Kumru

Ingredients

• 4 sesame-crusted soft rolls, about 90 g each
• 200 g sucuk (Turkish spiced sausage)
• 150 g kaşar cheese
• 100 g İzmir tulum cheese, or another salty crumbly cheese
• 2 tomatoes
• 4 long green peppers (sivri biber)
• 8 pickled cucumbers

Before you cook

• Slice the sucuk into rounds about half a centimetre thick.
• Slice the kaşar cheese thinly.
• Slice the tomatoes.
• Split the rolls almost all the way through, leaving a hinge along one side.
• Crumble the tulum cheese into a small bowl.

Steps

1. Set a heavy griddle or frying pan over a medium heat with no oil.
2. Lay the sucuk slices on the hot surface and cook them for two minutes a side, until the edges curl and the fat runs out.
3. Move the sucuk to a plate, leaving the rendered fat in the pan.
4. Put the green peppers on the griddle and blister them for four minutes, turning them as they colour.
5. Press the cut faces of the rolls into the hot fat for thirty seconds so they toast.
6. Lay the kaşar slices inside each warm roll so the heat starts to soften them.
7. Pile in the sucuk, then the tomato slices, then a blistered pepper.
8. Crumble the tulum cheese over the top and tuck in a couple of pickled cucumbers.
9. Close each roll, return it to the griddle and press it flat under a heavy pan for two minutes a side, until the cheese runs.
10. Cut each kumru in half on the diagonal and serve straight away.