Muğla Halkası

The fat is olive oil rather than butter, and lemon juice is what brings the dough together.

Egg. Vegetarian, but not vegan — contains egg, dairy (yoghurt).

Ingredients

• 500 g plain flour
• 200 ml olive oil
• 150 g thick yoghurt
• 1 egg
• 100 g caster sugar
• juice of 1 lemon
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• ¼ teaspoon salt
• 1 egg yolk, for glazing
• 4 tablespoons sesame seeds

Method

1. THE FAT IS OLIVE OIL RATHER THAN BUTTER, and in a biscuit that is not a small substitution. Two hundred millilitres of it. Butter is solid when it goes in, so it leaves pockets that give a short, crumbling texture; oil coats the flour evenly and gives something denser and more tender that bends slightly before it breaks. It also means the dough can be mixed in one bowl with a spoon -- there is nothing to cream and nothing to keep cold -- and that the biscuits keep for a fortnight without going stale, because there is no water in the fat.
2. LEMON JUICE IS WHAT BRINGS THE DOUGH TOGETHER. The juice of a whole lemon, going in with the yoghurt. Between them they provide all the liquid, and the acid reacts with the baking powder to give the lift -- there is no milk or water anywhere in it. The taste is noticeably sharp against the oil, which is the point.
3. IT IS A RING AND THE HOLE MUST BE GENEROUS. A rope joined into a circle, with a hole you could put two fingers through. These spread as they bake, and a mean hole closes up entirely, leaving a solid disc with a thick middle that is still soft when the edges are done.
4. THE DOUGH IS MIXED ONLY UNTIL IT COMES TOGETHER. An oil dough worked hard goes tough and greasy. Stirred to a shaggy mass, then brought together with the hands in a few turns and shaped at once -- it does not need resting or chilling.
5. THEY ARE BAKED MODERATELY AND COME OUT SOFT. 170°C for twenty minutes to a pale gold; they firm as they cool. Baked until crisp in the oven they are hard as stones cold, which is the usual way these go wrong.
6. The flour, sugar, baking powder and salt stirred together.
7. The olive oil, yoghurt, egg and LEMON JUICE added.
8. Stirred and then brought together with the hands only UNTIL IT COMES TOGETHER. Not kneaded.
9. Rolled into 24 ropes about 12 cm long, each joined into a RING with a GENEROUS hole.
10. Set on lined trays, brushed with egg yolk and dipped face-down in sesame seeds.
11. Baked at 170°C for 20 MINUTES, to a PALE GOLD. They will be soft.
12. COOLED COMPLETELY on a rack -- they firm as they cool.
13. TESTED cold: they should be firm but bend slightly before breaking. Rock-hard means they were baked until crisp.
14. Keeps 2 weeks in a tin.

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