I have been trying to make Turkish delight for two weeks and have used approximately 5 kilograms of sugar in coming up with this recipe. When you don’t boil the mixture well enough, the Turkish delight doesn’t turn up firm enough, when you boil it too much, the mixture turns out too hard.
Another important factor is the cooker you use. The timings given below are for gas cookers, it might take longer to cook Turkish delight on electric cookers.
So, don’t be discouraged in trying your skills, give the recipe a go. Enjoy !
The ingredients for making Turkish delight
- 1 kg white sugar
- 4 cups of water ( 1 cup = 350 ml )
- 90 gr starch (corn or wheat)
- 1 tea spoon cream of tartar
- Another cup of water
- hazelnuts, walnuts, shredded coconut
- 2 spoons of rose water
- additional coloring and flavour of your choice
- 2 cups of icing sugar
- 1 cup of additional starch
Step by step – how to make Turkish delight
Boil 4 cups of water with sugar. Ensure the mixture stays on fire until the sugar melts properly. Once the mixture (syrup) reaches boiling point, keep the mixture on medium heat for another hour.
Mix starch with 1 cup of water in a deep mixing bowl
Get rid of the foam on your syrup. Add 2 cups of your warm syrup into your starch-water mixture to ensure your starch-water mixture warms up a little bit.
Add your starch-water back into your syrup and cook it again on high until it boils. Once it reaches the boiling temperature, bring the heat to minimal and further cook your syrup for 70 minutes (1 hour and 10 minutes).If you have a sugar thermometer, you can check the temperature of your mixture after cooking it for an hour. For best results, make sure it reaches 113 Celsius. If you would like to use the rose-flavour, you must add the rose water in the last 10 minutes. Ensure you give the mixture a good stirring every now and then with a wooden spoon to prevent the mixture sticking to the base of the pan
Once the mixture turns golden and thickens, add your desired food coloring, aroma, hazelnuts and walnuts.
Prepare a hosting tray for your mixture. Make sure the base of the tray (or pan) is covered with a very thin layer of butter (or canola oil) and cover the base of your tray with cooking (parchment) paper. Spray some oil on your paper as well.
Pour your mixture into your tray. Sprinkle the additional 1/2 cup of starch onto your mixture and leave it to cool down place in the fridge for 4 hours or overnight until firm. Leave it for 24 hours for best result.
Once you’ve done all these, mix 2 cups of icing sugar with 1/2 cup of starch. Sprinkle some flour and starch on a cutting board. Roll your (now thickened) mixture on the cutting board and then slice it into cubes.
Pour the icing sugar-starch mixture in another tray and put your cubes into this second tray. Let it wait for another 24 hours.
You should end up having approximately 100 cubes of Turkish delight!
Afiyet olsun !