Çöp Şiş

Tiny pieces on soaked wooden twigs, cut small enough to cook in two minutes before the wood can burn.

Lamb. Not vegetarian — contains lamb.

Ingredients

• 700 g lamb shoulder, in 1.5 cm pieces
• 100 g lamb fat, in small pieces
• 1 onion, grated and squeezed for juice
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1 tablespoon dried thyme
• 2 teaspoons salt
• about 24 thin wooden skewers

Method

1. THE SKEWERS ARE WOOD AND THE MEAT IS CUT SMALL ENOUGH TO COOK IN TWO MINUTES, which is one decision rather than two. Çöp means twig, and the whole dish is built around the fact that a thin wooden stick over embers has about three minutes before it chars through and drops its load. So the pieces are a centimetre and a half -- half the size of a kuzu şiş cube -- and they are done in two. Cut to ordinary kebab size on the same sticks, the wood fails first and the meat lands in the fire. Metal skewers would solve it and make it a different dish: the point is many small sticks handed round, a couple of mouthfuls each.
2. THE STICKS ARE SOAKED THIRTY MINUTES AND IT IS NOT OPTIONAL. In cold water, fully submerged, weighted if they float. Dry wood over embers catches alight rather than charring slowly, and a stick that flames is a stick that burns through in forty seconds.
3. A PIECE OF FAT GOES BETWEEN EVERY TWO OR THREE PIECES OF MEAT. Small pieces have a lot of surface and very little mass, so they dry fast. The fat renders over them in the two minutes they are on the fire, and without it they come off as little dry nuggets.
4. THE HANDLE ENDS ARE KEPT OFF THE FIRE. The skewers are laid so the meat sits over the coals and the bare ends overhang the edge of the grill, resting on the rim. Laid flat across, the handles burn through and cannot be picked up.
5. THEY GO ON ALL AT ONCE AND COME OFF ALL AT ONCE. Two minutes means there is no managing them individually. The fire is ready, the skewers are lined up, and the whole lot goes on and is turned once together.
6. The wooden skewers SOAKED in cold water 30 MINUTES, fully submerged.
7. The lamb cut into small 1.5 cm pieces and the fat into smaller ones.
8. Mixed with the onion juice, olive oil, thyme and pepper. NOT salted yet. Left 2 HOURS.
9. The charcoal lit and burned down to embers.
10. The meat salted. Threaded onto the soaked sticks, 4 or 5 pieces each, with a PIECE OF FAT between every two or three.
11. About 3 cm of bare stick left at one end as a handle.
12. The skewers laid over the coals with the HANDLE ENDS OVERHANGING the edge of the grill, off the heat.
13. Cooked 1 MINUTE, turned once, and given 1 MINUTE more.
14. TESTED: a piece should be just cooked through. At this size a third minute makes them dry.
15. Lifted off by the cool handles onto flatbread.
16. Served at once, several sticks each, with sumac onion.

Our own recipe. This one was written for this site rather than taken from anywhere, so there is no source to point you at. The quantities and the order of the steps are choices, not the only way to do it.

Filed under Turkey · All recipes