Maraş Sour Soup with Purslane

At this time of July the peas are slowing down, and the beans and zucchini have not really gotten going yet, at least in my garden. However, there's lots of purslane. Lots and lots of purslane. Following my new policy of actually eating some quantity of it, it has gone from being an annoying weed to, well, being an annoying weed that I can eat. 

 

Once this soup came to my attention as a result of searching for purslane recipes, I found quite a number of (fairly similar) versions out there. If you don't have purslane, for instance, Swiss chard seems to be a pretty common substitute. All the recipes I saw want you to cook the chick peas, lentils, and wheat separately to which I said, not bloody likely. The chick peas do need to be cooked on their own, but that can easily be resolved by using a tin of them. People do use different tomato products, or none, in this. I used some of my own tomato sauce and thought it was a good addition.

I should note that I used and am calling for bulgur, but most recipes call for ashura wheat, which appears to me to be a kind of soft wheat berry. As ever, since there were no wheat berries in the cupboard, but I did have bulgur, I used bulgur. Wheat berries might need a little longer cooking.

 

Maraş is a city in southeastern Turkey, north of Aleppo and Gaziantep. It is now known as Kahramanmaraş, but people don't seem to have transferred that name to the soup. In Turkey this is a winter soup, not surprisingly, but here you are not going to get purslane or Swiss chard in the winter.  It mostly seems to be served without any yogurt, but perhaps because we are eating it in the summer, we found it an excellent addition. Ours was plain, but if you feel deprived of garlic (ha!) you could add a minced clove and a bit of salt to about 1 cup of yogurt. Speaking of which, 1 head of garlic is not a typo - 5 to 7 cloves is what you want.

 

4 to 6 servings

40 minutes - 20 minutes prep time

PLUS time to cook the chick peas and soak the bulgur and lentils 

Advance Preparation:

2 cups (1 540 ml tin) cooked chick peas

1/4 cup bulgur

1/4 cup red lentils

3 cups water

 

You can cook the chick peas yourself, or use a large tin. 

 

Put the bulgur and lentils in heavy-bottomed soup pot, and add the water. Bring it up to a boil, then cover and let them soak overnight.  

The next day, add the chick peas with cooking liquid to cover them, and simmer until the lentils disintegrate (probably not much more than half an hour).

 

Prepare the Seasonings:

1 head garlic

3 or 4 tablespoons chopped fresh mint 

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 1/2 teaspoons sweet paprika

1/2 teaspoon (more or less) Aleppo pepper

2 tablespoons sumac

 

Peel and mince the garlic. Wash and pick over the mint, and chop it finely. Set both aside. 

 

Mix the other spices in a small bowl and set them aside. 

Finish the Soup:

3 tablespoons olive oil

3 tablespoons tomato paste OR 1/3 cup tomato sauce

2 cups picked over purslane leaves 

OR finely chopped Swiss chard leaves and stems

the juice of 1/2 large lemon

yogurt to garnish (optional) 

 

Heat the oil over medium heat in a medium skillet. Add the tomato sauce and let it simmer until thick, then add the spices and cook into the oil for a minute or so. Add the garlic and mint and cook for another minute or so, stirring constantly, until the garlic no longer smells raw. Remove from the heat at once and add to the soup. 

 

If you use tomato paste rather than sauce, add it immediately after the spices go in rather than before as it does not need to cook down.  

The soup can be finished now, or held until closer to serving time. 

At some point by now, you should have washed and chopped the purslane or chard very finely. Add it to the soup and cook it in until done to your liking; about 5 to 8 minutes for me. Add the lemon juice. Add a bit more water if the soup seems too thin, and a little more salt if needed. It will depend on how much was used in cooking the chick peas.

 

Serve, if you like, with a dollop of thick yogurt. Add a minced clove of garlic and a little salt to the yogurt or not, as you like.

 

 

 

 

Last year at this time I made Eggs with Peas Chinese Style.