What is çiğköfte?

Is there raw meat in it?

Not in ours. The name comes from the original version from southeastern Turkey, where raw beef went through the bulgur. Since selling that became tightly regulated in Turkey, the vegetarian version has become the normal one: bulgur, tomato paste, onion, fresh herbs and spices, and nothing else. Our çiğköfte is vegetarian.

The kneading is the recipe

Çiğköfte is not mixed but kneaded, and for a long time. The finest bulgur there is takes up the moisture from tomato paste and onion during that kneading, and that alone is what holds it together, with no binder involved. The finger marks in each piece are not decoration: that is how it is shaped.

Mildly spicy, not hot

There is pul biber and a warm spice mix in it, so çiğköfte has a kick, but it is not a dish that sets your mouth on fire. We keep it mild enough to eat a whole bowl of. Lemon and pomegranate molasses over the top make it fresher, lettuce underneath makes it lighter.

Çiğköfte and mercimek köftesi

They look alike and are often mixed up. Both are hand-formed bulgur bites, but mercimek köftesi is based on red lentils and is softer and earthier in flavour, while çiğköfte is sharper and more spiced. On a meze table they sit together perfectly well.