Şevketibostan Yemeği

The peeled thistle stalks are held in lemon water or they blacken within minutes.

Lamb, Egg. Not vegetarian — contains lamb.

Ingredients

• 1.2 kg blessed thistle stalks
• juice of 3 lemons
• 2 litres cold water, for holding the stalks
• 600 g lamb shoulder, cubed
• 2 onions, finely chopped
• 4 tablespoons olive oil
• 2 tablespoons plain flour
• 600 ml water
• 2 egg yolks
• salt and black pepper

to serve

• a handful of dill, chopped

Method

1. THE PEELED STALKS ARE HELD IN LEMON WATER OR THEY BLACKEN WITHIN MINUTES. This is the whole difficulty of the vegetable. The stalks have to be trimmed of their spines and the tough outer fibre pared away with a knife, and the exposed flesh oxidises extremely fast -- a pared stalk left on the board goes grey and then brown-black in two or three minutes, and that discolouration persists through cooking into a dish that looks spoiled. So a large bowl of cold water with the juice of three lemons stands next to the board, and every piece goes straight into it as it is cut, and stays there until the pan is ready.
2. PREPARING THE STALKS IS THE LONG PART AND IT IS DONE WEARING GLOVES. The spines are sharp. The leaves and spines are trimmed off, the stalk is pared like a stick of rhubarb and cut into lengths of four or five centimetres. A kilo and a bit of raw stalk reduces considerably once trimmed.
3. THE LEMON IS IN THE COOKING LIQUID TOO, NOT JUST THE HOLDING WATER. The acid keeps the pale colour through the cooking as well as before it. A thistle stew finished with lemon only at the end will already have darkened.
4. THE LAMB IS BROWNED AND BRAISED BEFORE THE STALKS GO ANYWHERE NEAR THE PAN. Cubed shoulder browned and then simmered an hour until nearly tender. The stalks need only twenty-five minutes and would be reduced to fibres over an hour, so they are added for the last stretch.
5. IT IS THICKENED WITH FLOUR AND THEN FINISHED WITH EGG YOLK OFF THE HEAT. Flour cooked in the oil with the onion, then at the end two yolks beaten with some of the remaining lemon juice, tempered with hot liquid and stirred in with the pan off the flame. It gives the pale opaque sauce the dish wants. Boiled afterwards, the yolks curdle into threads.
6. THE STALKS ARE DONE WHEN TENDER BUT STILL IN PIECES. Twenty-five minutes. They should yield completely to a knife and still be identifiable lengths, not collapsed fibre.
7. The stalks trimmed of leaves and spines WEARING GLOVES, PARED of their tough outer fibre, and cut into 4 or 5 cm lengths.
8. EVERY PIECE DROPPED STRAIGHT INTO a bowl of the cold water with the juice of 2 of the lemons, as it is cut.
9. The olive oil heated and the lamb browned well, then lifted out.
10. The onions softened 8 MINUTES, then the flour stirred in and cooked 3 MINUTES.
11. The lamb returned with the 600 ml of water, seasoned, and simmered 1 HOUR until nearly tender.
12. The stalks DRAINED from their lemon water and added, with a little more lemon juice.
13. Simmered 25 MINUTES, until the stalks yield to a knife but are still in distinct lengths.
14. THE PAN TAKEN OFF THE HEAT.
15. The yolks beaten with the remaining lemon juice, a ladle of hot liquid whisked in, then stirred back into the pan OFF the heat.
16. TESTED: the stalks should be PALE, not grey or brown. Darkening means they spent time out of the lemon water.
17. Scattered with dill and served warm.

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