Soutzoukos Recipe (Cypriot Almond and Grape Must Candy, or Shoushoukos)

Soutzoukos belongs to a small family of sweets found around the Caucasus and eastern Mediterranean, all built the same way: nuts threaded on a string, dipped again and again into thickened fruit juice until a firm, chewy skin builds up layer by layer. In Cyprus it is made in autumn, when fresh grapes and their must are actually available, and it is described as one of the island's oldest sweets.

Most Cypriots do not say soutzoukos at all. In the island's dialect the word comes out closer to shoushoukos, and that is how you will hear it at village fairs and see it spelled on many packets. Almond shoushoukos and walnut shoushoukos are the two everyday kinds.

There is no refined sugar in it. The sweetness and the set both come from grape must, unfermented grape juice, reduced and thickened with a little flour or cornstarch until it will coat and hold on the nuts. It is patient work rather than difficult work, with several dips that each need to dry a little before the next.

If fresh grape must is out of reach, unsweetened grape juice reduced down on the stove gets you most of the way there, though it will not carry quite the same depth as juice pressed from actual grapes.

Key preparation steps

1. Thread whole almonds onto lengths of strong string.
2. Thicken grape must with a little flour and cook until it coats a spoon.
3. Dip the strings repeatedly, letting each layer set before the next.
4. Hang to dry for several days until firm.

Soutzoukos or shoushoukos: what is it called?

Both names are right. Soutzoukos is the standard Greek spelling (Σουτζούκος). The Cyprus Food Museum also records soutzoukkos and shoushoukkos, which is closer to the way the word sounds in Cypriot Greek. Because people write down what they hear, you will also find shushukos, sousoukos and soujouko on menus, market stalls and labels. They all mean the same sweet.

The Food Museum traces the name to the Turkish sucuk, the word for a cured sausage, which the long, knobbly strings resemble. Turkey has its own version called cevizli sucuk, meaning walnut sucuk.

How soutzoukos is made in Cyprus

The coating is the same thing as palouzes, the Cypriot grape must pudding made at harvest time. Fresh must is boiled, thickened with flour, and the strings of nuts are dipped into it while it is still hot and pourable. A batch of palouzes and a batch of soutzoukos are often made from the same pot.

Older recipes recorded by the Cyprus Food Museum clear the must first by boiling it with a white earth from Paphos, or with wood ash, until it turns shiny and pale, and some add a little rosewater with the flour. In some villages the coating was made with carob syrup instead, which gives a nearly black soutzoukos.

Each coat is left to dry in an airy, sunny spot before the next one goes on, the same way candles are built up in a dipping vat. Once finished and dried, the Food Museum notes the strings were kept for many months and sometimes a whole year. Soutzoukos is still sold at village fairs across Cyprus, and packed strings are on supermarket shelves all year, so it is an easy thing for visitors to take home.

Grape must, and what to use instead

Genuine grape must is the freshly pressed, unfermented juice of grapes, and in Cyprus it appears briefly each autumn during the harvest. It carries a deep, slightly tannic sweetness that store-bought grape juice does not fully replicate.

If you cannot get real must, a good quality unsweetened dark grape juice, reduced by about a third on the stove before you start thickening it, is the workable substitute most people will actually use. Concord grape juice, which is easy to find in the US, works well and gives a darker color. Reducing it first concentrates the flavor closer to genuine must.

Thickening it properly

Whisk a little all-purpose flour or cornstarch into a small amount of the cold must until smooth, then stir this into the rest of the must as it heats, to avoid lumps. Cook, stirring constantly, until it has thickened enough to coat the back of a spoon thickly and hold a trail when you draw a spoon through it.

Undercooked must will not build a coating at all, since it simply runs off the nuts. This is the step worth being patient with, even though it can take a genuine twenty to thirty minutes of stirring.

Building the layers

Thread whole blanched almonds, or walnut halves, tightly onto strong kitchen string or twine, leaving a loop at the top for hanging. Dip the whole string into the thickened must, lift it out, and let the first coat drip and firm up for fifteen to twenty minutes before dipping again.

Repeat six to eight times, building up a firm, even coating each time. Hang the finished strings somewhere cool, dry and out of direct sun for two to three days until the coating has set completely firm and no longer feels tacky.

Almond or walnut shoushoukos

Almond shoushoukos is the more common of the two in Cyprus and the one most people picture. Blanched whole almonds give a neat, even string with a clean crunch in the middle of each bite.

Walnut halves give a softer, slightly bitter center and a lumpier string, and they need a gentler hand when threading because they split easily. Push the needle through the thickest part of each half. You can mix the two on one string if you like, though most households stick to one.

Soutzoukos and its relatives

The same idea turns up wherever grapes and nuts grow together around the Black Sea and the eastern Mediterranean. The method barely changes from country to country. What changes is the nut, the thickness of the coat and whether anything like rosewater or spice goes into the must.

In Greece the closest thing is petimezi, grape must boiled down to a syrup, which is used to sweeten rather than to coat. For more of the island's sweets, see our Cypriot recipes.

What matters in this dish