Instructions: Combine the bread and cooled walnuts in a food processor and reduce them to crumbs.

Add the chopped peppers garlic lemon rind and juice pomegranate syrup and pepper flakes or chilli if using.

Process together to a pulp.

Add the herbs (reserving a few sprigs of parsley for garnish) and with the machine still running add the oil in a steady trickle.

Add salt to taste and the pistachio nuts if using.

Process with a quick burst so that the nuts are coarsely chopped and not powdered.

Chill for a couple of hours in order to let all the flavours blend together.

Take out of the refrigerator about half an hour before serving.

Just before serving mix in half of the pine nuts and turn out on a serving plate.

Sprinkle the remaining pine nuts over to serve and garnish with a sprig of parsley if you wish.

This is a speciality of Gaziantep in South east Turkey. There they would include a red pepper paste which the matriarch of each household makes at the end of the summer and stores for the winter. As this is almost impossible to obtain commercially I have substituted pomegranate syrup (qv) for that additional twist in flavour. You can make it lower in fat and calories by omitting the pistachio and pine nuts.

Serves 6

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