Ezogelin Çorbası

Three starches at once — red lentils, bulgur and rice — each breaking down to a different degree.

Vegetarian, but not vegan — contains dairy (butter).

Ingredients

• 200 g red lentils
• 50 g fine bulgur
• 50 g rice
• 1 onion, finely chopped
• 3 cloves garlic, crushed
• 2 tablespoons tomato purée
• 1 tablespoon hot red pepper paste
• 1.6 litres water or light stock
• 3 tablespoons olive oil
• 40 g butter
• 2 teaspoons dried mint
• 2 teaspoons Aleppo pepper flakes
• 1 teaspoon ground cumin
• salt
• lemon wedges, to serve

Method

1. THREE STARCHES GO IN AT ONCE AND EACH BREAKS DOWN TO A DIFFERENT DEGREE. Red lentils collapse completely and become the body of the soup. Rice softens but holds its shape, so there are whole grains in the spoon. Fine bulgur swells and stays slightly firm, giving a faint grittiness against the smooth lentil. That three-way texture is what this soup is, and it is why the quantities are so lopsided -- two hundred grams of lentils to fifty each of the others. Made with lentils alone it is a smooth red lentil soup, which is a different and more ordinary thing.
2. THEY ALL GO IN TOGETHER AND NOT IN STAGES. Despite cooking at different rates, the three go in at the same time and cook for the same twenty-five minutes. That is deliberate: the lentils need that long to disintegrate, and the rice and bulgur arriving at merely tender in the same span is exactly the contrast wanted.
3. IT IS NOT BLENDED. Stirred hard at the end so the lentils break down further, but never put through a blender -- which would destroy the whole reason for the rice and bulgur. If it looks too rustic, it wants more stirring and another five minutes, not a machine.
4. THE DRIED MINT IS BLOOMED IN BUTTER AT THE END, NOT BOILED IN THE SOUP. Butter melted, pulled off the heat, the mint and Aleppo pepper stirred into it for a few seconds until the smell lifts, then poured over. Dried mint simmered for twenty-five minutes tastes of hay; thirty seconds in hot butter is where its flavour actually comes from, and this soup without it is unrecognisable.
5. THE PEPPER PASTE AND TOMATO PURÉE ARE FRIED FIRST. Two minutes in the oil with the onion and garlic, until the colour deepens and the raw tomato smell goes. Stirred into the water instead, they taste tinny and sit on top of the soup rather than in it.
6. The olive oil heated and the onion softened 8 MINUTES without colouring.
7. The garlic in for 1 MINUTE, then the tomato purée and pepper paste FRIED 2 MINUTES until darkened.
8. The lentils, bulgur and rice added ALL TOGETHER with the cumin and stirred for 1 MINUTE.
9. The water poured in and brought to the boil, then simmered 25 MINUTES, stirring now and then.
10. Salted, and STIRRED HARD for a minute so the lentils break down further. NOT blended.
11. The butter melted in a small pan until foaming and PULLED OFF THE HEAT.
12. The dried mint and Aleppo pepper stirred into the butter for a few SECONDS, until the smell lifts.
13. Poured over the soup and stirred through once.
14. TESTED: whole rice grains and a slight bulgur grittiness should both be findable in a spoonful of otherwise smooth soup.
15. Served with lemon wedges.

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