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Candied Pumpkin with Tahini and Walnuts

Kabak tatlısı, nationwide; the tahini topping is beloved in southern Turkey

🇹🇷 Turkey Desserts easy 15 min (plus overnight rest) prep · 45 min cook serves 6 plates overnight start to table ~310 kcal per serving surprise

Turkey looks at a pumpkin and sees candy: slabs of raw squash buried in sugar overnight until they turn glassy and syrupy. Then comes the curveball, a drizzle of tahini over the top.

Pumpkin flesh is already full of natural sugars, so slow cooking in the syrup it releases concentrates it into something honeyed and translucent rather than vegetal. Earthy, slightly bitter tahini and toasty walnuts then pull the sweetness back into balance, the way peanut butter earns its place next to jelly.

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The story

Pumpkins reached Anatolia from the Americas through trade in the 1500s and 1600s and were quickly folded into the Ottoman tradition of syrup-soaked desserts. Kabak tatlisi became the thrifty winter standard: pumpkin, sugar, time, and nothing else, with each region choosing its own finish, crushed walnuts almost everywhere, clotted kaymak in some homes, and a generous ribbon of tahini especially in the south around Hatay, where an even crunchier lime-water version called kirecte kabak is a local specialty.

It is autumn and winter home cooking more than restaurant food, made when market stalls pile up with cooking pumpkins and served at room temperature with Turkish tea after dinner. Because it keeps for days in its syrup and tastes better on day two, it is also a favorite make-ahead dessert for guests.

Fair warning: It is soft, very sweet, and completely unspiced, so anyone expecting pumpkin pie flavors will find it plain unless the tahini and walnuts actually make it onto the plate.
The recipe

Ingredients

  • 1 kg (2 1/4 lb) pumpkin fleshpeeled and seeded weight; butternut or kabocha squash works well outside Turkey
  • 250 g (1 1/4 cups) sugar
  • 60 g (1/2 cup) walnutscrushed
  • 2 to 3 tbsp tahinifor drizzling; stir the jar well first
  • to taste kaymak or clotted creamoptional

Method

  1. Cut the pumpkin into chunky pieces about 3 to 4 cm thick.
  2. Layer the pieces in a wide, heavy pot, scattering the sugar evenly over each layer, then cover and leave overnight at cool room temperature or in the fridge; by morning the sugar will have pulled out enough juice to nearly cover the pumpkin.
  3. Set the covered pot over low heat, no added water needed, and cook gently for 30 to 40 minutes, spooning syrup over the pieces now and then, until the pumpkin is tender and turning translucent.
  4. Alternatively, bake the macerated pumpkin and its juices uncovered at 180 C (350 F) for about 1 hour, basting every 20 minutes.
  5. If the syrup still looks thin, uncover and simmer a few minutes more until it lightly coats a spoon.
  6. Cool the pumpkin completely in its syrup; it firms up and takes on its candied texture as it cools.
  7. Serve at room temperature or chilled with syrup spooned over, a drizzle of tahini, a shower of crushed walnuts, and a spoonful of kaymak if you like.
Shopping notes
Choose a dense, firm-fleshed squash: butternut, kabocha, or a proper cooking pumpkin, never a stringy carving pumpkin. Tahini is in most supermarkets near the nut butters and in any Middle Eastern grocery.
Cross-checked against: ozlemsturkishtable.com · giverecipe.com
Kitchen notes

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