3

     

happy ending!!!

happy ending!!!

            

Smakelijk!!!

SOUR AND HOT SPINACH ROOTS WITH GREEN LENTIL AND CHICKPEAS

(English text is below. Türkçe tarif için burayi tiklayin)

In Belgium, I used to buy spinach in plastic bags of 500 grams and washed. The only thing I needed to do was to open the bag and do whatever I want to do with it. Here in Turkey, the spinach that you bought from the open air market will be with its roots. And you have to clean them yourself. Most of the people that I know throw away the spinach roots that they’ve cut off from the spinach with their organic waste. 

But here’s one yummy and quick recipe with spinach roots that I got to learn from my mother. It is not something that I am used to from my mother’s kitchen though; it’s only recently that my mother got this recipe from a friend of hers. And when she made us try the dish, we could only appreciate the success of the recipe! I noticed only then that in the supermarkets, you have these roots in bags. So, it is not only when I want to use the roots I cut off from the spinach that I make this dish. When I feel like it, there are these bags of 500 grams or so. 

You may say that you don’t want to have spinach and its side products in a row of days, then the roots you can keep a few days in a box. I haven’t tried to freeze them yet; but if one day I try; I’ll also let you know! 

Below is the recipe. I added pepper and carrot too, but the original recipe doesn’t include these two ingredients. You are free to add them or not. This time I forgot to boil lentil but that’s not too bad either. If you say, “oh, my dish won’t be perfect without lentil”, you could still boil and add them to the dish later on. 

One more thing that I’d like to say: we like to make things sour sometimes. A bowl of lentil soup? We add a few drops of lemon juice. We make bulgur salad called “Kısır” and to it we add a few drops of lemon juice. The main salad dressing in Turkey is a mixture of olive oil, salt and of course lemon juice. I observed from my Belgian husband and Belgian family or friends that sour is not very much liked there. With this recipe, you can limit the amount of lemon juice to try if you haven’t yet or totally disregard it. What makes the recipe hot is the red pepper paste that I use. If the dish is a bit hot, it's also very nice!

Ingredients (Serves 2 small plates)

200 grams spinach roots; carefully washed and drained

spinach roots, washed and drained

Half a glass of chickpeas, boiled and drained

2 spoons of lentil, boiled and drained

1 desert spoon tomato and red pepper paste (two types of “salça” as we call them)

1 small onion, chopped

1 green pepper, chopped (the original recipe does not include pepper, however I added some and it’s still nice with it)

Half a carrot, sliced thin (see comment above for the pepper)

onion, carrot, pepper and salça (tomato paste)

 



2-3 spoons olive oil

Juice of half a lemon
Half a glass of warm water

Salt to your liking

Method:

1. Sauté the chopped onion on medium fire for about 2 minutes.
2. Add the pepper and the carrots and stir for 2 minutes
3. Add the paste and stir for 2 to 3 minutes till the paste lost its smell.
4. Add the lentil and the chickpeas. Bring to low fire, stir a few times.
5. Add the spinach roots.  Add the lemon juice. Add the water. Close the lid. 10 to 15 minutes should be enough.

Ready to cook for 10 to 15 minutes

The dish is ready when you think your spinach roots are ready (depending on how soft you like them)

happy ending!!!

Enjoy!!!