for the shell
2 cups Fine Bulgur Wheat
1 & 1/2 cups boiling water
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 cup All Purpose Flour
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp white pepper
for the filling
(I made a lot of filling. This yields about 1.5 cups of extra filling which can be enjoyed on its own.)
500g lean ground pork
3 tbs olive oil for frying
1 finely chopped large onion
1/2 cup finely chopped parsley
2 tbs finely chopped fresh mint
3/4 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp cumin
1/8 tsp all spice
2 tbs toasted pine nuts
salt & pepper to taste
vegetable oil for frying (3 inches deep)
1. Prepare the bulgur wheat mixture. In a large bowl add the bulgur wheat, salt and boiling water. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and let rest for 1.5 to 2 hours until the bulgur wheat absorbs the water. Toast the pine nuts in a small pan on the stove. Once toasted, leave the pine nuts to the side to cool.
2. In the meantime, prepare the filling. Heat the olive oil, add the onion and cook and stir until the onion is soft. Then add the pork, and stir fry until it is cooked and the liquid released has evaporated. Then add the toasted pine nuts, parsley, mint, cumin, cinnamon, all spice and salt and pepper to taste.
3. Once the bulgur wheat mixture is ready, add the cinnamon, flour and white pepper. Mix together well. Then begin to prepare the “koupes”. Add a drop of water to your hands and rub them together. Pick up about a walnut sized amount of the bulgur wheat mixture. The bulgur wheat mixture will crack a tiny bit when you spread it out into your hand, but it should be wet enough that it comes together like in the pictures. You may need to add a little bit more water if this is not the case.
4. Flatten the walnut sized scoop of bulgur wheat mixture into the palm of your hand. Curl your hand to form a little bowl shape and add a teaspoon of filling. Add a little bit more bulgur wheat mixture on top of the meat. Then with both hands form a small little oval-sphere ball. Make sure the sphere is tightly packed otherwise the “koupe” might fall apart when you fry it. Place the “koupe” in a plate. Prepare all the “koupes” the same way.
5. Heat the vegetable oil to a high temperature, it should be about 3 inches deep. Add one “koupe” at a time, rolling them occasionally in the vegetable oil to make sure the “koupe” becomes golden brown all the way around.
6. Once the “koupe” is golden brown, remove it, and place it on paper towel to soak up the excess vegetable oil.
Your koupes look lovely Christina! Don’t you love it when you realize something is not as difficult as you thought? I have never heard of that name, koupes, to be honest, but again, I am not terribly familiar with Cypriot cuisine.
I smiled when I saw the name πουργούρι on the packet of bulgur wheat as I had no idea the Cypriot name was so different from the Greek name. In Greek, the name is πλιγούρι. Love how I get to find out more things about Cyprus and the Greek-Cypriot dialect through your blog!
Hope you have a great rest of summer and I look forward to your new posts in September! xoxo
Thanks Magda! xx 🙂 Yup, I totally agree! I was waiting for the difficulty/frustration of a hard recipe to set in, but I think it is just the rolling which is time consuming but OK! haha, that’s funny about the words. My first boyfriend was a Greek guy so when I first learned to speak Greek it was proper Greek, and then when I would try to speak with my relatives they would find it funny that I didn’t know the Cypriot words. But now I don’t know the Greek words! Enjoy the rest of the summer and speak soon! xxxx
Loving this post! I’m gonna try to make this. I love koupes. When I first moved to Cyprus, I had to eat this everyday!
Thanks Mary! I hope the recipe works out well for you! I LOVE snacking on “koupes” too, so hard to resist when walking into a bakery!! xx
Love this – my husband adores Koupes. Will try using Quinoa or Amaranth to make it
Gluten-free
Thank you! I think quinoa would be really interesting to use in this recipe. You could also try using chickpea flour too as a substitute for the flour? I hope the variation works out well! xx
Hello my dear, finally I found this reciepe. We’ve been several times in Cyprus and my friend is beging me since a long time to make koupes. I believe we also had chicken koupes in Cyprus. Would you maybe have the reciepe for that? Kind regards to Cyprus Sarah Lee
Hi Sarah, I don’t have the recipe for chicken koupes but I don’t see any reason why you can’t just make the recipe above for pork koupes and substitute chicken mince for the pork mince?
This look great – do you reckon they would freeze well (prior to cooking?)
Yes, I think so! Good idea considering how much work is involved in making them!
Hi Jem – sorry for the delay in replying! I don’t know actually because if you freeze them and they have water on them and then deep fry them later the water might splash a lot? I would make a lot and then maybe freeze the ones you made?
What happened to the pine nuts? You didn’t include them in the method
Hi Claire – good point, thanks! I’ve added them above – it works best when you toast the pine nuts separately at the start, and then add them into the filling mix!
I make koupes all the time for my restaurant kosmos Taverna in Manchester, in the pougouri (cracked wheat) I also add grated onion and one boiled mushed potato. I also freeze them and fry them from frozen.
ooo that sounds good! I must try that. Do you make loukoumades? I have heard people add potato into that when they make them in Cyprus!
Hi Christina,
Love the recipe, slightly different from my mum’s. My background is similar to yours and wondered if you could let me have your email address for correspondence
Kyriacos
I loved watching my father make these for us. He taught my brother and myself to make these when we were teenagers. They are so yummy and just as nice the next day. We would always fight who would get the last one. I recently lost my father and i am determined to keep making some of his favourite recipes from home. Thank you for posting some wonderful recipes, some of them i had forgotten but you have bought back some wonderful memories for me.