Cevizli Sucuk (Walnut Churchkhela): Turkey's Grape Candy
Cevizli Sucuk (Walnut Churchkhela): Turkey's Grape Candy
Cevizli sucuk is a Turkish sweet, not a sausage: walnut halves threaded on string, dipped in thickened grape must, and sun-dried until chewy. Known as churchkhela in Georgia and köme or orcik in parts of Anatolia, it tastes like grape fruit leather wrapped around toasted walnuts — no meat, no added sugar in traditional recipes.
If you grew up around Turkish markets, you know the sight: knobby, wine-dark strands hanging in rows every October, just after the grape harvest. If you didn't, the name alone has probably thrown you, because sucuk usually means garlic sausage. This guide untangles the two, walks through how the candy gets made, and covers how to slice, serve, and store it. For the wider world of Turkish sweets, start with our Turkish desserts guide.
First things first: there is no meat anywhere in this story. None.
Key Takeaways
- Cevizli sucuk is a candy: walnuts on a cotton string, coated in grape must thickened with flour, then sun-dried.
- It shares a name with sucuk the garlic sausage because of shape alone — the two foods have nothing else in common.
- The same sweet is called churchkhela in Georgia, köme in Gümüşhane, and orcik around Elazığ.
- Traditional versions get all their sweetness from grapes; no sugar is added to the classic recipe.
- Slice it into coins, pull out the string, and serve it with black tea.
What Is Cevizli Sucuk?
Cevizli sucuk translates to "walnut sausage," and the name is pure geometry. Walnut halves get threaded onto a cotton string, the string gets dipped into grape must thickened with flour, and the coated strand hangs in the sun until it firms into a long, dark, knobby link. That is the whole trick. Shape, not meat.
The candy belongs to the grape harvest. Every autumn during bağbozumu (harvest season), Anatolian vineyard families press their grapes and split the fresh juice three ways: some ferments, some boils down into pekmez (grape molasses), and some gets thickened on the stove for dipping walnut strings. Cevizli sucuk was how a household turned one busy week of grape surplus into a winter's worth of portable food — centuries before anyone printed "energy bar" on a wrapper.
A good batch needs exactly three things: ripe grapes, plump walnuts, and patience. If you ever want to try a homemade string, the hardware is nothing more than what you'd find in our nuts and seeds collection plus a bottle of pekmez.
Isn't Sucuk a Garlic Sausage?
Yes — and that is exactly where the confusion starts. In Turkish, sucuk describes anything stuffed or shaped into a long link, so the language happily uses one word for two foods that share nothing but a silhouette. Sucuk on its own almost always means the fermented beef sausage, loaded with garlic and red pepper; we cover that one in our guide to sucuk, the Turkish garlic sausage. Put cevizli ("with walnuts") in front, and you have crossed into the candy aisle.
A quick label rule for US shoppers: cevizli sucuk, ceviz sucuğu, walnut sucuk, and churchkhela all mean the sweet. Kangal, parmak, and dana sucuk mean the sausage. When in doubt, look for the string running through the middle — sausages don't have one.
How Is Cevizli Sucuk Made?
The traditional method has five steps, and none of them have changed much in centuries:
- Press the grapes. Fresh must — şıra in Turkish — is the base. Sweet white grape varieties are the classic choice because they boil down clean, without bitterness.
- Boil it down. The juice simmers until the grape sugars concentrate. Makers without a vineyard skip ahead by thinning ready-made pekmez with water; you can find pekmez in our honey and syrups collection.
- Thicken with flour. Wheat flour or starch gets whisked in and cooked until the pot holds a pudding consistency. Georgians have a name for this stage on its own: tatara.
- Thread and dip. Walnut halves go onto a cotton string with a knot at the bottom. The string takes a slow dunk in the warm grape pudding, hangs to set, then goes back in. Two or three coats build the candy layer.
- Dry in the sun. The coated strands hang somewhere airy for anywhere from five days to a couple of weeks, until the outside turns leathery and the inside stays chewy.
Walnuts are the classic filling, but not the only one. Hazelnut versions are common near the Black Sea, and almond versions show up around the Aegean and in Cyprus. The coating changes too: some regions use mulberry must instead of grape.
Want to taste it without waiting two weeks? Our Turkish desserts collection carries ready-made cevizli sucuk alongside the lokum and halva it usually shares a shelf with.
Why Do Georgians Call It Churchkhela?
Because Georgia makes the most famous version, and the candy is genuinely old there. During rtveli, Georgia's autumn grape harvest, families hang rows of churchkhela in the same week the wine goes into vessels. Tradition holds that Georgian warriors carried strings of it as field rations — dense, sweet, slow to spoil, and light enough to tie to a saddle. Tbilisi market vendors today sell it to tourists under a cheekier name: the Georgian Snickers.
The candy stretches across a whole belt of grape country, and nearly every stop gives it a different name. Armenia makes sweet sujukh, also called sharots. Cyprus makes soutzoukos, often with almonds. Inside Turkey, Gümüşhane is famous for köme — usually hazelnuts dipped in mulberry-based coating — while the Elazığ region calls its walnut version orcik.
Different strings, same idea: nuts, thickened must, sunshine, and time. Nobody owns it, which is probably why everyone claims it.
What Does Cevizli Sucuk Taste Like?
Start with the coating. It chews like a dense fruit leather and tastes the way a vineyard smells in late September: raisin, dried fig, a faint wine-like tang under the sweetness. Because the sugar all comes from grapes, it lands mellow rather than sharp — closer to dried fruit than to candy-store candy.
Then the walnut. Each coin of the sliced candy holds a piece of it, and the toasty, slightly tannic crunch cuts straight through the chew. That contrast is the whole point.
Texture shifts with age. A fresh string is soft and pliable; a two-month-old one is firmer, with a drier bite and deeper flavor. Both are correct. Turkish grandmothers argue about which is better, and the argument has no winner.
How Do You Eat and Serve Cevizli Sucuk?
Slice it into coins about half an inch thick, working around the string — or pull the string out first if the candy is soft enough to let it go. Then:
- With tea. The classic pairing is a glass of black tea in the afternoon. The tannins in the tea and the grape coating flatter each other.
- On a cheese board. Coins of cevizli sucuk next to kaşar or tulum cheese and a scatter of dried apricots and figs make a board that needs no crackers.
- On the trail. It is shelf-stable, dense, and won't melt in a backpack — the original hiking snack, field-tested for a few hundred years.
- In a lunchbox. Two coins is a kid-sized portion of fruit and nuts that doesn't look like a lecture about fruit and nuts.
Next time you set out a dessert spread for guests, put a sliced string next to the baklava and watch which plate empties first.
How Should You Store Cevizli Sucuk?
Keep it in an airtight container in a cool, dark pantry, and it will hold for months. Skip the fridge — the humidity swings do it no favors, and it doesn't need the cold.
Two storage notes that save people needless worry. A fine white dust on the surface is grape sugar crystallizing as the candy ages, the same harmless bloom you see on dried figs; mold looks fuzzy and green-gray, and that is a different, throw-it-out situation. And if a well-aged string turns too firm to slice cleanly, hold it over gentle steam for a few seconds. It softens right up.
Ready to stock the pantry? Browse our confectionery and sweets collection — TG Gourmet has been shipping Turkish sweets to doors across the US since 2003, back when you knew us as Tulumba.com.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is cevizli sucuk the same as sucuk sausage?
No. Sucuk the sausage is fermented, spiced beef. Cevizli sucuk is a candy made from walnuts and thickened grape must. They share a name only because both are shaped like a long link.
Is cevizli sucuk vegan?
The traditional recipe is plant-based: grape must, flour or starch, and walnuts. Most commercial versions stay that way, but a few add glucose syrup or other extras, so read the ingredient label if it matters to you.
Why is there white powder on my churchkhela?
That is sugar bloom — grape sugars crystallizing on the surface as the candy dries, the same thing that happens to dried figs. It is harmless and normal. Mold, by contrast, looks fuzzy and green-gray.
Does cevizli sucuk contain added sugar?
The classic recipe contains none; all the sweetness comes from concentrated grape must. Some factory-made versions add glucose or sugar to speed production, so check the ingredient list if you want the traditional style.
How long does cevizli sucuk last?
Stored airtight in a cool, dark pantry, it keeps for several months. It firms up and deepens in flavor as it ages, which many people consider an upgrade rather than a flaw.
Can I make cevizli sucuk at home?
Yes. You need grape juice or diluted pekmez, flour, walnut halves, cotton string, and several dry, warm days for hanging. The dipping takes an afternoon; the sun does the rest.