Mercimek Köftesi

The bulgur goes into the hot lentils off the heat and swells in the residual heat, never on the stove.

Vegan.

Ingredients

• 250 g red lentils
• 750 ml water
• 200 g fine bulgur
• 2 onions, finely chopped
• 3 tablespoons olive oil
• 2 tablespoons tomato purée
• 1 tablespoon hot red pepper paste
• 1 teaspoon ground cumin
• 2 teaspoons salt
• 6 spring onions, finely sliced
• a large bunch of parsley, chopped
• juice of 1 lemon
• lettuce leaves, to serve

Method

1. THE BULGUR GOES INTO THE HOT LENTILS OFF THE HEAT AND SWELLS IN THE RESIDUAL HEAT, never on the stove. The lentils are cooked to a thick purée, the pan comes off, the bulgur is stirred in and the lid goes on for twenty minutes. There is just enough liquid left in the lentils to hydrate it and just enough heat to do the job, and because nothing is boiling the grain swells gently and stays distinct. Cooked on the heat with the bulgur in, the pan catches almost immediately -- lentil purée with grain in it is one of the easiest things to scorch -- and the bulgur goes to paste. Twenty minutes under a lid off the heat gives a mixture that can be squeezed into shape.
2. THE LENTILS ARE COOKED UNTIL THEY COLLAPSE AND THEN SOME. Red lentils go soft at fifteen minutes and collapse to a purée at twenty-five, and it is the purée that is wanted: it has to act as the binder for two hundred grams of bulgur. Lentils still holding their shape give a mixture that crumbles.
3. THE WATER IS MEASURED AND NOT TOPPED UP. Seven hundred and fifty millilitres to two hundred and fifty grams of lentils, and nothing added afterwards. The amount left in the pan when the lentils are done is exactly what the bulgur needs; a generous hand with the water gives a sloppy mixture that will not hold, and there is no draining it off without losing the purée with it.
4. THE ONIONS ARE COOKED LONG AND SLOW FIRST. Twelve minutes in olive oil until genuinely soft and sweet, with the tomato and pepper pastes fried in after. This is the only cooked flavour in the dish -- everything added later is raw -- and softened for three minutes they stay sharp and dominate it.
5. THE SPRING ONION, PARSLEY AND LEMON GO IN COLD AND AT THE END, and the mixture must be cool first. Stirred into a warm mixture the parsley wilts and darkens and the spring onion goes limp. Cooled to room temperature, they stay crisp and green, and they are most of what the finished köfte tastes of.
6. The lentils rinsed and simmered in the MEASURED 750 ml of water 25 MINUTES, until completely COLLAPSED to a purée. No water added.
7. Meanwhile the onions cooked in the olive oil over a low heat 12 MINUTES until soft and sweet, then the tomato purée, pepper paste and cumin fried in 3 minutes.
8. The onion mixture and the salt stirred into the lentils.
9. THE PAN TAKEN OFF THE HEAT.
10. The bulgur stirred in and the LID PUT ON.
11. LEFT 20 MINUTES off the heat, undisturbed.
12. Stirred through and TESTED: the bulgur should be fully swollen and the mixture should hold together when squeezed.
13. Spread out and COOLED to room temperature -- not warm.
14. The spring onions, parsley and lemon juice folded in.
15. Tasted and corrected for salt and lemon.
16. Squeezed in the fist into small oval köfte, so they take the shape of the fingers.
17. Served cold on lettuce leaves. Keeps 3 days.

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