View of Galata Tower and the Old City from the rooftop bar at the Hotel Marmara, Istanbul.

CONTENTS
COVER
TITLE
DAVID’S PREFACE
SOMER’S PREFACE
ESSENTIALS
HISTORY, INGREDIENTS & TECHNIQUES

BREAKFAST
LIGHT STARTS & BANQUETS

LUNCH
CASUAL & REGIONAL

AFTERNOON TEA
PUDDINGS, BAKLAVAS & SWEETS

MEZE
SMALL PLATES TO DRINK WITH

DINNER
TRADITIONS & INNOVATIONS

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
INDEX
COPYRIGHT
One of the few surviving Istanbul street markets, in Kadıköy.
DEDICATION
This book has two inspirations: Musa Dağdeviren, who introduced regional Anatolian food to the
world long before it was trendy; and Janni Kyritsis, great chef and great friend, who embodies the
notion that generosity of spirit crosses all national boundaries.
 ABOUT THE AUTHORS
Somer Sivrioğlu grew up in Istanbul and moved to Sydney when he was twenty-five. He now
runs Efendy restaurant in Balmain where he draws on a multitude of cultural influences
to recreate the food traditions of his homeland.
David Dale is an Australian political journalist, commentator on popular culture and food and
travel writer. His earlier books include Soffritto: A Return to Italy; The Art of Pasta (with Lucio
Galletto); Essential Places; and The Obsessive Traveller or Why I Don’t Steal Towels from
Great Hotels Anymore.
Fans of Galatasaray football team gather in Istanbul’s meyhane district, before losing 6–1 to Real Madrid.
DAVID’S PREFACE
For a while I was keen to call this book The Garden of Eden, but my sensible co-
author talked me out of it.
The idea came up when we were flying east from Istanbul and I was studying a map
of our destination—the town of Gaziantep near the Syrian border. I said to Somer:
‘This river that’s labelled Fırat—is that the Euphrates?’ He replied: ‘Yes, that’s the old
name for it.’

In growing excitement, I asked: ‘Is the Tigris also on this map?’ Somer: ‘Yes, just down there, it’s
called the Dicle [dizh-leh] nowadays.’ Me: ‘So actually we are headed for the Garden of Eden,
where all the fruits and vegetables in the world originated, and where the forbidden apple was
probably a fig?’ Somer (eyes narrowed): ‘Well, I suppose you could say that.’
One of the first things I learned about Somer Sivrioğlu (pronounced ‘Sivriolu’, with the ‘g’ silent,
as in tagliatelle) is that he prefers science to superstition, and he’s inclined to regard references to
Adam and Eve with caution. I share his scepticism, but I love a good story, particularly when it’s
about food. I was charmed by the notion that Anatolian was the world’s oldest cuisine.
We’d met three months earlier when a Greek friend took me to lunch at Somer’s restaurant—
Efendy, in the Sydney suburb of Balmain. The meal we ate shattered my stereotypes about Turkish
food, and our conversation demonstrated that Somer was not only a great cook but also a great
scholar.
Our Greek friend, Janni Kyritsis, was happy to concede that while Greek cooking had stagnated,
Turkish cooking seemed still to be evolving. With a mischievous smile, Somer told us: ‘Turkish is
one of the three great cuisines of the world, but only Turks know this. The other two are French and
Chinese, but the French got their cream sauces from our yoğurt, and the Chinese got their dumplings
from our mantı.’
It became apparent that Somer likes to make fun of his countrymen’s tendency to claim ownership
of every great cooking technique in the Western world, and to cling to absurd food myths that promote
Turkish nationalism. He prefers to use the more ancient word Anatolia when talking about the
geographical area that is now called Turkey, and to give credit to the many cultures that contributed to
the region’s food repertoire.
I asked Somer if he’d be interested in doing a book that would challenge old theories about Turkish
cooking and create a few new ones; that would give readers a way to recreate classic dishes at home
and also help them understand what they’re eating when they visit Turkey.
We worked up a pitch to Sue Hines at Murdoch Books, and three months later were flying towards
the Garden of Eden. The town of Gaziantep turned out to be very strange. For breakfast, they eat liver
kebaps or chilli soup. They make the best baklava in the world, using the best pistachios. They
proudly preserve a cooking style that has never needed to make compromises with tourism. Whether
or not it was once paradise, it was the best possible place for me to begin my lessons in Anatolian
culture.
Gaziantep has a tradition that inspired the way we approached this book. Whenever a family has to
spend the day rolling the hundreds of tiny meatballs that go into a festive soup called yuvalama, they
bring in a professional storyteller to keep the rollers from getting bored.
We decided to tell a tale with every recipe. Sometimes we would talk about the mythical origins of
the dish or its ingredients, sometimes we would talk about Somer’s first experience of the dish, and
sometimes we would talk about its place in the rituals and fashions of ancient and modern Anatolia.
Working with Somer, I learned that Anatolian cooks take a pretty relaxed approach to their
creations. They rarely use written recipes and, when they do, the instructions tend to be vague, as in
‘measure with your eyes’, ‘add whatever it needs’; or else poetic, as in ‘cut into bird’s heads’
(cubed), ‘small as a rat’s tooth’ (finely chopped) or ‘till the dough has the texture of an earlobe’.
We’ve tried to avoid the vagueness but retain the relaxation. While breads and pastries need precise
measures, most other recipes can be varied according to your taste—more chilli, less onion, more
vegetables, less meat, as you fancy.
The stories and the recipes are told in Somer’s voice. I hope you enjoy your conversation with him
and share the joy I experienced in learning about an approach to life’s greatest pleasure that is still
evolving after 5000 years.

DAVID DALE
The Kadıköy apartment block where Somer grew up: ‘We had Greek, Armenian and Sephardic Jewish neighbours, and I was blessed to
taste their meals’.
SOMER’S PREFACE
The 1970s was an eventful decade in Turkey, and not only because I was born then.
In 1971, the military staged a coup for the second time (the first one being in 1960);
left-wing students and right-wing militants supported by the government were at war
with each other; and day and night curfews were in place.

I grew up knowing the difference in sound between a gunshot in the next street and a bomb in the next
suburb. Even in the midst of civil war, my babaanne (grandma) retained her sense of hospitality. ‘Do
not close the door, Somer—our neighbours might think we want to keep them away’, she would tell
me every time I shut the door to the family apartment in Istanbul.
My grandad had bought the apartment building in the Kadıköy neighbourhood after selling his hotel
and hamam (Turkish bath) in the rural town of Eskişehir. He’d moved the whole family to the
multicultural suburb on the Anatolian side of the city, giving one flat to each of his children so the
whole family could live near each other. The block felt like a village, with the hallways full of
cooking smells floating from open doorways.
I was lucky to be a kid during that time in Turkish history. People still shared food with their
neighbours; every store in your suburb knew your name; the butcher would keep all the high-protein
offal for families with growing children; and kids from different ethnic backgrounds not only played
together but also ate together in whatever house they happened to find themselves around supper time.
We had neighbours with Greek, Armenian and Sephardic Jewish backgrounds, and I was blessed
to taste their everyday meals. In an era of curfews, suppression and terror, I felt strangely safe in the
company of family, friends and neighbours.
In 1980, Turkey, moving towards a free-market economy, suffered another military coup. My
parents separated and I was living in another suburb in another kind of apartment, with double locks
on the door. I had more toys and fewer friends, and a lot less diversity in my diet. My friends and I
queued for two hours in front of the first McDonald’s when it opened in Turkey, so that we could
have burgers and Coke.
My priorities began to change after I landed in Australia in 1995. I’d graduated in hospitality from
a college in Turkey, and now I was doing my MBA in Sydney, discussing Organisational Behaviour
during the day and washing dishes at night (and being told my pan-scrubbing skills were not up to
scratch). Living close to Sydney’s Chinatown, and eating every cuisine but my own, I re-learned the
value of a multicultural society and its contribution to national happiness.
Fast forward to 2007 and I am married to my beautiful wife Aslı. Just after we have our second
baby, we open our first restaurant, serving what I imagined to be ‘modern Turkish cuisine’. My first
menu included okra in truffle oil, crab mantı and Turkish-coffee crème brûlée.
Looking back, I think I was silly. I was trying to impress by using the trendy ingredients of the time.
I wasn’t being true to myself or my culture. My excuse for playing around with the recipes was that I
thought I didn’t have access to the kind of produce I could have found in Turkey, so it would be
impossible to cook at the same quality.
My mind was opened by a visit from my culinary hero, Musa Dağdeviren, from the world-famous
Çiya restaurant in Kadıköy. When I picked him up at the airport, I apologised that Australian
ingredients would be limiting. He asked if there was a Chinatown in Sydney and soon he was
showing me all the wild weeds, fruits, vegetables and greens he could use. I’d worked just next door
to those markets and I’d never noticed. During that visit, Musa made the best ‘Sumac salad’ I’d ever
eaten using a native Australian fruit called Davidson plum instead of sumac.
He showed me that Turkish cooking is less about particular ingredients and more about philosophy.
It’s about sitting at a table in a Black Sea village, sharing a plate of Armenian topik, Kurdish kebap,
Jewish boyoz and Greek tarama, and washing down the meal with a glass of rakı or ayran. It’s about
the ways different cultures have taken advantage of the abundance of produce in the area now called
Anatolia.
In Australia, I’m regarded as a Turkish chef with a modern presentation. In Turkey, I’m regarded as
an Australian chef experimenting with some sort of Turkish ‘fusion’. I think I’m simply doing what the
peoples of Anatolia have done for millennia—getting the best out of local produce with techniques
tested and proved by my ancestors.
My family and friends are a diverse bunch. We support different football teams, different religions,
different politicians, and different sexual orientations. We come from different ethnicities. So we are
just like Turkey. We argue a lot—as the peoples of Anatolia have done for thousands of years. But
when we sit together around a table, we are united by one idea—we want to enjoy our food. My hope
is that this book will do that for you too.

SOMER SIVRIOĞLU
ESSENTIALS
We called this book Anatolia because that word best conveys the history and diversity
of a land that only started using the term Türkiye (Land of the Turks) in the eleventh
century, and only became the Turkish Republic in 1923. The word Anatolia is used to
show that our book includes the delicious Arab, Armenian, Assyrian, Balkan, Greek,
Jewish, Kurdish and Romany contributions to the way Turks eat.

Turkish people have a passion for eating well. While they’re enjoying breakfast, they’re planning
dinner. They cook a lot at home, but everyone has a favourite kebap shop, a favourite lunch lokanta, a
favourite source of baklava, and a favourite street stall for sobering up with stuffed intestines after a
long night drinking rakı in a meyhane. There is no time of day when you can’t get interesting food, so
instead of dividing this book into conventional chapters such as starters, mains, desserts and party
food, we’ve arranged the chapters in the form of a typical Turkish eating day.

A LITTLE HISTORY
The first use of the term Anatolia was in clay tablets written 4300 years ago in the cuneiform letters
of Mesopotamia, so that suggested a timespan for this book. (We could have taken you back 11,000
years, because the world’s first human settlement has been discovered at Göbekli Tepe, near the town
of Şanlıurfa in southeastern Anatolia, but information on the cuisine of that period is scarce.)
The Hittites may not have been the first organised civilisation on earth (that title should probably
go to the Sumerians), but they do seem to have been the first to use iron weapons; the first to make
wine and cultivate olives, almonds and apricots; and were the speakers of a language that turned into
most of the dialects of modern Europe.
The Hittite Empire was at its peak 3500 years ago, and Troy was a west-coast branch. The defeat
of Troy about 3200 years ago (as reported by Homer) was part of a Greek conquest of Anatolia that
was confirmed by Alexander the Great about 2300 years ago. About 2600 years ago, a Greek
demigod named Byzas founded the city that came to be called Byzantion (Byzantium), then New
Rome, then Constantinople, and finally Istanbul (which literally translates as ‘into the city’).
The Greek Empire was replaced by the Roman Empire around 2000 years ago and Constantinople
became the imperial capital when Rome fell to barbarians in the fourth century.
The last vestiges of Roman-Christian rule were eliminated in the eleventh century by the invading
Seljuks (an extended family of Muslims from the northeast, whose empire also included Persia). The
Seljuks spoke a language called Turkic.
Western Anatolia got involved in various disputes with European crusaders passing through on
their way to Jerusalem, but stayed in Seljuk control until the arrival, around 1300, of an army under
the command of a military strategist named Osman in Turkish and known to English speakers as
Ottoman. This commander gave his name to an empire that proceeded to invade lands we now call
Greece, Hungary, Bulgaria, Iraq, Iran, Syria, Egypt, Libya, Tunisia and Algeria.

One of the obsessions of the Ottoman Turks was the art of food, and at the peak of their power
(under Sultan Süleyman the Magnificent in the sixteenth century), the Topkapı Palace in Istanbul had
400 cooks using ingredients and techniques from all over the empire.
In the sixteenth century, Anatolia welcomed Jews and Muslims who were expelled from Spain and
Portugal by Christian fundamentalists. They brought new approaches to the way ingredients could be
combined.
 Then, in the seventeenth century, Anatolia welcomed Spanish and Portuguese traders who brought
strange and exciting ingredients from the New World—tomatoes, peppers and potatoes.
Ottoman rule collapsed during the First World War, and in 1923 a bunch of modernisers took over.
The first president of the Turkish republic was Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, a soldier who had defeated
the Allied invaders at Gelibolu (Gallipoli) in 1915. He abolished the dominance of the Islamic clergy
(known as ‘the caliphate’), gave women the vote and created a secular democracy. As part of a treaty
between the new nation and the Allies, Anatolians of Greek background were told to move to Greece
while Muslims of Turkish background moved from Greece to Turkey.
So you can see why Anatolian food is likely to have a fair bit in common with the cooking of
Greece, Syria, Egypt, Armenia, Italy, Spain, Iran and even Hungary, and why so much culinary
mythology has developed over the past four millennia.
Myths make good stories, so in this book we’re going to recount the myths and then try to analyse
where they deviate from reality. We are not going to waste time with disputes about which ethnic,
religious or national group ‘owns’ a particular dish.
The cooking in a particular area is dictated by the climate, the soil, the range of ingredients
available, the survival techniques developed over the millennia and the cultural assumptions passed
on by successive waves of settlers. It’s perfectly possible for a dish to be simultaneously Turkish,
Greek, Italian and Syrian, or to be none of the above if it appeared long before those names were on
any map. When in doubt, our default position is to describe a dish as ‘adapted from the Hittite’.
So how is a non-Turkish-speaking visitor going to tap into this historical, geographical and cultural
abundance? In Istanbul most waiters speak enough English to respond to your enthusiastic request to
try a range of local specialities and avoid the tourist clichés. Outside Istanbul and the coastal resort
towns, two phrases might come in handy in a lunch lokanta or meze bar: ‘Herşey [hershay] den az az
ortaya lütfen’, which means ‘Can I have a variety of small servings, please’ (literally, ‘Little little in
the middle’) and ‘ Ben de şundan [shundan] alabilir miyim, lütfen’ (‘Could I have those, please’),
with which you should point to a dish on another table or on display on the counter.
After the recipes, we’ve provided a list of recommendations on eating places worth visiting in
Istanbul and around the countryside. In the unlikely event you don’t find great food in Turkey, cook
from this book and discover how it should have tasted.

THE REGIONS
The geographers divide modern Turkey into seven regions, which vary greatly in their approach to
cooking …
The Marmara region (main cities Bursa, Edirne and Istanbul) contained all the palaces from which
the Ottoman sultans controlled their empire, so Turkey’s wealth, industry and gourmet faddism are
concentrated here. Istanbul, with its 20 million residents, is the heart of the nation (although the
political capital is Ankara, 400 km/250 miles away). You can find excellent examples of every
region’s specialities without leaving Istanbul, because every successful regional restaurant dreams of
opening a branch there (even at the risk of losing authenticity). In Istanbul, go for seafood, because the
Marmara Sea supplies tasty fish. Edirne is known for its sautéed liver. Bursa is known for Iskender
kebap.
 The Mediterranean coast (main cities Antalya and Adana) grows most of Turkey’s fruits and
greens. Hatay is the most multicultural city in Turkey, with large communities of Arabs, Christians
and Jews—which makes its cuisine fascinating. Antalya is nicknamed ‘Antalsky’ in the summer
months, because of the invasion of Russian tourists. That’s when serious foodies leave the coast and
head for the mountains.
In the wild and windy Black Sea region (main cities Trabzon and Samsun) the obsessions are
hazelnuts, corn, salad greens and a fish called hamsi (somewhere between a sardine and an anchovy).
There are alleged to be more than 200 recipes for it, including a hamsi jam.
Not surprisingly, the Aegean coast (main cities Izmir and Bodrum) is Greek-influenced. The Greek
islands are so close that at night Turks in the Aegean region can see the headlights of cars driving
around Kos, Lesbos, Chios and Samos. No wonder it was so easy for the Greeks to invade Troy. It’s
a wine-making area, more liberal than the rest of Turkey in its attitude to alcohol. The best food is
found in its meyhanes, which do seafood specialities, and olive oil-braised greens and other
vegetables.
Central Anatolia (main cities Ankara, Konya and Kayseri) is the agricultural heartland, growing
most of the vegetables and grains. The restaurants tend to specialise in lamb, börek pastries and
casseroles with bulgur. Konya was one of the first places settled by the nomadic Turkic people when
they arrived in the eleventh century, and has become a culinary and cultural centre. The Armenian
community in Kayseri made the region famous for beef pastırma and sucuk sausage. Butter is the main
cooking medium here, not olive oil.
Eastern Anatolia (main cities Van, Kars and Malatya) borders Iran, Armenia, Azerbaijan and
Georgia, and has a large Kurdish population. On its western side, the climate is ideal for growing
apricots, figs and grapes that turn into powerful red wines. On the eastern side, the cattle, sheep and
goats produce wonderful cheeses.
Southeastern Anatolia (main cities Gaziantep, Şanlıurfa and Mardin) has a cuisine influenced by
neighbouring Syria and Iraq. It produces the world’s best pistachios and thus the world’s best
baklava. The climate is harsh in winter and hot and dry in summer, so they’ve perfected drying,
preserving and pickling techniques to keep their eaters happy all year. The famous isot chilli pepper
and çiğ köfte (raw veal and bulgur wheat) come from Şanlıurfa.
 The food regions of turkey:
AEGEAN SEA: Olives, wines, salads, herbs, wild weeds and seafood
BLACK SEA: Hamsi, tea, corn, hazelnuts and pide bread
CENTRAL ANATOLIA: Börek pastries, beef pastirma, lamb casseroles and fruit molasses
EASTERN ANATOLIA: Cheeses, dried fruits, grains and lamb
MARMARA: Mezes, white wine, rakı, small fish and puddings
MEDITERRANEAN SEA: Large fish, salads, oranges, lemons and figs
SOUTHEASTERN ANATOLIA: Kebaps, bulgur wheat, baklava and peppers
 The Fifteen Favourite Ingredients

BREAD

Growing up in Istanbul, the only bread I knew was ekmek—a torpedo-shaped roll that was made
every morning in a wood-fired stone oven by a bakery a few doors from my apartment. No Turks
bake their own bread at home because the price of bread has been subsidised by the government since
Ottoman times (when the sultans followed the Roman emperors’ practice of pacifying the populace
with ‘bread and circuses’).
Bread is subject to a multitude of laws specifying minimum size of loaf (250 g/9 oz), minimum
flour type, maximum salt content (1.5 per cent) and hygiene for shops and delivery trucks (delivery
truck needs to be washable), and can only use flour, yeast, salt and water.
Although my family was not religious, the holy month of Ramadan was an exciting time for me,
because a new kind of bread appeared—a round and fluffy creation called pide, designed to be
consumed hot as soon as the faithful break their fast at sunset. The cooks elaborated on the basic
ekmek by putting yoğurt or molasses on top. I later discovered that if I visited southeastern Anatolia I
could eat pide all year round because it’s their standard form of bread. (Pide is not to be confused
with pita, which is not a word used much in Turkey. The flatbread called pita by other cultures is
called lavaş in Turkey.)
So if you go to the southeast of Turkey and ask for ekmek, you will get pide. If you ask for pide on
the west coast, they will tell you ‘It’s not Ramadan yet’. In the Black Sea, if you ask for pide, they
will ask you ‘with cheese or lamb?’ In Istanbul tourist restaurants they will serve you pide in the form
of a balloon, made by throwing cardboard into the stone oven in the last few seconds of the baking
process to create a sudden blast of heat that will make the bread puff up. Do not try this at home.

YOĞURT AND OTHER DAIRY

Being nomadic people, the Turkic groups who reached Anatolia in the eleventh century first drank
horse milk. When they settled in one spot, they domesticated cows, sheep and goats, and found new
flavour sensations.
Although I am sceptical about the Turkish habit of taking credit for all sorts of culinary creations, I
think we are safe in saying those invaders gave yoğurt to the world (which is why I’ve used the
Turkish spelling throughout this book). Turks are now the biggest consumers of plain yoğurt on the
planet—our average consumption is 24 kg (over 50 lb) per person per year. We use it in or with just
about everything.
For my grandma, yoğurt was as much a medicine as a food. A burnt hand got a yoğurt wrapping, a
sunburn meant your whole back, neck and face were covered with it. If you got food poisoning, it
settled your stomach. My grandma bought her yoğurt from a man who walked down her street at the
same time every day carrying two pots suspended from a pole that went across his shoulders.
I like to say that I can offer four recipes in which the only ingredients are yoğurt and time—in its
basic form as a sauce; thickened to become a dip (by hanging in a muslin cloth for three hours over a
pot to catch the drips); thickened and sun-dried to become a cheese (hanging for twelve hours); and
diluted to become a drink (which we call ayran—and okay, I must admit water is another ingredient,
unless you got it from the pot under the bag in which you made the cheese).
To make your own yoğurt:

First buy a full-fat natural yoğurt (ideally pot-set). Boil 1 litre (35 fl oz/4 cups) of milk for 5 minutes
and let it cool until you can keep your finger in it for 10 seconds. Stir 1 tablespoon of the commercial
yoğurt through it and whisk with a fork to aerate. Cover the pot and leave it overnight in a warm place
(in winter, wrap it in a blanket and keep it in the warmest part of the house). It should have turned to
yoğurt within 8 hours, and then you can keep it in the fridge. You should eat it within 5 days, which
won’t be difficult if you’re cooking Turkish recipes.
Butter is the main cooking medium in eastern Anatolia (on the west coast they follow the Greeks in
preferring olive oil). Some of my recipes involve the use of clarified butter (ghee). If you want to
make your own ghee:
Gözleme are a kind of pancake made popular by Yörük people who bring their food stalls from the mountains to coastal villages.
Nose to tail eating is common in Turkey, with two types of butcher shops: those that sell prime cuts and mince, and those that specialise
in offal.

Melt butter over very low heat and when it starts to sizzle, pour it into a bowl and put it in the fridge.
Next day, scrape the layer of fat off the top. The liquid at the bottom is ghee.

FETA AND OTHER CHEESES

A text published by the University of Kars (on Turkey’s eastern border) identifies 193 types of cheese
commonly used in Anatolia—twenty-three of them made in Kars. The favourite type is ‘white’, a
variation on the Greek feta. Mostly it’s made from cow’s milk, but sometimes from sheep’s or goat’s
or a mixture. It’s an essential component of breakfast, while other cheeses start to appear later in the
day.
Sheep were first domesticated in Anatolia around 10,000 years ago and, soon after that, the habit of
storing milk in the stomachs of sheep produced the first cheese (because the milk reacted with the
stomach enzymes, known as rennet).
The first written reference to cheese is in The Iliad, where Homer describes a wounded soldier
being treated with a mixture of wine, barley and goat’s cheese.
Next comes kaşar, a semi-hard yellow cheese often melted on toast. For the recipes in this book
I’ve tried to suggest alternatives that might be available in deprived English-speaking countries, but
when you’re in Turkey, I urge you to try every regional artisanal cheese you can find, because the
more unusual types are at risk of disappearing.

LAMB AND LESSER MEATS

Yes, we do eat chicken and beef (never pork), but I must admit that 80 per cent of the meat consumed
in Turkey is lamb. We see it as a main meal, an ingredient in kebaps, and a flavouring for rice. We
use every part of it, and in this book you’ll find recipes for its head, liver and testicles. In 2012,
somebody did a census and found that Turkey contained 8 million goats, 14 million cows and 28
million sheep.
Lamb was easily bred in the Anatolian climate, and became hallowed by religious ritual very early
in our history. A common prayer goes: ‘If you give me this, I will kill a sheep in your name and give
it to the needy.’
Around 3000 years ago, so the holy texts tell us, the prophet Abraham sacrificed a sheep instead of
his son after passing a test imposed by an angel sent from God. Many villages celebrate this in a
religious holiday during which a lamb is tethered outside your house all day, then slaughtered, sliced
and distributed to your neediest neighbours (you can only keep a third for yourself).
During the four-day religious festival called Kurban Bayramı, it’s traditional for rich families to
sacrifice a sheep and distribute it to the needy. In the past you’d go and select the animal yourself and
watch it being slaughtered with appropriate prayer readings. Nowadays, busy people organise the
whole thing online, and never see the sheep or its parts.
There are two varieties of lamb: those with a fatty tail and those with a thin tail. The fat-tailed
sheep are highly prized by eastern Turks, who love the flavour of the tail fat, which melts at low
temperatures. Some areas use tail fat the way the French use butter—to enrich a casserole. Kebaps
are healthier because the fat drips off into the embers.

SEAFOOD
Turkey is girt by sea on three sides—the Black one at the top, the Aegean on the left and the
Mediterranean on the bottom. The seafood varies hugely between regions, getting bigger the further
south you go.
Turks don’t feel the need for complex recipes for fish, and they don’t bother much with fillets. The
rule is grill the fish whole if large, and fry the fish whole if small, then serve with lemon and rocket
(arugula). They get more imaginative with mussels, calamari, octopus, scallops and shrimps.
Everyone agrees the best fish come from Istanbul’s Marmara Sea, which connects the Aegean with
the Black, and the best month to eat it is September.
I grew up fishing in the Marmara with my father, who had his own boat and knew how the currents
and the seasons affected the availability of the fish. Nowadays, fishing in that area is banned between
April and early September, but once the ban is lifted, you will be astounded by the variety at the
Kumkapı fish market, and you can eat wonderfully in restaurants along the Bosphorus (I’ve named a
few of my favourites in the recommendations at the end of this book). The fish you should ask for is
lüfer, which is usually translated as bluefish.
In this book I’ve tried to replace varieties unique to Turkey with similar fish available in English-
speaking countries.

EGGPLANT AND OTHER VEGETABLES

Eggplants (aubergines) are even more common than lamb in Turkish recipes (usually disguised under
poetic titles rather than their own name, patlıcan), so you might imagine we grew them first. But they
seem to have been brought into Anatolia from India by Arab traders at least 3000 years ago. Per
capita, Turks are the greatest consumers of eggplants in the world.
The best way to cook eggplant is to pierce the skin with a fork and put it directly over fire—either
the embers of a barbecue or the gas flame of your stove. Be careful, though. Historians writing about
Istanbul in the seventeenth century record frequent destruction of property due to ‘eggplant fires’,
because householders would put them over flames and walk away, letting them drop onto the wooden
floor.
You should stay nearby, turning the eggplant with tongs until the skin is blackened. Let it cool and
drip in a colander for 10 minutes, then scrape out the flesh. If you’re not going to eat it straight away,
keep it in water into which you have squeezed half a lemon.
Our next most beloved ingredient is the tomato (domates)—which you’re going to tell me should
not be in this section because it is actually a fruit (but you’ll never convince a Turk of this botanical
detail). Its omnipresence is surprising since it only entered the Anatolian repertoire in the eighteenth
century (imported from the Americas). Turkey is the fourth-biggest producer in the world, eating 11
million tonnes of tomatoes a year.
Somer and his father Güngör checking the daily catch at an Aegean village fish shop.
The handwritten sign says: ‘Very juicy, wonderfully fragrant 5 Turkish lira.’

Every market across the land has tubs piled high with mounds of bright-red tomato paste (usually
sitting next to a tub overflowing with even brighter peppers). We use it to boost the flavour of
everything but fish (which works better with fresh tomato).
You can make your own tomato paste like this:

Slice 1 kg (2 lb 4 oz) of over-ripe tomatoes into quarters and let them rest for a day under a cloth.
Then push them through a coarse sieve to get rid of the skins and most of the seeds. Wrap the pulp in a
muslin cloth (cheesecloth) and put a weight on the parcel to squeeze the water out overnight.
Stir 1 tablespoon of olive oil and 1 teaspoon of rock salt through the pulp, and simmer for 1 hour,
stirring regularly. Put the paste in clean jars, with some more olive oil at the top, and tightly seal the
lids. You can keep the paste in the fridge, topping up with more olive oil each time you dig into it.

POMEGRANATE AND OTHER FRUITS

The pomegranate has been a symbol of opulent eating around the Mediterranean for thousands of
years. A tradition going back to the Greek occupation of Anatolia is throwing a pomegranate into the
doorway of your house on New Year’s Eve to ensure abundance for the following year.
Turkey is the third-biggest pomegranate producer in the world, (after Iran and India). Turks call it a
‘superfruit’, believing it to contain an antioxidant that lowers cholesterol.
Every Turkish supermarket sells special-purpose pomegranate seeders and pomegranate juicers,
but if you can’t find these devices near you, don’t despair. Cut the pomegranate in half, horizontally.
Put one half face down over a bowl and tap gently all over the back. The seeds should pop out. Then
you can crush them to make juice or use them to decorate dishes, savoury or sweet.
Turkish supermarkets also sell pomegranate molasses. To make your own:

Simmer the pomegranate juice in a heavy-based saucepan until it has reduced to a quarter its original
volume. There’s no need to add sugar.
You can use it in any dish where you might use balsamic vinegar or lemon. In my restaurant, I serve
my bread with a saucer containing two tablespoons of olive oil and a teaspoon of pomegranate
molasses. I also like to baste lamb in it, because it caramelises the exterior.
When I arrived in Sydney, I was delighted to learn that the Australian term for English people is
pommie, supposedly because their faces quickly go the colour of my favourite fruit under the hot
Australian sun.
The next most popular fruit in Turkey is the fig, which is at its best in autumn. It was apparently the
first crop to be cultivated in the world—in southeastern Anatolia, of course, about 10,000 years ago.
We use unripened figs in jams, fresh figs in salads, and dried figs in deserts and dolma stuffings.
Turkey supplies 80 per cent of the world’s dried fruits, particularly apricots, dates and raisins. The
Ottoman sultans embraced the Persian passion for combining dried fruits with stewed or roasted
meats, as you’ll see in our Dinner chapter.

PEPPERS

Before the appearance of chillies and peppers in the seventeenth century, the cooks in the Ottoman
kitchens used huge quantities of ground black pepper to satisfy the jaded sultans’ need for culinary
kicks. In the sixteenth century, peppercorns were a major trading commodity, with 1 kg (2 lb 4 oz)
costing as much as 35 kg (over 75 lb) of bulgur. Then the long red and green peppers and chillies
arrived from the Americas, and the bottom dropped out of the black pepper market, because chilli
proved to be a useful preservative as well as a flavour booster.
Heat preference varies hugely around Anatolia. In the southeastern culinary triangle of Şanlıurfa,
Gaziantep and Maraş, spice is everything. They give chillies to children to chew on as an appetite
stimulant. In villages near Şanlıurfa in late summer, you can see chillies laid out all over the flat
roofs, then covered with sheets at night to ‘sweat’ them. The famous Maraş and isot chilli flakes are
exported around the world, including to my restaurant in Sydney. Maraş is stronger, with an intense
‘mouthburning’ flavour. Isot (also known as Urfa pepper) is milder but longer lasting.
When I arrived in Australia, I was disappointed to find the peppers were much bigger, with thicker
skins, than the ones I knew in Turkey. I have shifted to bullhorn peppers in some of my recipes,
because they’re closer to the taste and texture I knew in Turkey. Feel free to use whatever form you
can find near you, but remember that smaller is better, especially if you are stuffing them.

BULGUR AND OTHER GRAINS

Wheat was first cultivated in eastern Anatolia about 10,000 years ago, and it’s likely that before the
grains were turned into flour for bread, they were stripped of their skins and boiled, to become a
belly filler and a base for roasted meat or vegetables. Much later in history rice arrived from China,
and the principle became: rice for the rich, bulgur for the poor. So the poor were better nourished.
In Turkey, bulgur is now sold in four grind classifications: extra fine (for kneading with raw meat
in çiğ köfte); fine (for lentil köfte); coarse (for mixing into salads); and extra coarse (for pilav, served
with stews). To make an interesting bulgur pilav:

Sauté 1 finely chopped onion in butter for 5 minutes, then add 500 g (1 lb 2 oz) of bulgur and sauté for
another 10 minutes. Add 750 ml (26 fl oz/3 cups) of water or chicken stock and simmer, covered, for
another 10 minutes. Add a chopped tomato and/or a chopped capsicum (pepper) if you like. Decorate
it with chopped flat-leaf (Italian) parsley, and serve it with a stew or kebaps or just with yoğurt as a
dish in itself.
Another form of wheat, called freekeh, became trendy in Anatolia 4000 years ago and is now
becoming trendy again in the English-speaking world. It is a green wheat that has been roasted (in
southeastern Turkey they set fire to the wheat field to burn off the chaff and give the grains a smoky
taste).
Drying red peppers for winter in Oğuzeli in southeastern Anatolia.
Pistachios and other nuts and pulses for sale at a village shop.

The name literally means ‘rubbed’, and of course it comes with a story: around 4000 years ago a
bunch of Hittites harvested their wheat when it was unripe and stored it away in a wooden shed,
which caught fire. When they recovered the stalks and rubbed off the blackened husks, they found the
grains smelled and tasted delicious, and a fad was born.
Freekeh is easier to digest than bulgur, which can bloat you if you eat too much. A bowl of freekeh
brings a beautiful aroma to the table, and makes an ideal base for a chicken stew or a healthy dose of
fibre mixed into a salad.

RICE

In Ottoman times, rice (pirinç), initially imported from China, was a treat for the aristocrats. If you
visited Istanbul’s Topkapı Palace 500 years ago, you’d be offered three beautiful dishes—dane-i-sarı
(yellow rice, made with saffron), dane-i-yeşil (green rice, made with spinach or fresh herbs), and
dane-i-kızıl (red rice made with pomegranate or barberries). Nowadays, every class eats it, but more
in Turkey’s west than east.
There is much debate about how to get the best out of rice, but here’s my preferred way to make an
interesting rice pilav, learned from my mother-in-law:

Soak 200 g (7 oz/1 cup) of rice in 500 ml (17 fl oz/2 cups) of warm water and 1 tablespoon of salt
for 1 hour. Rinse the rice and toss with 1 tablespoon of melted butter over medium heat for 2 minutes,
then add 250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) of water (or chicken stock) and 1 grated tomato, and simmer, covered,
for 15 minutes.

PASTRIES—YUFKA, FILO AND BÖREKS

Stuffing and baking pastries is a huge fad in Turkey, but it’s rare for Turks to make the basic pastry at
home, because so many shops sell sheets of yufka (for böreks) and filo (for baklava). The word yufka
meant ‘thin’ in the old dialect, and that’s exactly why you risk frustration if you try it at home.
But if you’re game, this is what you need to do to make yufka sheets:

Mix 1 kg (2 lb 4 oz) of strong flour with 2 tablespoons of salt and 250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) of water.
Knead for about 10 minutes until a flexible dough is formed. Divide the dough into ping-pong-ball-
sized lumps. Covering your work surface, hands and a thin rolling pin with lots of flour to prevent
sticking, roll and pull each ball out into a sheet about 50 cm (20 in) across. If you have a pasta
machine, you could use that to start the rolling process, but you’ll have to finish it by hand.
Now you need to partly cook the pastry. You’ll need a large wok, which will become a device the
Turks call a sač.
Scrub the wok clean, inside and out, and put the wok upside down over a lit burner on your stove.
Drape a sheet of dough over the wok, and as soon as you see it start to bubble, put another sheet of
pastry over it, and flip the pair over. Cook the bottom side of the second sheet for 1 minute or so, then
remove the pair (put them on a board next to you) and start again with another sheet. You’re cooking
every sheet on one side only, then adding its partner and flipping.
You can keep the partly cooked yufka sheets in the fridge for 3 days. When making böreks, always
put the stuffing on the uncooked side.
The process for making filo is similar, except that the dough sometimes contains eggs, and must be
rolled out even thinner than yufka—as thin as a page of this book, in fact.
In the recipes you’re about to read, we’ll show you how to make other forms of pastry (gözleme,
katmer, mille-feuille), but we’ll suggest buying commercial filo, as Turkish families do.

PISTACHIOS AND OTHER NUTS

Almonds and pistachios are the only two nuts mentioned in the ancient religious text that is accepted
by Muslims, Jews and Christians (known as the Tevrat, the Torah or the Old Testament of the Bible).
Both were first cultivated in Anatolia. Ground almonds became the basis for the favourite sauce of
the early Ottoman sultans, and crushed pistachios became the basis for their favourite desert—
baklava.
The world’s best pistachios come from Gaziantep in southeastern Anatolia. That’s been the case
since at least the year 100, when the Roman emperor Trajan organised regular deliveries of
pistachios from the village of Zeugma to Rome. They are expensive but versatile—the wild form
makes an interesting form of coffee. Turkey is the third-largest producer in the world, but Iranian and
Californian varieties are arguably of lesser quality. Gaziantep pistachios are harvested in
midsummer, when they are small enough to be best for baklava.
Turkey produces 75 per cent of the world’s hazelnuts, mostly in the Black Sea region. They are
roasted for snacking or turned into oil for frying, paste as a breakfast spread, and meal for cakes.

CHICKPEAS AND OTHER PULSES

When you go out drinking of an evening anywhere in Turkey, you’re likely to be given a bowl of what
you think are salty nuts. They are more likely to be leblebi (toasted chickpeas), bought from nut shops
that cook them all day in giant leblebi roasters. Chickpeas, now used to bulk out countless casseroles,
were first cultivated in Anatolia more than 8000 years ago. In the fifteenth century, a vizier working
for the sultan in the Topkapı Palace became famous for surprising his guests by hiding a golden
chickpea in one of the dishes in every banquet.
The next most popular pulse is lentils. The green variety is produced in central Anatolia and used
whole in sautés. It’s known as the poor man’s beef, because of its high iron content. The softer red
variety is produced in the southeast and used in soups or as a paste in köfte.
Turks also use dried beans a lot—in particular the small white ones the Italians call cannellini—
and in this book so do we. It’s vital to soak these beans overnight, rinse them and change the water
several times to get rid of the chemicals that can upset your digestion.

ONION AND GARLIC

My friend Musa Dağdeviren, the scholar-chef who sparked the revival of regional Anatolian cooking
(see Dinner chapter), was once asked to name the three ingredients he would take with him to a desert
island. He said: ‘Onions, garlic, and spring onions, because as long as I have them, I can make a
delicious meal with anything else I find on the island.’
Onion was the key flavour-booster in Anatolian food long before the arrival of peppers from the
Americas, and it remains dominant. Every home-style Turkish appetiser or main course has onion or
garlic or both at its heart, often with leek as well.
My preference is to use red onions in salads and white or brown onions in cooking, and always to
sauté onions for 5 minutes longer than garlic.
It’s common in Turkey to use the green shoots of fresh garlic, which are most readily available in
spring. They look like thin spring onions. In some recipes, we’ve suggested garlic shoots, but if you
can’t find them, toss whole spring onions in equal amounts of olive oil and finely crushed garlic to
achieve a similar flavour.
We love leeks in winter, particularly braised in olive oil as part of a meze spread, or as wrappers
instead of pastry around mince or rice parcels.

PARSLEY AND OTHER HERBS

Anytime I talk about parsley in this book, I mean the flat-leaf kind English-speakers call continental
or Italian parsley. You never see the curly type in Turkey, but you see the flat-leaf kind everywhere.
Don’t feel compelled to follow the Turkish habit of sprinkling it on anything savoury. I know parsley
is good for you, but I fear it is used too often as decoration and in my restaurant I have to spend a lot
of time picking it off dishes my cooks send out of the kitchen.
Mint is our second favourite herb, used fresh in salads and dried as decoration on soups and
dumplings. It is hardly ever associated with lamb—Turks regard that as an English eccentricity,
preferring to use oregano or thyme (which is also used to make an invigorating tea in the southeast).
We like to use bay leaves with fish, marjoram with chicken, and wild weeds (nettles) with eggs and
pastries—but only on the west coast.
Herbal teas are central to Turkish life, seen as suitable treatments for colds, anxiety and stomach
upsets. Wild thyme (zahter) tea is popular in the southeast for aiding digestion, and you’ll also find
teas made with linden, mountain sage and wild nettles.

The equipment you should have

Big sharp knife for mincing (ideally a zırh or a mezzaluna knife)

Large, thick wooden board
Long tongs for the barbecue
Mortar and pestle
 Baking trays for pastries
Plastic wrap
Paper towel
Baking paper
Aluminium foil
Skewers—bamboo and three sizes of metal (round, narrow-flat, wide-flat)
Small and large clay pots for baking
Wooden spoons
Mixer/ blender/ food processor
Whisk
Regular rolling pin
Thin (stick) rolling pin
Wide heavy-based saucepans
Pizza stone or unglazed terracotta tile
Charcoal grill (broiler) or wood-fire barbecue
Muslin (cheesecloth), for straining
Ideally, a pomegranate seeder
Turkish coffee pot (cezve)
Spice grinder
Sealable jars (for pickles and preserves)

Turkish home cooking is about doing what’s comfortable with the equipment that’s
available, so if you don’t have any of the above, adapt with what’s in your cupboard.
 The Wines of Anatolia

It is believed that the first place in the world where wine was made was Anatolia—by those reliable
old Hittites, around 6000 years ago. The Hittites used the Sumerian term viyana for the alcohol
derived from grapes—a word which some Turkish scholars think was the origin of a name to the
capital of Austria (just as the Persian word ungur for grapes, gave a name to the capital of Turkey,
Ankara).
Jewish and Muslim texts tell us that the first crop planted by Noah after he got off the ark was
grapes, so his family could celebrate with a cup of wine. That supposedly happened on the
southeastern side of Anatolia. Nowadays, excellent red wines are still made in that hot, dry climate.
The Greeks who conquered Troy thought the west-coast town of Nysa was the birthplace of white
wine—and of the drunken demigod known to them as Dionysos (Dionysius) and to the Romans as
Bacchus. Around 3000 years ago, white wines from western Anatolia were exported all around the
Mediterranean in giant two-handled jugs called amphoras, some with a capacity of 75 litres (over 15
gallons). Thousands of amphoras have been found in ships that sank in the Aegean Sea, stamped with
details of the wine’s quality, including a recommendation that it be diluted in the proportion two cups
wine to five cups water, or improved by the addition of honey.
Wine became a key component of celebrations for every ethnic, tribal or religious group that ever
ruled Anatolia. Even some Ottoman sultans, supposedly devout Muslims, consumed vast quantities at
palace banquets, while publicly disapproving of it for their subjects.
But in the nineteenth century the Turkish wine industry went into a decline, as drinkers decided they
preferred to swallow rakı with their meze. By the time I was at university and ready to start my
drinking life, wine (sold in bottles with plastic stoppers) was regarded as a poor man’s tipple,
suitable only for alcoholics who couldn’t afford rakı.
The comeback started in the 1990s (despite a government determined to tax it out of existence),
when some visionary Turkish companies sought the help of French winemakers to make better use of
ideal climatic conditions in particular regions of Anatolia. Nowadays, if you visit a wine-tasting shop
such as Sensus, near Istanbul’s Galata Tower, you’ll be surprised how many Turkish wines can match
the best of America, Australia, Italy and France.
Many Turkish winemakers simply replicate the international clichés of chardonnay, sauvignon
blanc, cabernet sauvignon and shiraz. They taste fine, but for the visitor they don’t represent a
uniquely Anatolian experience. You should look for wines made from the local white grapes called
emir (from the cold middle of the country), narince (from Tokat in Central Anatolia), and misket
(from the Aegean coast). My favourite whites are Suvla Kınalı Yapincak and Sevilen Isabey Narince.
I think Turkish reds are much more advanced and complex than Turkish whites. My favourites are
Sevilen Plato Kalecik Karası and Kavaklıdere Prestige Boğazkere.
The red grapes to look for are öküzgözü (literally ‘ox-eye’, grown in Eastern Anatolia near
Malatya) and boğazkere (‘savoury throat’, grown in the southeast, near Diyarbakır). I’m particularly
pleased to see kalecik karasi making a comeback in the vineyards near Ankara. That was the grape
used by the Hittites (and probably Noah), so it could well be the oldest wine in the world. Dionysos
would approve.
Somer’s mum Ülkü with her signature fava meze.
 A beginner’s glossary

Here are a few terms you’ll encounter in Turkey that might not turn out to be quite as you expect:
Ayran (pronounced ‘eye-run’): The other national drink (after rakı), made with yoğurt, salt and water.
Baklava: A sweet made with filo pastry layered with pistachios (sometimes walnuts) and soaked in
sugar syrup (not honey).
Börek: Savoury pastry (called yufka) that has been rolled, stuffed or layered with (usually) feta,
spinach and/or lamb mince.
Çay (pronounced ‘ch-eye’): Tea, served with all shopping experiences and much more popular than
Turkish coffee.
Çorba (pronounced ‘chorba’): Soup, served for breakfast, lunch and dinner, sometimes approaching
the thickness of stew.
Dolma: Anything stuffed, most often peppers, eggplant and zucchini, but occasionally lamb ribs,
intestines and melons.
Dondurma: Ice cream, the best kind beingthe stretchy maraş (pronounced ‘marash’) made with mastic
gum and salep (wild orchid stems).
Gözleme (pronounced ‘goz-lem-eh’): A kind of savoury pancake, usually stuffed with feta, spinach
and/or lamb mince.
Helva: A sweet, often made with semolina or flour (at home) or with tahini and soapwort root (in
shops, where it’s sold in sticky blocks).
Kahve (pronounced ‘kah-weh’): Turkish coffee,and please wait for the grounds to settle (see
Afternoon Tea chapter).
Kaymak (‘keye-muk’): Clotted cream, made with buffalo, cow’s or sheep’s milk.
Kebap: Char-grilled meat, usually on a skewer. Döner kebap is the vertical version.
Köfte (pronounced ‘kof-tuh’): Usually translated as ‘meatball’ — minced meat kneaded into various
shapes, often with bulgur wheat.
Kokoreç (pronounced ‘koko-rezh’): A kind of char-grilled sausage made with lamb offal wrapped in
lamb intestines, often sold in street stalls.
Lokanta: A casual eatery, ideal for a cheap lunch, where most dishes are displayed on counters and
served lukewarm.
Lokum: Turkish delight.
Mantı (pronounced ‘mantuh’): Dumplings usually stuffed with beef mince and served with garlic
yoğurt and pepper sauce.
Meyhane (pronounced ‘may-huh-neh’): A bar that serves small tasting plates called meze,
accompanied by aniseed-flavoured alcohol called rakı, or wine if you insist.
Muhallebici (pronounced ‘moo-hah-lebee-zhee’): A pudding shop, selling milk- and rice-based
desserts.
Pastane (pronounced ‘pas-tah-neh’): a pastry shop, selling biscuits and syrupy sweets.
Pastırma: Dried spiced beef, usually served in thin slices as a cold cut.
Pide (‘pee-deh’): A kind of bread roll, often stuffed with cheese or mince, sold in shops called pideci
(‘pee-day-zhee’).
Restoran: Less casual than a lokanta, open for lunch and dinner, where you’re likely to see a menu
and a wine list.
Salça (pronounced ‘salcha’): A flavouring paste, usually made with tomato or pepper.
Salep: A hot drink for winter, made with powdered orchid tubers, thought to be an aphrodisiac.
Sucuk (‘soo-jook’): A spicy dried sausage, usually made of beef and usually fried.
Tarator: A paste of walnuts, garlic and day-old bread, usually served with fried seafood.
 THE TEN TOP TECHNIQUES

DOLMA AND SARMA (STUFFING AND ROLLING)

Most English-speakers are familiar with a Greek dish called dolmades, which they take to be vine
leaves filled with seasoned rice. In Turkey, that’s not a dolma, that’s a sarma. Dolma means ‘stuffed’
and sarma means ‘rolled’. Turks will stuff anything that can be made to have a space in the middle,
and anything they can’t stuff (like leaves from grapevines, spinach, or cabbage) they will roll.
Records from the sultan’s palace show that in the fifteenth century Turks were stuffing onions,
apples and intestines; in the sixteenth century, zucchini (courgettes), eggplant (aubergine) and
butternut pumpkin (squash); in the seventeenth century, mackerel, watermelon and barbunya (red
mullet); in the eighteenth, leeks, spinach and quince; and in the nineteenth, melon, okra and lamb ribs.
You’ll find most of those recipes here, though we’ve occasionally expanded upon the two standard
fillings (rice, onion and lamb mince or rice, cinnamon, currants and pine nuts).

SALÇA (PASTE-MAKING)

The array of dishes that can be called ‘Turkish cuisine’ evolved in a time-rich, cash-poor society.
Because of harsh climate variations in the eastern half of the country, people had to find ways to make
ingredients last across four seasons. So they perfected techniques for drying, pickling, brining,
preserving and pulverising products that were plentiful in late summer.
The pulverising process is called salça in Turkish—a word that entered culinary dictionaries only
in the nineteenth century, even though it’s derived from the Latin salsa. Before that, the word palude
was used for pastes, sauces and reductions that were thickened with starch. For me, salça means a
concentration of one ingredient—a paste, perhaps with salt as a preservative.
The most popular salça is made with peppers. On the farm of my traditionalist friend Musa, they
pick the peppers in the morning, remove the stalks and seeds, and toss them into a purpose-built
pepper mincer. Then they simmer the mince in huge pots over a wood fire until most of the water has
evaporated.
To make your own pepper salça (pepper paste) at home:

Remove the stalks and seeds from the capsicums (peppers) and boil the chopped pieces in a little
water for 1 hour (with the lid on the pot). Strain the capsicum and purée the pieces in a blender, then
simmer the purée for 1 hour with the lid off.
For every kilogram of capsicum, stir in 2 tablespoons of olive oil and 1 teaspoon of salt. Pour the
paste into clean glass jars while still warm, top with olive oil and seal.
FIRIN (BAKING)

The local baker in an Anatolian village is the home cook’s best friend. You can send him any dish and
he will cook it for you in his wood-fire stone oven, taking a share of the food as payment if you’re not
flush with funds.
In the southeastern town of Gaziantep, I spent a morning in the bakery of Aydın Kilitoğlu, who’s
had twenty-nine years’ experience with heat. His place is as big as the average bedroom, but he
produces 3000 pides a day. His eleven-year-old son Samet (opposite) works as an apprentice during
school holidays—just as Aydın did with his own father.
Locals kept coming in with trays of eggplants, peppers and even kebaps that would normally be
done over charcoal but which he quickly finishes in his oven. He charges 1 lira per tray, regardless of
what the customer has put on it. Some people were bringing him ‘new’ dishes, such as pizzas they’d
constructed at home, and he was enjoying the challenge of deciding where in the oven the pizza tray
should go, and how long it should stay there.
If you don’t have a stone wood-fire oven, the best way to get close to Aydın’s effect is to turn your
oven up to full blast for at least 30 minutes before you put in your baking tray (or pizza stone, or
unglazed terracotta tile).
If you’re using a metal oven tray, the best way to avoid your pide dough sticking is to spread a bit
of flour on the tray and bake it for about 5 minutes before putting the ball of dough on the flour.
Samet, eleven-year-old son of the owner of Asri Bakery in Gaziantep, learning how to make pide.
The ‘Spice Girl’, Bilge Kadıoğlu, in her shop in ‘Area 51 ‘of Istanbul’s Spice Market.

TENCERE (STEWING)

Turks don’t make stocks or reductions for storage. We simmer whatever meat we need on the day
we’re going to eat it, and boil the accompanying rice in that water when the meat is removed. We
might make a second dish from the leftovers, but essentially it’s all consumed within 24 hours.
But we do love slow cooking. The tradition of güveç (clay pot) cooking started in rural
households, which would have a fire pit outside the house—a hole in the ground called a tandır. You
would light a fire in the bottom and hang a clay pot over the fire, slowly simmering a mixture of any
ingredients you could find. If you could afford it, you would line the sides of the pit with clay, and
bake dough on the hot sides, making a loaf that was called nan in Ottoman.
In the nineteenth century, an iron device called a kuzine became the centrepiece of every Turkish
home. It was a wood-fire stove, useful for warming the house, but also used for stewing, brewing tea,
even roasting chestnuts. The cook would leave a clay pot full of ingredients on the top all day long
and everybody tucked in when they got home at night.
The trick with güveç cookery is layering the pot so that the ingredient that will take the longest is at
the bottom, while the one needing least heat is at the top.

KURUTMA (DRYING)

In delicatessens called şarküteri all over Turkey, you’ll see red tubes that look like salami and red
slabs that look like leather hanging from hooks. The sausage is called sucuk, spiced beef inside a
lamb intestine, and the leather is a marinated beef fillet called pastırma.
The word pastırma (adapted to basturma in Greece and pastrami in New York) simply means
‘pressed’, but that reveals nothing of the long and complex process of drying and coating in paste that
produces Turkey’s ubiquitous answer to prosciutto.
Kayseri in central Anatolia is the capital of pastırma-making. It is thought to be the first place meat
was wind-dried in the world, some time before the Romans arrived. These days the master-driers are
said to be people of Armenian background. Afyon on the Aegean coast is the capital of sucuk-making.
In this book we’ve given a couple of recipes for non-traditional pastırma and a suggestion for
sucuk without the intestine, but we’re happy for you to use store-bought general versions.
In food markets across the land you will see small purple pouches hanging on strings from the roof
beams. They are dried eggplants, waiting to be stuffed. Most likely they came from the Oğuzeli area
in southeastern Anatolia, where summer is perfect for growing baby eggplants and drying them. In the
season, they pick the eggplants (and zucchinis) early in the morning, scoop out the flesh and leave
them to hang in the 35°C (95°F) heat for 24 hours. That’s all it takes. But if it rains, the eggplants will
become spotted and unsellable, and the grower will need to start again.

BAHARAT (SPICING)

For 1000 years Constantinople was the end point of the spice route. Some spices were literally worth
their weight in gold because they were thought to be miracle cures for a variety of ailments. Now they
are flavour boosters.
In a quiet corner of Istanbul’s spice market, identified as number 51, you’ll encounter a shop called
Ucuzcular (Cheapies), run by Bilge Kadıoğlu (opposite). She’ll tell you her first name is pronounced
‘like Bill Gates—but without the money’. She’ll tell you she doesn’t mind being called the ‘Spice
Girl’. She’ll tell you the term ‘Area 51’ is appropriate, echoing the section of a US air force base
where UFOs are allegedly hidden, because in the marketplace she’s an alien—the only woman to run
a shop, and the only shopkeeper to charge the same prices to locals as to visitors. She’s an honest
broker in one of the world’s oldest professions.
When I’m there, I always buy my salep powder (made from orchids) and mahlep powder (made
from white cherry seeds) from Bilge. She also turns her spices into perfumes and oils for the skin.
Bilge’s two most traditional spice mixes are spot on: dolma baharı (a blend of cinnamon, allspice,
black pepper and pimento, to be stirred through rice) and köfte baharı (a mixture of cumin, black
pepper, pimento, dried oregano and dried coriander, to be kneaded into minced meat). They are
extraterrestrial. In this book we’ll try to show you how to replicate their effect.

TURŞU (PICKLING)

A local movie called Happy Days, made in the 1970s, exposes one of the most divisive issues in
Turkish society. It shows a married couple at odds over the best way to pickle vegetables. The
husband says lemon, the wife says vinegar. They divorce and then get back together, but never reach
agreement. Both as a chef and as a married man, I know you can never win an argument with a
woman, so I mostly go with vinegar.
That also puts me on the side of the first published picklers. A fourteenth-century nutrition book
contains recipes for preserving cucumber, eggplants, onions and beetroot in a vinegar marinade. In
the seventeenth century, Greek meyhanes started pickling a fish called lakerda, its saltiness probably
boosting alcohol sales.
The Turkish technique seems simple:

For every 1 litre (35 fl oz/4 cups) of water you need 100 ml (3½ fl oz) of vinegar and 3 tablespoons
of natural rock salt (not iodised). But the devil is in the detail—you must make sure your glass jar is
sterilised, the vegetables are of premium quality, not overripe, and evenly placed in the jar, and you
must wait at least 5 weeks before eating them. You can throw in a few chickpeas to speed
fermentation, but be sure to remove them after 1 week. The ideal temperature of the room where you
store your pickles is 20°C (about 70°F). For every two degrees Celsius below that, wait another
week.

REÇEL (PRESERVING)

There are more jams in Turkey than there are fruits, because we often make several types from the
one ingredient—for example, orange rind marmalade and orange jam, or unripened fig jam, fresh fig
jam and dried fig marmalade.
 Some recipes are simple—as in, boil 1 kg (2 lb 4 oz) of berries with 800 g (1 lb 12 oz) of sugar
for 30 minutes, adding the juice of half a lemon to prevent crystallisation. Some are more elaborate,
like the rose petal jam we discuss in the Breakfast chapter.
The word reçel (jam) comes from the Persian ricar, which suggests an origin a little to the east of
Anatolia. But we know the Romans were making marmalade with fruit and honey before they arrived
in Byzantion, so we could also credit an influence from the West. The crusaders supposedly took jam-
making recipes from Istanbul to northern Europe in the thirteenth century, and by the sixteenth century
the futurologist Nostradamus was using them to impress the French royal family. Eat jam with pide
and clotted cream.

KÖFTE (KNEADING)

This is what they do for entertainment in the southeastern town of Şanlıurfa: watch an expert make çiğ
(chee) köfte. While a band plays and singers emote, the master sits on the floor and kneads a mixture
of raw veal, bulgur and spices in a large tray for up to an hour. Moving his shoulders in time to the
music, he produces hundreds of meatballs, which are served to the guests sitting around the
musicians. The guests roll the pieces of köfte in lettuce leaves, and munch on them as they watch the
floor show. The sweat from the master’s hands has become part of the flavour. In a sense, sweat is the
most important ingredient in any köfte, because it symbolises how much effort you’ve put into the
kneading.
Köfte is often translated as ‘meatball’ but it comes from a Persian word that simply meant
‘mashed’. The name implies no particular ingredient, which can be raw or cooked, meat, fish or veg.
You work with shoulders and (thoroughly washed) hands for as long as it takes to produce a smooth
patty. When you think it’s ready, knead it for another 10 minutes.
In the centre of Sultanahmet Square, just near the Topkapı Palace, you will see rows of köfte
sellers claiming to be ‘the original’, ‘the historical’ and ‘the traditional’. The best, the first and the
original does not display any of those adjectives. It’s called Selim Usta (Selim the Master) and it
dates from 1920. Selim’s köfte is made from spiced beef and served with bean and onion salad.

KEBAP (GRILLING)

A common folk myth goes that kebap cooking was invented in the twelfth century by Turkish soldiers
who skewered meat on their swords and cooked them over a fire. But an archaeological dig in
Santorini, Greece, found kebap cookers called ‘fire dogs’ (with a hotbox carved into the shape of a
dog) that were in use 3700 years ago. So it’s one of humanity’s most ancient forms of cooking, now
evolved into a fine art.
First you must decide the form in which your lamb, beef or chicken will be cooked—whole, in
lumps or minced into patties. Any mincing must be done with a giant sharp knife called a zırh. Then
you must blend in your flavouring—a sophisticated mix of herbs, peppers, onions, spices and (with
meat kebaps) lamb fat, which will drip out of the meat and turn into a fragrant smoke that will further
complicate the ultimate flavour.
And it’s not just a matter of sticking it on a fire. The wood or charcoal must be lit 1 hour in
advance and allowed to die down to embers, so there will be no flames in contact with the meat.
Turks like to go to specialist kebap houses for their charcoal hits. Australians claim to be barbecue
kings, so kebap cooking at home should be easy for them. If you don’t own a charcoal grill, we offer
some kebap recipes that can be cooked in the oven. But you’ll be missing a lot of flavour.

How to talk Turkey

After the republic was formed in 1923, Turks moved from the confusing Arabic alphabet to the
much simpler Latin alphabet. In this book, we’ve used the Turkish spellings of dishes and
locations.
The names might seem difficult at first, especially since the alphabet has twenty-nine letters,
but the spelling is logical and phonetically consistent, once you get the hang of it.
All letters are read as they are written, and they always have the same sound.
AA/a B/b C/c Ç/ç D/d E/e F/f G/g Ğ/ğ H/h I/ı İ/i J/j K/k L/l M/m N/n O/o Ö/ö P/p R/r S/s Ş/ş
T/t U/u Ü/ü V/v Y/y Z/z

A few letters are pronounced differently from the English alphabet:

A/a = as in far
C/c = as in joke
Ç/ç = as in chair
E/e = as in set
G/g = as in goat
Ğ/ğ = silent g, not pronounced but it extends the preceding vowel
I/ı = (without a dot) pronounced as the last syllable in button
İ/i = (with a dot) as in sit
J/j = as in measure
Ö/ö = as in bird
Ş/ş = as in shut
Ü/ü = as in cube
V/v = like w, as in water

So, for example, köfte (meatball) is pronounced ‘kirf-teh’; sütlaç (rice pudding) is ‘soot-latch’;
mantı (dumpling) is ‘mantuh’; gösleme (pancake) is ‘gerslemeh’; yogurt is ‘yoh-ourt‘; keşkül
(almond pudding) is ‘kesh-kool’; kahvaltı (breakfast) is ‘kah-waltuh’; and baklava is ‘bah-
klawa‘.
At Karadeniz in Istanbul’s Beşiktaş market, the döner kebap starts the morning as a 100 kilo ball of meat and slims down as the day
proceeds.
breakfast
They love a big breakfast banquet in the far east of Anatolia. In the city of Van
(pronounced ‘wahn’), they’ll take three hours to consume as many as forty-one
courses, and then eat nothing else for the rest of the day. Most of the courses will be
small—like a dish of olives, a few slices of watermelon, a pot of rose jam and bread
rolls in various shapes—but they add up to a feast. There’s a famous Turkish
romantic poem, written by Yılmaz Erdoğan in 2002, in which an ardent suitor tells his
sweetheart: ‘I’d love the chance to have breakfast with you in a breakfast salon in
Van.’

Now please don’t imagine this is typical of all of Turkey—or even that it’s an ancient tradition. Our
word for breakfast is kahvaltı, which literally translates as ‘coffee after’. It implies that breakfast is
something that puts a layer on your stomach before your first coffee of the day, and in most Istanbul
homes most mornings that means white cheese, fruit, yoğurt and bread from the local bakery. The egg
dishes will come out at weekends.
Even the wealthy Ottomans of the sixteenth century didn’t go in much for breakfast, preferring to
have some soup and leftovers from last night’s banquet around 11 am, in what these days we would
call brunch.
Outside of Istanbul today, there is huge regional variation in morning behaviour. In the gourmet
town of Gaziantep, in southeastern Turkey, they like to eat liver kebaps or a fiery soup of lamb, rice
and chilli. Along the Black Sea they dip their bread into a kind of cheese fondue. In central Anatolia
they love böreks—pastries usually stuffed with feta and spinach. In ancient Tarsus, they serve warm
humus with bread for dipping. All of them drink tea with their first meal of the day, and have coffee
after.
And in Van, they’ve only been doing the big breakfast since the 1940s, when it was introduced in a
salon called Sütçü Kenan (which we could translate as ‘Milkman Ken’) to showcase the vast variety
of cheeses from the region. Milkman Ken’s breakfast banquet was quickly copied by other cafés in
his town, and then by breakfast salons (kahvaltı evi) in Istanbul.
Four years ago, I started offering a ‘Van breakfast’ on Sunday mornings in my restaurant in Sydney.
It’s been a huge success. This chapter shows you how you can create your own Van breakfast, or any
part thereof, at home.
For the record, these are the courses I serve in my version of the Van breakfast:

1. Pide bread
2. Pomegranate molasses
3. Bazlama bread
4. Poğaça pastry
5. Simit (a kind of pretzel)
6. Kaymak (clotted cream)
7. Honey
8. Rose jam
9. Sour cherry jam
10. Fig jam
11. Quince jam
12. Feta (goat’s cheese)
13. Kashkaval (sheep’s cheese)
14. Tulum (sheep’s cheese aged in goat skin)
15. String cheese
16. Lor cheese (a kind of ricotta)
17. Labne balls (yoğurt cheese)
18. Unsalted butter
19. Sucuk (sausage)
20. Cigar böreks
21. Spinach böreks
22. Paçanga (pastırma böreks)
23. Cracked green olives
24. Black olives
25. Sliced tomatoes
26. Cucumbers
27. Olive paste
28. Tomato ezme (crushed with chilli)
29. Muhammara (pepper dip)
30. Pastırma (cold cuts of spiced beef)
31. Barbecued haloumi
32. Menemen (scrambled eggs)
33. Watermelon
34. Melon
35. Grapes
36. Mulberry leather (dehydrated grape molasses)
37. Katmer (sweet börek)
38. Red grapes
39. Turkish delight
40. Baklava
41. Tahini helva

Now you can make your own.

The Sunday Van breakfast at Efendy restaurant in Sydney.

SİMİT
SESAME RINGS

What pretzels are to New Yorkers, simit are to Istanbulians, who buy them from street stalls all day
long and munch them between appointments.
They are at least 600 years old—Topkapı Palace documents from 1593 include bulk orders for
simid-i halka (round simits). They have entered the language of metaphor. A Turk who hates his job
will say: ‘I’d be better off selling simit’. Protesters trying to dissuade police from breaking up a
demonstration will shout: ‘Sell simit and leave with honour.’
There are bakeries that cook nothing but simit—in wood-fire ovens, of course, at 300°C (570°F/
Gas 10+). And there are cafés, usually with titles such as ‘Palace of Simit’, that serve them with
melted cheese, tomato and other unnecessary additions. Personally, I would never sit down to eat
simit, and I would never cook them at home if I was in Istanbul. But outside my homeland, you need a
recipe.

SERVES 8

2 teaspoons dry yeast

2 teaspoons sugar
300 g (10½ oz/2 cups) plain (all-purpose) flour, plus extra for dusting
1 tablespoon vegetable oil, plus extra for greasing
45 ml (1½ fl oz) thickened (whipping) cream
1 teaspoon salt
350 g (12 oz/1 cup) grape molasses
140 g (5 oz/1 cup) sesame seeds
butter and feta, to serve (optional)

Mix the yeast and the sugar in a bowl with 250 ml (9 fl oz /1 cup) of lukewarm water and then set
aside for 5 minutes. It should start to form bubbles. Add another 125 ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) of water and
combine.

Sift the flour into a mixing bowl, make a well in the middle and pour in the yeast mixture, vegetable
oil and thickened cream. Knead the dough for 5 minutes to make a soft and stretchy dough, adding
more flour if the dough is sticky. Cover the bowl with a damp cloth and rest for 1 hour. It should
expand.

Preheat the oven to 230°C (450°F/Gas 8).

Add the salt to the dough and knead for 3 minutes. Sprinkle some flour on your work surface. Divide
the dough into eight pieces and roll into balls. Rest for 3 minutes. With floured hands, pull each ball
in half and roll each half into a strip about 50 cm (20 in) long. Twist the two strips around each other
into braids. Pull the braided dough around into a circle. Stick the ends together, wetting the dough if
necessary to help it hold.

Dilute the grape molasses in 170 ml (5½ fl oz/2/3 cup) of water.

Place a frying pan over low heat. Add the sesame seeds and toast, tossing constantly, until the seeds
turn golden brown. Turn onto a tray and set aside

Pour the grape molasses into a shallow bowl. Dip the braided dough into the molasses, one at a time.
Turn to coat both sides. Shake off the excess liquid then toss each braid in the sesame seeds, making
sure both sides are evenly coated.

Line a baking tray with baking paper and brush with oil. Arrange the simit on the tray and bake for 20
minutes until golden brown and crusty.

Serve warm with butter and feta, or at room temperature as part of a breakfast spread.
BAZLAMA
PAN-FRIED BREAD

Bazlama is the simplest form of bread in the world—it doesn’t even require an oven. The technique is
probably at least 3000 years old. In Turkish villages, lumps of dough are spread on a sac
(pronounced ‘sazh’), which is like an upturned wok resting over hot coals. You could try that, or use
a frying pan instead.
Unlike most breads, bazlama involves little preparation time. You could leave it to rise overnight,
or you could wake up on a Sunday morning, decide ‘Lets do a bazlama brunch’, invite your friends,
leave the dough to rise while you’re showering and tidying up, and fry your bread while your guests
are sitting down.
Because it contains yoğurt it has a rich flavour and an interesting texture—soft inside and crunchy
outside. You’d serve it with jams or cheeses (which you would need to make earlier).

SERVES 4

2 teaspoons dry yeast

1 teaspoon sugar
600 g (1 lb 5 oz /4 cups) plain (all-purpose) flour, plus extra for dusting
1 teaspoon salt
125 g (4½ oz/½ cup) plain yoğurt
vegetable oil, for frying
butter, jam or cheese, to serve

Put the yeast and sugar in a bowl with 250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) of lukewarm water, then set aside for 5
minutes. It should start to form bubbles.

Sift the flour into a mixing bowl, make a well in the middle, and pour in the yeast mixture. Knead the
dough for 1 minute, then add the yoğurt. Knead for a further 10 minutes or until the dough has reached,
as we say in Turkey, ‘the softness of an earlobe’. Cover the bowl with a damp cloth and rest in a
warm place for 2 hours. The ball of dough should double in size.

Add the salt to the dough and knead for 3 minutes. Sprinkle some flour on your work surface and
divide the dough into four balls. Return the dough to the bowl, cover with a damp cloth and rest for
10 minutes.

Place one ball of dough on the work surface and, using floured hands or a rolling pin, flatten into a
round about 10 cm (4 in) wide and 1 cm (½ in) thick. Repeat with the remaining dough balls.
Heat 1 tablespoon of vegetable oil in a frying pan for 1 minute over medium heat and swirl gently to
coat. Add one round of dough and cook for 1 minute. Turn the round over and cook for 1 minute more
or until golden brown, then transfer onto paper towel. Repeat with the remaining three rounds, adding
more oil to the pan as required.

Serve the bazlamas with butter, jam or cheese.

TIRNAKLI PİDE
FINGER PIDE

Let me say it again—pide bread is different from pita, which is a Greek term for the unleavened
bread that wraps around kebaps (better known as lavaş in Turkish). In Istanbul, pide is a treat you
enjoy for one month of the year—when you break your fast after sunset during the month of Ramadan.
In lucky southeastern Anatolia they get to have pide all year round, because it’s their main form of
bread. The cooks augment it with a coating of yoğurt, deposited on the top with dancing fingers, like
concert pianists—hence the name ‘finger pide’. The accompaniments for pide are infinite—jam is
only the beginning.

SERVE 4

3 teaspoons dry yeast

500 g (1 lb 2 oz/31/3 cups) plain (all-purpose) flour, plus extra for dusting
50 ml (12/3 fl oz) sunflower oil
½ teaspoon mahlep powder (ground white cherry seeds) (optional)
2 teaspoons salt
25 g (1 oz) plain yoğurt
1 tablespoon nigella seeds
1 tablespoon sesame seeds
50 g (1¾ oz) wholemeal flour (if using a baking tray)

Dissolve the yeast in a bowl with 250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) of lukewarm water. Set aside for 5 minutes.
It should start to form bubbles.

Sift the flour into a mixing bowl, make a well in the middle and pour in the yeast mixture. Add 375 ml
(13 fl oz/1½ cups) of water, the sunflower oil and mahlep powder, and knead for 5 minutes to form a
soft dough. Cover the bowl with a damp cloth and rest in a warm place for 1 hour. The ball of dough
should double in size.

Add the salt to the dough and knead for 3 minutes. Sprinkle the extra flour on your work surface.
Divide the dough into five pieces and roll into balls. Return the dough to the bowl, cover with a damp
cloth and leave to rest for 30 minutes.

Preheat the oven to its maximum temperature (as close to 300°C/570°F as possible). If you have a
pizza stone or unglazed terracotta tile, place it in the oven to heat.

Place one ball of dough on the work surface and, using floured hands or a rolling pin, flatten into a
round about 10 cm (4 in) wide and 2 cm (¾ in) thick. Repeat with the remaining dough balls.

Mix the yoğurt and 25 ml (¾ fl oz) of water together in a bowl. Dunk both your hands in the mixture
and then, using four fingers of each hand joined together, hop your fingertips across the dough
vertically and then horizontally to make indentations across the top of each round. Dip your fingers
into the yoğurt regularly to keep them wet.

Mix the nigella and sesame seeds together and sprinkle them evenly onto each round. Put the bread on
the pizza stone or tile and place on the middle rack of the oven. If you don’t have a stone or tile,
sprinkle the wholemeal flour on a baking tray lined with baking paper and place the rounds on the
flour. Cook for 5 minutes at 300°C (570°F/Gas 10+) (or 6 minutes at 250°C/500°F/Gas 9 or 7
minutes at 200°C/400°F/Gas 6) until brown on top and golden on the sides.

Serve warm as part of a breakfast spread.

The harbour at Bodrum, Aegean coast.
POĞAÇA
BALKAN-STYLE BRIOCHE STUFFED WITH
POTATO AND CHILLI

The Turkish word poğaça (pronounced ‘poe-uchah’) comes from the same root as the Italian word
focaccia: the Latin panis focacius, which means bread cooked in the hearth. That suggests it must have
been a favourite of the Romans during their time in Constantinople. In the mid-seventeenth century, the
travel writer Evliya Çelebi reported in his memoir Seyahatname (Tales of the Journey) that a sweet
version of poğaça had been popular in the sultan’s palace 100 years earlier but was introduced as
street food by Balkan immigrants, who would heap hot ashes over the dough, let it bake, then scrape
the bread clean and serve it with cheese or lamb mince. (The description sounds rather like damper, a
favourite of Australian bushies in the nineteenth century.)
My version of this recipe could not have been eaten by the Emperor Constantine, since potatoes
only reached Turkey from South America in the eighteenth century. I think poğaça tastes even better
when the mash melts into the dough.

SERVES 4

1 teaspoon dry yeast

2 teaspoons sugar
70 g (2½ oz) butter
1 egg
125 g (4½ oz/½ cup) plain yoğurt
300 g (10½ oz/2 cups) plain (all-purpose) flour, plus extra for dusting
3 boiling potatoes (such as desiree)
2 teaspoons salt, plus extra for boiling the potatoes
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
2 teaspoons chilli flakes
1 heaped tablespoon shredded kaşar (or mozzarella)
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
1 egg yolk
1 tablespoon nigella seeds
1 tablespoon sesame seeds

Mix the yeast and the sugar in a bowl with 125 ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) of lukewarm water and set aside
for 5 minutes. It should start to form bubbles.

Whisk the butter, egg and yoğurt together in a bowl. Sift the flour into a mixing bowl, make a well in
the middle, pour in the yeast mixture and stir through. Add the yoğurt mixture and knead vigorously
for 10 minutes to make a soft, stretchy dough. Cover the bowl with a damp cloth and rest in a warm
place for 2 hours to expand.

Preheat the oven to 200°C (400°F/Gas 6).

Peel and quarter the potatoes, then place in a large saucepan, cover with salted water and bring to the
boil. Cook for 15 minutes or until the potatoes are tender, then drain well. Add half the salt, the
pepper, chilli flakes and cheese, and roughly mash.

Add the remaining salt to the rested dough and knead to combine. Sprinkle some flour on your work
surface. Divide the dough into eight pieces and roll into balls. Place one ball of dough on the work
surface and, with floured hands or a rolling pin, flatten into a round about 10 cm (4 in) wide and 1–2
cm (about ½ in) thick. Repeat with the remaining dough. Add 1 tablespoon of the mashed potato
mixture in the middle of each round. Fold over one side to create a half moon shape. Press lightly
around the edges to seal.

Line a baking tray with baking paper and brush with vegetable oil. Arrange the poğaças on the tray.
Brush the pastry with oil and the tops with egg yolk, and sprinkle on the seeds. Bake for 30 minutes or
until golden brown.

Serve warm, two per person.

BALIKLI EKMEK
BLACK SEA CORNBREAD WITH LEEKS
AND WHITEBAIT

When I led my first gourmet tour of Turkey in 2013, we visited the tranquil Istanbul suburb of
Anadolu Kavaği—the last stop for the Bosphorus ferries—lined with casual seaside restaurants
looking out to the Black Sea and up to Yoros Castle. We sat down to a fish feast.
Walking back to the ferry, we passed an unassuming bakery, and one of my guests noted a snack I’d
never seen before—cornbread that seemed to be stuffed with sardines and leeks. He bought some for
everyone and they declared it the highlight of the day. So I researched it and recreated it for this book.
Hamsi is the most prized fish of the Black Sea—somewhere between an anchovy and a sardine. I
decided to substitute baby whitebait, because hamsi don’t swim far beyond the Bosphorus and
sardines might be too strong for breakfast.

SERVES 8

½ bunch silverbeet (Swiss chard)

½ bunch dill
½ bunch flat-leaf (Italian) parsley
2 leeks
2 onions
2 tablespoons butter
2 tablespoons dried mint
500 g (1 lb 2 oz) whitebait
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 kg (2 lb 4 oz) maize flour
250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) olive oil, plus extra for brushing
1 egg
1 tablespoon salt

Wash the silverbeet and remove the stalks. Finely chop the leaves. Remove the stalks from the dill.
Pick the leaves from the parsley. Remove the roots and green outer layer from the leeks, then rinse to
remove any dirt. Finely chop the leeks, parsley and onions separately.

Melt the butter in a frying pan over high heat. Add the onions and cook for 3 minutes or until soft. Add
the leeks and cook for 3 minutes, then add the silverbeet and cook for a further 5 minutes. Remove
from the heat, turn into a bowl and leave to cool.
Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F/Gas 4).

When the silverbeet mixture has cooled, stir in the parsley and dried mint. Add the whitebait and
mash together with a fork.

Mix the baking powder with 300 ml (10¾ fl oz) of warm water. Sift the flour into a mixing bowl,
make a well in the middle and pour in the baking powder mixture. Stir thoroughly and then add the
whitebait mixture, olive oil, egg and salt. Knead for 5 minutes, or until it forms a rough dough.

Line a 30 x 20 x 4 cm (12 x 8 x 1½ in) baking tray with baking paper and brush with olive oil. Press
the dough into the tray. Sprinkle the dill over the top and press it in. Brush the top with oil and bake
for 45 minutes.

Take the tray out of the oven and make three knife cuts across the top of the bread to ensure even
cooking. Brush the top and the slits with more oil and bake for a further 45 minutes or until golden
brown.

Turn off the heat, leaving the bread in the oven, and rest for 30 minutes.

Slice or break the warm cornbread into chunks and serve.

 Kaymak at Pando’s

Everything moves slowly at Pando’s—particularly Pando Şestakof, who is ninety. When a young
businessman on his way to work sits at an outside table for a plate of kaymak and asks: ‘Could you
rush the order?’ Pando replies: ‘Here it runs at my speed.’ Then he shuffles inside and painstakingly
scoops the pure white treasure onto a steel plate and drizzles it with honey. He picks up a plastic
basket containing half a loaf of bread, roughly chopped, and takes a full five minutes to shuffle back
outside with the two plates.
That ritual has been going on in this place since 1895, when Pando’s grandfather came from
Bulgaria and set up a shop called Hayat (Life) to sell the products of his dairy farm. He became the
favoured supplier to the Dolmabahçe Palace, where the sultan lived in summer. After the revolution
that palace became the residence of President Atatürk, and Pando’s father continued to provide the
kaymak.
When Pando and his wife Yuanna inherited the shop, they sold the farm and started buying their
milk from the best water buffalo farmers in the neighbourhood. Pando opens his café at 8 am, seven
days a week, and closes when he runs out of kaymak. Then he goes home to make some more for
tomorrow.
Pando’s little shop is a geographical reference point in the neighbourhood. For the past thirty years,
visitors asking the way somewhere won’t be given a street name but instead be told ‘Go 20 metres
past Pando’s and turn left’. He’s at a kind of crossroads in Beşiktaş market, one of the last surviving
local markets in Istanbul. As recently as twenty years ago, nearly every suburb had a jumble of shops
and stalls like this. But more than a hundred local markets have shrunk to a handful, replaced by
shopping centres with escalators instead of lane ways and supermarkets that sell flavourless
commercially processed kaymak.
Here’s how Pando makes his clotted cream (and you’ll quickly see why we adapted the recipe):

Use unpasteurised and unhomogenised buffalo milk (which has a fat content of about 8 per cent, while
cow’s milk has 3 per cent).
Pour it into a baking tray over a wood fire and slowly cook it. Never let it boil. After about four
hours it will start to develop a skin.
Every few hours, skim off the skin and put it into a separate tray. The skin is the kaymak. Over 48
hours you will get 100 g (3½ oz) of kaymak from 1 kg (2 lb 4 oz) of buffalo milk. You can drink the
watery milk that is left behind.

To accompany our recipe on the following page, we’ve suggested rose jam—because that’s how
Pando used to serve it back in the 1960s. Nowadays, he prefers honey, but he always keeps a pot of
rose jam for nostalgic customers.
Pando Şestakof delivers the tea that must accompany his precious kaymak.
YALANCI KAYMAK
CLOTTED CREAM WITH ROSE JAM

The Turkish name for this dish translates as ‘Liar’s kaymak’, because our recipe will not end up
tasting the same as the kaymak that has been served for 100 years in my favourite breakfast café in
Istanbul—Pando in Beşiktaş markets. There the kaymak is made with water buffalo milk that has been
slowly simmered until it’s thick and luscious.
In this recipe, I’ve included cornflour as a thickener, on the assumption that you will be using
pasteurised milk. If you have access to creamy unpasteurised milk, lucky you, because you can
eliminate the cornflour and come closer to the Pando experience.

SERVES 4

KAYMAK
60 g (2¼ oz/½ cup) cornflour (cornstarch)
250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) full-cream (whole) milk (preferably high-fat such as Jersey or buffalo)
500 ml (17 fl oz /2 cups) thickened (whipping) cream
50 g (1¾ oz) butter

RO SE JAM
50 pink rose petals
500 g (1 lb 2 oz) sugar
1 teaspoon citric acid powder
pide bread, to serve

First make the kaymak. Whisk the cornflour, milk and cream together to dissolve the starch. Transfer
to a baking tray, preferably a stainless steel ¼ gastronorm tray (26.5 x 16.3 x 2 cm/101/3 x 6½ x ¾ in).
Place the tray over very low heat and whisk for 5 minutes—being careful not to let the mixture stick.
Add the butter and continue to whisk for 15 minutes or until it thickens to a pudding consistency.
Remove from the heat and leave to rest for 30 minutes, then transfer to the fridge.

To make the jam, first peel the petals from the pink roses. If using organic (non-sprayed) roses, wash
under cold running water. If using commercial roses, blanche in boiling water for 15 seconds, soak in
cold water in the fridge for 12 hours, and then strain and wash under cold running water. Discard any
brown or spotty petals. Cut the white patch off the bottom of each petal and slice any large petals in
half. Pat the petals dry with paper towel. Place a layer of petals in a bowl, sprinkle with sugar, add
another layer and repeat the process until all the petals are coated with the sugar. Cover with plastic
wrap and refrigerate overnight.
Pour 500 ml (17 fl oz/2 cups) of water into a heavy-based saucepan and add 1 tablespoon of sugar.
Slowly bring to the boil, stirring frequently. Add the sugared rose petals and simmer for 20 minutes,
stirring occasionally. Add the citric acid and simmer for a further 10 minutes, scooping off any scum
that forms on the surface. To test the thickness of the jam, scoop a spoonful onto a cold plate. It should
form a gel. If it‘s still runny, simmer for a further 5 minutes or until it thickens.

Remove the jam from the heat and leave to cool to room temperature, then transfer to a jar with a
tight-fitting lid* and set aside. (Do not put in the fridge.)

Spread 2 tablespoons of jam on a plate and top with a large dollop of kaymak. Serve with pide.

NOTE
Stored properly, the rose jam will keep for up to 6 months. Cut a piece of baking paper slightly larger
than the jar cap, brush liberally with olive oil and place it between the jar and the cap before sealing
tightly. This will prevent mould forming on the jam.
Pando’s wife, Yuanna Şestakof.
LABNE
MINTED YOĞURT BALLS

When I first heard of a Middle-Eastern cheese called labne I was intrigued, but I refrained from using
it in my restaurant because I thought it was Lebanese. Then I discovered that the name comes from
laban, an Egyptian-Arabic word for ‘milk’, that it is just strained yoğurt, treated with a little lemon
and salt; and that it can be found all over Turkey under the name süzme. The Lebanese like to dip their
labne in zaatar, and the Egyptians dip them in dukka, but I thought I’d be Turkish and use mint and
sumac.

MAKES ABOUT 15 BALLS

1 garlic clove
1¼ tablespoons salt
1.4 kg (3 lb 2 oz) plain yoğurt
juice of ¼ lemon
1 mint stalk
500 ml (17 fl oz/2 cups) extra virgin olive oil
3 tablespoons dried mint
3 teaspoons sumac
2 teaspoons chilli flakes
1 tablespoon dill tips (or dried dill)

Crush the garlic with 1 teaspoon of salt, then mix with the yoğurt and lemon juice.

Place the yoğurt mixture on a sheet of muslin (cheesecloth), tie up the corners and hang over a pot for
12 hours to drain. The yoğurt should thicken to a cream cheese consistency.

Mould the thickened yoğurt into spheres about the size of a ping-pong ball. This quantity should make
about fifteen balls.

Gently place the labne into a large jar with the fresh mint, cover with olive oil, and then set aside to
rest for at least 24 hours.

When you’re ready to serve, combine the herbs and salt on a plate and roll the balls in the mix, one at
a time. Serve on a platter in the middle of the table for people to help themselves.

NOTE
Labne can be kept in the fridge for up to 1 month.
SİGARA BÖREĞI
ROLLED PASTRY CIGARS WITH FETA AND
PARSLEY

This is the first of three recipes for böreks, the pastries that got their name from a Turkish verb
meaning ‘to twist’. You can tie yourself in knots trying to fold the pastry as neatly as a Turkish cook.
We suggest you just relax and try to make shapes that vaguely resemble cigars (this recipe) or spirals
(the next recipe) or square parcels (the third recipe).
The word börek is very old—there’s a reference to a sugar burek in a twelfth-century book called
Danişmendname, about the conquest of Anatolia by the Turks, which presumably means we can call
böreks ‘the breakfast of conquerors’.
The cigar börek is the simplest form, and can be made with commercial yufka (or two layers of
filo) instead of rolling out your own pastry. From one sheet of yufka you can make eight to twelve
cigars, which you could freeze and then deep fry (without defrosting) when you need them.
Normally sigara böreği are stuffed with just feta and parsley, but I find mint a refreshing addition.

MAKES 8

CHEESE FI LLI NG
1 bunch flat-leaf (Italian) parsley
1 bunch mint
300 g (10½ oz) sheep’s feta
1 egg
1 tablespoon sweet paprika

WRAPPI NG
1 sheet yufka, about 80 x 80 cm (31½ x 31½ in) (if you cannot buy yufka)
1 egg white

sunflower oil, for frying

First make the filling. Pick the mint and parsley leaves (discarding the stalks) and finely chop. Mash
the feta with a fork. Break the egg into a small bowl and whisk. Add the feta, parsley, mint and
paprika, and stir to a chunky paste.

Place the yufka on a board and cut across four times to create eight wedges (or cut eight times, into 16
wedges, to make cigarillos). Next, fill and fold your cigars. Place the egg white in a bowl. With the
round edge of one yufka segment facing towards you, place a strip of filling across the pastry, about 5
cm (2 in) from each edge. Fold the round edge over the strip of filling and press down. Then, fold
over about 5 cm (2 in) of pastry from the left side, leaving a straight edge. Finally, fold over a 5 cm
(2 in) flap from the right side, leaving a straight edge. Using a pastry brush, brush the top triangle of
pastry with egg white and roll the folded part tightly over to make a cigar shape. Repeat this process
with the seven other segments.

Place a deep frying pan over high heat and add enough sunflower oil to cover the böreks (about 3
cm/1¼ in deep). Add a drop of water to the oil. If it sizzles, the oil is ready. Carefully add four
böreks and fry for 2 minutes or until lightly golden. Remove the böreks from the pan with a slotted
spoon and place on paper towel to absorb the excess oil. Repeat with the remaining böreks.

Serve immediately.
ISPANAKLI KOL BÖREĞI
ROLLED PASTRY WITH SPINACH AND
FETA

The Turkish word kol means ‘arm’, and presumably gets into the Turkish name for this börek because
each roll of pastry is bent to look like an arm coming round to hug you. It would make more sense to
call this a spiral or a labyrinth, since that is how it looks when all the arms are linked together.
My maternal grandma, who came from Yugoslavia, was a master of the ‘arm börek’, and she made
giant spirals to feed a large family. In later life, she used an electric börek cooker, called a drum
oven, which was a cylinder with doors on the side and shelves onto which you could place multiple
layers of börek.
Spinach is the traditional filling, but you can use kale, silverbeet or even minced lamb.

SERVES 8

250 g (9 oz) English spinach

1 onion
4 spring onions (scallions)
120 ml (4 fl oz) sunflower or vegetable oil
1 tablespoon chilli flakes
1 tablespoon salt
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 tablespoon dried mint
150 g (5½ oz) feta
80 ml (2½ fl oz/1/3 cup) milk
1 egg
1 tablespoon plain yoğurt
2 sheets yufka (if you cannot buy yufka)

Wash the spinach thoroughly. Remove the stalks, then finely chop the leaves. Finely slice the onion.
Wash the spring onions, then remove the roots and green outer layer. Finely chop.

Put 2 tablespoons of oil in a frying pan over medium heat. Add the onions and cook for 3 minutes.
Add the spring onions and cook for 3 minutes more. Add the spinach and cook for a further 3 minutes,
then remove from the heat. Mix in all the herbs and spices and leave in the frying pan to cool. Grate
the feta into the cooled spinach mixture.

Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F/Gas 4).

Whisk the milk, egg, yoğurt and 2 teaspoons of oil in a mixing bowl.

Unfold a sheet of yufka and slice it down the middle to create a half moon shape.

Brush a quarter of the egg mixture onto each half moon of yufka. Spread a quarter of the spinach
mixture along the flat side of the half moon, making a strip about 5 cm (2 in) wide. Fold the strip over
and tightly roll the yufka into a tube about 80 cm (31½ in) long.

Brush a 20 cm (8 in) wide baking tray with the remaining oil. Place the rolled börek onto the tray and
pull it around into a circle, with the ends overlapping. Make another börek and join that to the inside
end of the previous circle, so that it forms a smaller ring inside the first one. Add two more börek
tubes so you have a spiral of smaller and smaller rings.

Bake for 20 minutes or until the börek are golden. Turn off the heat, leaving the tray in the oven, and
rest for 10 minutes.

Cut across the spiral four times to make eight wedges, and serve.
KÜRT BÖREĞI
KURDISH-STYLE ROLLED PASTRY WITH
HAZELNUTS

The Turkish name for this pastry—kürt böreği—suggests it is a Kurdish speciality, but you should not
expect to find it in eastern Anatolia, where the Kurds live. The name seems to have arisen because
it’s the kind of dish Istanbul chefs imagine Kurds might eat. To confuse the issue further, I’ve boosted
it with hazelnuts and crème pâtissière, which makes it more like the kind of rich pastry they love on
the Black Sea.

SERVES 4

RO LLED PASTRY
120 g (4½ oz/1 cup) hazelnuts
1 kg (2 lb 4 oz) plain (all-purpose) flour (plus extra for dusting), or 3 sheets frozen puff pastry
2 eggs
1 tablespoon baking powder
125 ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) vegetable oil
125 g (4½ oz/½ cup) plain yoğurt
150 g (5½ oz) butter, plus extra for greasing
1 tablespoon cinnamon powder
3 tablespoons icing (confectioners’) sugar

CRÈME PÂ TI SSI ÈRE

310 ml (10¾ fl oz fl oz/1¼ cups) milk
3 egg yolks
3 tablespoons cornflour (cornstarch)
2 tablespoons plain (all-purpose) flour
30 g (1 oz/¼ cup) icing (confectioners’) sugar
1 vanilla bean, or 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F/Gas 4).

Place the hazelnuts on a baking tray and bake for 5 minutes. Remove from the oven and leave to cool.
When the nuts are cool enough to handle, remove the skin, transfer to a food processor and grind
coarsely.

To make the crème pâtissière, warm the milk in a saucepan over low heat for about 10 minutes until it
reaches a low simmer, preferably using a simmer mat. Try to keep the temperature around 70°C
(160°F) if you have a food thermometer, being careful not to let the milk start to boil.

Meanwhile, combine the egg yolks, cornflour, flour and icing sugar in a mixing bowl and whisk until
smooth. Ladle about 125 ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) of the warm milk into the yolk mixture, whisk together,
and then pour into the saucepan with the remaining milk. Whisk slowly for another 2 minutes, then
remove from the heat. Slit the vanilla bean lengthways, scrape the seeds into the mixture and stir
through. Discard the skin. Put the bowl in the fridge to cool.

Sift the flour into a mixing bowl, make a well in the middle, break in the eggs and then add the baking
powder, vegetable oil and yoğurt. Knead the dough for about 10 minutes, or until the dough is soft and
stretchy. Cover the bowl with a damp cloth and rest for 1 hour to expand.

Sprinkle some flour on your work surface. Divide the dough into twenty pieces and roll into balls.
With floured hands or a rolling pin, flatten one ball into a round 20 cm (8 in) wide and 2–3 cm (about
1 in) thick. Repeat with the remaining dough.

Melt the butter in a frying pan over medium heat (or microwave for 30 seconds). Brush each round
with the butter and then place the rounds on top of each other to make a stack. Press the stack down
and spread the dough out with a rolling pin, as thin as possible. Brush with butter and roll into a log.
Slice into three equal pieces, wrap each piece in plastic wrap and refrigerate for 1 hour to rest.

Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F/Gas 4).

Remove the chilled dough from the fridge (or freezer if using store-bought puff pastry) and leave to
warm to room temperature. Grease a 30 x 20 x 4 cm (12 x 8 x 1½ in) baking tray with butter. Roll out
the first piece of puff pastry to the size of the tray. Remove the crème pâtissière from the fridge and
spread onto the pastry, then sprinkle one-third of the hazelnuts over the top.

Roll out the second and third pieces of puff pastry to the size of your tray, and brush the top with
butter. Place the second puff pastry layer on top of the first, sprinkle with another third of hazelnuts,
and then place the final pastry layer on top.

Cut the stacked dough into 8 cm (3¼ in) squares. Bake for 25 minutes or until golden on top. Remove
from the oven and leave to cool slightly.

Sprinkle the remaining hazelnuts on top of the börek, dust with cinnamon and icing sugar, then serve
warm.
KUYMAK
BLACK SEA FONDUE

This is a speciality of the Laz people who live along the Black Sea in northern Anatolia. People from
other parts of Turkey say two things about the Laz people: the women are very beautiful and the men
are very smart before midday. The Laz are famous for creating hundreds of recipes from a fish similar
to a sardine called hamsi, but this is one of the few sardine-free recipes. It’s a kind of fondue into
which you dip bread, but the maize flour gives it more of a hearty porridge consistency than a Swiss
fondue. It prepares you to face the harsh climate along that windy coast.

SERVES 4

2 tablespoons butter
½ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
100 g (3½ oz) maize flour
115 g (4 oz/¾ cup) shredded mozzarella
1 tablespoon grated parmesan
½ teaspoon smoked paprika
pide bread, to serve

Combine the butter, salt, pepper and 500 ml (17 fl oz/2 cups) of water in a saucepan over high heat
and bring to the boil. Reduce the heat and add the maize flour. Cook for 10 minutes, stirring
constantly. Add the cheeses and stir in to melt.

Top with paprika and serve hot in the pot, with pide for dipping.
Mehmet Özsimitci, third-generation master of the art of katmer making.
KATMER
PISTACHIO PANCAKES WITH CLOTTED
CREAM

When the suffix -ci (pronounced ‘zhee’) is added to a Turkish noun it means ‘a maker of’ that thing.
Thus a katmerci is a maker of katmer, the crunchy pancake that is a speciality of Gaziantep, in
southeastern Anatolia. The supreme katmerci in that foodie city is a man named Mehmet Özsimitci,
whose surname translates as ‘maker of genuine simits’. That tells you that one of his ancestors was a
specialist in the pretzel/bagels that every Turk consumes as a street snack.
Somewhere along the line, Mehmet’s family swapped from making simits to making katmers,
adding greatly to the happiness of the world. Outside his shop, at the end of an arcade in the modern
part of the city, Mehmet displays a slogan that translates as ‘Katmer is not a product of a pastry shop
but a culture of master Zekeriya’. Zekeriya is Mehmet’s father, who these days sits at the cash register
while Mehmet supervises his team of young pastry rollers and dances around the outside tables,
taking orders and chatting to customers.
He’ll tell you that katmer is best consumed with tea rather than coffee (and he’ll order you a tea
from the shop next door); that katmer is traditionally the first meal eaten by a bride and groom after
their wedding night (to restore their energy); and that half his daily production goes to home delivery
—transported by moped across Gaziantep and by mail to homesick Turks all over Europe.
I hope my recipe does him justice.

SERVES 4

2 sheets chilled filo pastry, about 40 x 27 cm (16 x 10¾ in) each

2 tablespoons ghee
2 tablespoons thick (double) cream, or kaymak
2 heaped tablespoons ground pistachios
1 tablespoon sugar

Take the filo sheets out of the fridge and leave to warm to room temperature for 1 hour. Spread one
sheet out on a large work surface and overlap with another sheet to create a 40 x 40 cm (16 x 16 in)
square of filo. Paint a little ghee where the sheets overlap, and join them together.

Leaving a margin of about 10 cm (4 in) around the edges, dot nine dobs of cream onto the filo to make
a square about 20 cm (8 in) wide. Sprinkle the pistachios and sugar over the cream, and then fold the
four edges of pastry over to make a square parcel about 20 cm (8 in) wide.

Pour 1 tablespoons of ghee into a frying pan and swirl to coat. Place the pan over medium heat and let
the ghee warm for about 10 seconds. Drop the filo parcel into the pan (wrap-side down) and cook for
2 minutes or until golden. Using two spatulas or large knives, turn the pancake over and cook for 1
minute more.

Cut the katmer into eight squares and serve two per person as part of a breakfast spread.

At Zekeriya Usta, the art of katmer making begins with sprinkling and tossing sheets of buckwheat dough to make the thinnest possible
fila.
PESTİL
GRAPE LEATHER STUFFED WITH
WALNUTS

Pestil is fruit juice that has been dried into strips. Although the process originated as a way of
preserving summer ingredients to last through winter, it has now become the candy bar of central
Anatolia. Rolled around nuts, it goes in a kid’s backpack to be consumed at school as a nutritious
morning snack. We’re suggesting you make pestil from grape juice, but you can get tasty results with
mulberries, plums or apricots. If you’re planning to keep your pestil strip for any length of time, roll it
up in baking paper so it does not stick.

MAKES 16

GRAPE LEATHER
500 g (1 lb 2 oz) red grapes
1 star anise
1 cinnamon stick
3 cloves
1 heaped tablespoon cornflour (cornstarch)

WALNUT AND FI G FI LLI NG

5 dried figs
150 g (5½ oz/11/3 cups) walnuts

Wash the grapes and remove any stalks.

Place a large saucepan over low heat and then add the grapes, star anise, cinnamon stick and cloves.
(Don’t add any water.) Press down with a potato masher to push out some of the juices. Bring the
grape mixture to the boil and then simmer for 15 minutes, pressing down regularly to release the
juices.

Take the grape mixture off the heat and leave to cool. Put a muslin (cheesecloth) over another
saucepan and pour all the grape pulp into the muslin. Tie the edges of the muslin together and squeeze
the bag to extract all the juice—it should yield about 300 ml (10½ fl oz).

Preheat the oven to 100°C (200°F/Gas ½).

Place the grape juice in a saucepan over medium heat and bring to the boil. Put the cornflour in a
bowl and mix in 250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) of the hot grape juice and then pour the mixture back into the
pan. Continue to cook for 15 minutes, stirring regularly, until the mixture thickens to a custard-like
syrup.

Line a baking tray, including the sides, with baking paper. Pour the syrup into the tray (it should be
about 5 mm/¼ in deep).

Tap the tray to remove any air bubbles from the syrup. Bake for 5 hours, checking every hour to
ensure the edges are not becoming too dry. If they appear crusty, use a pastry brush to apply a little
water.

Remove the tray from the oven and leave to cool slightly. When the grape leather is cool enough to
handle, carefully lift the baking paper edges to remove it from the tray and transfer to a board to cool
completely.

Next, make the stuffing. Put the figs in a bowl, cover with hot water and leave to soak for 15 minutes.
Transfer the figs to paper towel, drain for 10 minutes, and then remove the stalks. Put the figs in a
food processor, add the walnuts and coarsely combine.

Cut across the grape leather to make four equal strips. Spoon a line of filling along the middle of each
strip. Roll each strip, lengthways, to create a log about 20 cm (8 in) long, pressing down to keep it
sealed. Slice the log into four equal pieces and serve as part of a breakfast spread.
CARTLAK KEBABI
LIVER KEBAPS

You’ve got to get up pretty early in the morning to catch Ali Haydar. Around 6 am should do it. If you
wait till 8, you might find he has sold out of his speciality and gone home. This speciality is lamb
liver kebaps—another breakfast tradition of southeastern Anatolia that baffles visitors from Istanbul.
Ali opens his little kebap shop, just down the hill from Gaziantep Castle, immediately after the
dawn prayer, which means around 5 am in the summer and around 6 am in the winter. Gradually the
customers arrive to sit on the tiny stools outside the shop. Some sit at an angle that suggests they are
on the way home from a night of drinking. Others are straight-backed and alert, suggesting they are
just out of the nearby mosque and on their way to work.
Inside the shop, Ali, in a light-blue butcher’s jacket, risks setting fire to his moustache as he uses a
sheet of cardboard to fan the coals of his charcoal grill. He closely watches his skewers and, at the
moment the exterior turns crunchy while the inside stays pink, he lifts them away from the coals and
wipes them into a mitten of flatbread. When all his livers (and his hearts, lungs and kidneys) have
been cooked and consumed by customers, he heads home. In the afternoon he visits the offal market
(distinguished by a large sign announcing ‘Cleaned Heads’) and collects the ingredients to be
prepared overnight for the next morning’s feast.

SERVES 4

KEBAPS
2 lamb livers, about 300 g (10½ oz)
250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) milk
4 mild green or red chillies
1 teaspoon cumin
1 teaspoon hot paprika
1 teaspoon chilli flakes
1 teaspoon salt
250 g (9 oz) butter, softened

PARSLEY SALAD
1 bunch flat-leaf (Italian) parsley
1 red onion
1 tablespoon sumac
1 teaspoon chilli flakes
2 teaspoons pomegranate molasses
1 tablespoon olive oil
4 store-bought pita breads (or make a lahmacun base and fold it over), to serve

Soak the lamb livers in milk overnight, covered, in the fridge.

Remove the bowl of livers from the fridge and set aside.

To make the parsley salad, pick the leaves off the parsley and roughly chop. Discard the stems. Finely
slice the red onion and place in a salad bowl. Add the parsley, sumac, chilli flakes, molasses and
olive oil, and mix well.

When you’re ready to cook the livers, remove them from the bowl, pat dry with paper towel and
clean off the membrane and sinews. Roughly cut each of the cleaned livers into 16 cubes about 2 cm
(¾ in) across—the size of a bird’s head, as we say in Turkey.

Preheat the barbecue grill to very high. If using bamboo skewers, soak in water for 15 minutes.

Slit down one side of each chilli and remove the seeds. Slice across each chilli to make six pieces
about 1 cm (½ in) wide. Mix the cumin, paprika, chilli flakes and salt in a bowl, then stir in the
softened butter. Using your hands, rub the pieces of lamb liver in the spiced butter to coat well.

Next, make the kebaps by alternately threading four pieces of liver and three chilli chunks onto each
skewer—with the chilli keeping the liver pieces apart. Repeat to make eight kebaps.

Put the skewers on the grill and cook for 2 minutes on each side, turning the skewers once. The livers
are ready when they start to form a crust.

Partly slit through the pita bread so that it can open like jaws. Spread any leftover spiced butter inside
the bread. Next, holding a skewer in your left hand and a pita in your right hand, use the pita like a
baseball mitten to wrap round the skewer and pull the row of liver and chilli pieces off. Repeat so
each pita contains the liver from two skewers. Open the bread again and add a heaped tablespoon of
salad between the two strips of liver. Close the bread and serve immediately.
Ali Haydar’s liver stall at 6 am, just after morning prayers.
İNCİR UYUTMASİ
THE SLEEPING FIGS

‘While shepherds watched their flocks by night, all seated on the ground, they also soaked their figs in
milk, and then some sleep they found.’ That’s essentially the back story of this dish. I love its name—
the Sleeping Figs—because it suggests the gentle process of warming the milk and resting the pudding
overnight.
A version of this dessert, called teleme, has been a typical goat herder’s snack popular for
thousands of years in northwestern Anatolia. They’d milk their goats, add a few drops of sap from
fresh figs to the milk, mix it for a few minutes and let it set into yoğurt. Then they would slice fresh
figs through it. Of course, that restricted the pleasure to early autumn, when figs are at their best. Our
version uses cow’s milk, walnuts and dried figs to make a healthy breakfast for all seasons.

SERVES 4

10 dried figs
500 ml (17 fl oz/2 cups) milk
2 fresh figs
2 tablespoons grape molasses
60 g (2¼ oz/½ cup) walnuts

Put the figs in a bowl, cover with hot water and leave to soak for 15 minutes. Transfer the figs to
paper towel, leave to drain for 10 minutes, then remove the stalks. Roughly chop each fig into about
six pieces and then set aside.

Warm the milk in a saucepan over low heat until it reaches a low simmer, preferably using a simmer
mat. Try to keep the temperature around 70°C (160°F) if you have a food thermometer, being careful
not to let the milk start to boil.

Add the chopped figs and, using a hand-held blender, mix to a purée. Simmer for a further 5 minutes.
(If you don’t have a stick blender, pour the mixture into a blender and pulse until smooth, then pour it
back into the saucepan and warm for a further 7 minutes).

Half fill four small bowls with the fig purée. Put the bowls in a cool spot, cover with a tea towel
(dish towel) and rest for 2 hours. Cover the bowls with plastic wrap and place in the fridge
overnight.

When you’re nearly ready to serve, preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F/Gas 4).
Cut each fresh fig into quarters. Place them on a baking tray with the skin side down. Brush each fig
piece with grape molasses, then bake for 5 minutes until slightly soft but still semi-firm.

Roughly chop the walnuts using a food processor, or by hand. Remove the fig purée cups from the
fridge. Place two fig quarters on each cup and sprinkle the crushed walnuts over the top, then serve.
MENEMEN
SMASHED EGGS WITH BULLHORN
PEPPERS AND TOMATO

Menemen is a famous breakfast dish in Turkey—the nearest thing we do to scrambled eggs—but

nobody can agree on the perfect version. It varies from village to village and from house to house—
even in the Aegean town called Menemen, which is not necessarily its place of origin. There is
constant debate among chefs and domestic cooks on whether to use butter or oil, whether to include
onions or garlic, whether to include peppers or tomatoes, and whether to leave the eggs whole for the
eater to smash, or scramble them as part of the cooking process.
I prefer to use oil, because I want to cook the onions and peppers without burning the butter. I add
the tomatoes at the last minute so they taste fresh. And I prefer my eggs stirred not scrambled. You can
join the debate and vary the dish to your taste.

SERVES 4

4 ripe tomatoes
2 green bullhorn peppers (or 1 large green capsicum/pepper)
1 red onion (optional)
2 tablespoons olive oil
4 eggs
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 tablespoon chopped flat-leaf (Italian) parsley

Score a shallow cross in the base of each tomato. Put the tomatoes in a heatproof bowl and cover
with boiling water. Leave for 30 seconds, then transfer to a bowl of cold water and peel the skin
away from the cross. To seed, cut the tomato in half and scoop out the seeds with a teaspoon. Chop
the tomatoes into 1 cm (½ in) dice.

Cut the peppers in half and discard the stems and seeds. Chop the peppers into 1 cm (½ in) pieces. If
you are using an onion, finely slice it.

Heat the olive oil in a frying pan over medium heat. Add a drop of water to the oil. If it sizzles, the oil
is ready. Add the onion and cook for 5 minutes. Add the chopped peppers and cook for a further 5
minutes, or until soft. Break the eggs into the pan and cook for 30 seconds. Add the tomatoes, salt and
pepper. Stir two or three times to mix in the eggs, but don’t blend. Cook over medium heat for a
further 3 minutes until the egg whites are set.
Sprinkle with parsley and serve the menemen in the pan for people to help themselves.
SUCUKLU YUMURTA
SPICY SAUSAGE WITH EGGS

There is nothing sophisticated about this recipe, but I had to include it because it’s one of the most
common breakfasts all over my land. It’s our answer to Britain’s bacon and eggs. A wife might say of
her husband: ‘He’s so hopeless, he can’t even cook sucuk and eggs’.
You can buy sucuk everywhere in Turkey, so nobody would bother to make it at home. But if you
can’t find it near you, you could use the recipe we offer here (or substitute chorizo). Bear in mind that
this won’t taste exactly like a professional sucuk, since that is stuffed into intestine casings, then hung
and dried for a month. But it will be tasty.

SERVES 4

SUCUK*
2 garlic cloves, crushed
250 g (9 oz) minced (ground) veal or beef
150 g (5½ oz) minced (ground) lamb
1 teaspoon cumin
1 teaspoon dried oregano
2 teaspoons chilli flakes
2 teaspoons smoked paprika
1 tablespoon capsicum (pepper) paste
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 teaspoon butter
1 teaspoon salt
4 eggs
pide bread, to serve

To make your own sucuk, crush the garlic into a fine paste. Put the garlic into a mixing bowl, add the
ground meat and spices, and knead for 10 minutes.

Using a rolling pin, flatten the meat mixture into a strip about 1 cm (½ in) thick and then roll it into a
log about 4 cm (1½ in) wide. Wrap tightly with plastic wrap, squeezing all the air out, then freeze for
1 hour.

Remove the sucuk from the freezer, remove the plastic wrap, and slice off twenty thin slices (about 5
mm/¼ in thick). Put the remaining sucuk in the fridge where it will keep, wrapped in plastic, for 2
weeks.
(If using store-bought sucuk or chorizo, soak in hot water for 15 seconds, then peel off the skin. Slice
into twenty thin slices.)

Place a frying pan over medium heat. Add the sucuk and spread out into a single layer. Add the butter
(and 1 tablespoon of water if the sucuk seems dry) and salt, then cook for 1 minute. Once the sucuk
begins to sizzle, take out eight slices from the middle of the pan and break the eggs into the space
created. Put the eight sucuk back on top of the eggs.

Cook for 3 minutes, or until the egg whites begin to set, the sides curl, and the yolk is soft but still
formed in the centre. If you prefer your eggs more cooked, cover with a lid and simmer for 1 minute
more.

Place the sucuk in the middle of the table—the Turkish way—for people to help themselves. Serve
with pide.

NOTE
Instead of making your own sucuk you can use 100 g (3½ oz) of store-bought sucuk or chorizo if you
prefer.
ÇİLBİU
POACHED EGGS IN GARLIC YOĞURT AND
PAPRIKA

In Ottoman times, çılbır was the generic term for poached eggs, done all sorts of ways. Palace
records from the fifteenth century show that a version of çılbır containing poached eggs and onion
was cooked for the mighty sultan Mehmet II. The imperial cooks kept improving on it over the years.
This recipe, with garlic yoğurt, was a favourite of the second-last sultan in the empire, Abdulhamid
II, in the early twentieth century, and became the gold standard for çılbır in homes and restaurants
across Anatolia.

SERVES 4

1 garlic clove (or chopped garlic shoots)

500 g (1 lb 2 oz/2 cups) plain yoğurt
½ small red capsicum (pepper)
125 ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) white vinegar
8 eggs
2 tablespoons butter
½ tablespoon aleppo red pepper flakes (or chilli flakes)
4 teaspoons smoked paprika
pide bread, to serve

Crush the garlic and mix it with the yoğurt (if the taste of raw garlic in the morning is too strong for
you, you could leave out this step, and instead fry a little garlic or chopped garlic shoots later with
the capsicum). Set aside at room temperature.

Remove the seeds from the capsicum and finely chop.

Divide the yoğurt mixture into four bowls.

Put 1 litre (35 fl oz/4 cups) of water and the vinegar in a deep frying pan over high heat. Bring to the
boil, then reduce the heat to a gentle simmer. Carefully break in the eggs, one at a time, with a
maximum of three eggs poaching at a time. Cook for 2–3 minutes, or until the whites are set and the
yolks are still soft and runny.

While the eggs are poaching, melt the butter in a saucepan, add the red pepper flakes, paprika and
capsicum (and garlic, if you’ve saved it for this step) and cook for 3 minutes.
When ready to serve, scoop the eggs out of the simmering water with a slotted spoon and place two in
each bowl, on top of the yoğurt. Pour a light stream of the melted butter and peppers over the eggs.
Serve with pide.
KAYGANA
CRETAN EGGS WITH WILD WEEDS

There’s a joke about a salad farmer who is having a tea in the village café. A neighbour comes in and
says: ‘There’s a goat in your field.’ The farmer says: ‘Don’t worry, he won’t eat much’. Shortly
afterward, the neighbour returns and says: ‘There’s a cow in your field.’ The farmer keeps sipping his
tea and says: ‘Don’t worry about it.’ Then the neighbour returns and says: ‘There’s a man from Crete
in your field.’ The farmer leaps up and rushes back to save his field before everything green has been
stripped.
People of Cretan background are famous for eating the dark-green weeds that grow wild along the
Aegean coast and that were ignored for centuries by Turkish cooks. This egg dish uses the kind of
wild (and tame) greens the Cretans have taught the Turks to love.

SERVES 4

1 cup of any or all of these, mixed: nettles, curly endives, chicory, dandelion greens, round radicchio,
beetroot (beet) leaves, wild rocket (but not witlof)
3 spring onions (scallions)
1 onion
80 ml (2½ fl oz/1/3 cup) olive oil
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 teaspoon hot paprika
4 eggs
pide bread, to serve

If you are using nettles, use gloves to handle them. To remove the sting, put in a heatproof bowl and
cover with boiling water for 30 seconds. Transfer to cold water for 30 seconds. Pick the green leaves
and discard the stems.

Clean and finely chop the endives and the chicory, discarding the woody stems. Wash the spring
onions, then remove the roots and green outer layer. Finely chop the onion.

Heat the olive oil in a non-stick frying pan over medium heat, then add the onion and brown for 5
minutes. Add the spring onions and cook for another 3 minutes, then add the wild leaves in this order
(from toughest to softest): endives, chicory, radicchio, nettle, dandelion, beetroot leaves, wild rocket.
Lightly fry for about 5 minutes to let any excess water evaporate. Add the spices and stir. Make four
wells in the mixture and break an egg into each well. Continue to cook until the whites are set but the
yolks are still runny.
Serve the kaygana in the pan for people to help themselves. If the yolks spread into the mixture, so
much the better. Serve with pide.
Mustafa Hasırcı preparing mutton for beyran soup at Metanet, Gaziantep.
BEYRAN
FIERY LAMB AND RICE SOUP

Take a whole sheep, skin it and gut it. Boil it for 12 hours. Shred all the meat. Boil the same weight of
rice. Put some rice, a handful of meat and a hell of a lot of garlic and chilli into a bowl. Put it over an
open flame so the fat on the surface catches fire. Serve.
That’s not the recipe we’re suggesting for beyran, but it’s what Mustafa Hasırcı and his team do
every day at Metanet, just behind the central spice market in Gaziantep, southeastern Turkey. The
restaurant’s name means ‘endurance’ or ‘fortitude’, which is presumably what you need to eat this
spicy soup every day for breakfast as many citizens of Gaziantep do (only tourists think of having
beyran for lunch).
Mustafa certainly has endurance. For the past forty years he’s been getting up every day at 4 am to
make his soup—following in the footsteps of his father, the founder of Metanet. Mustafa has earned
the title usta, which means ‘master of your craft’. He has no equal in Gaziantep.
Our soup is a modified version of Mustafa’s masterwork, and we won’t tell anybody if you decide
to have it for lunch or dinner.

SERVES 4

1 lamb neck, about 1 kg (2 lb 4 oz)

220 g (7¾ oz/1 cup) medium-grain rice
2 teaspoons salt
4 garlic cloves, crushed
1 tablespoon chilli flakes

Put the lamb neck in a large saucepan with 1 litre (35 fl oz/4 cups) of water, then cover, and bring to
the boil. Reduce the heat and simmer for about 1½ hours.

Lift out the neck and place on a rack or plate to cool. Do not discard the cooking water. When the
lamb is cool enough to handle, strip off the meat and discard the bones. Shred the lamb into small
strips and set aside.

Pour the rice into the pot of lamb-flavoured water and bring it back to the boil over medium heat.
Cook the rice for 15 minutes, then add the salt, garlic, shredded lamb and chilli flakes. Increase the
heat to very high and boil rapidly for 1 minute to spread the red-chilli colour through the liquid. Serve
immediately, while very hot.
Lunch heaven: one of Musa Dağdeviren’s three Çiya restaurant in Kadıköy, Istanbul.
LUNCH
Traditionally in Turkey, lunch was no big deal. People ate before they went out to
work in the fields, and carried with them simple snacks such as bread, olives and
cheese. In the late nineteenth century, cheap eateries started appearing in the cities,
where tradesmen and shopkeepers could grab a soup, a stew, and maybe a börek or a
kebap. These places came to be called lokanta (from the Italian word locanda).

In the 1980s, the lunchtime habit of going quick and casual made Turks in Istanbul an easy target for
the American fast-food chains, and for a while it looked as if the midday formula of soup-stew-kebap
was going to turn into Coke-fries-Big Mac.
Then Musa Dağdeviren appeared and went in exactly the opposite direction. He travelled round the
countryside and spoke to farmers, bakers, butchers, picklers, pastrymakers and home cooks, and
figured out how to recreate Turkey’s vast regional diversity in a commercial kitchen.
Now his three lokantas—Çiya, Çiya Sofrası and Çiya Kebap—in the Istanbul port suburb of
Kadıköy are packed every lunchtime with people desperate to test how many of the fifty dishes on
display can be crammed into their bellies, and looking forward to returning three months later to find
the new season has brought a different array of ‘forgotten’ recipes. Young chefs have been inspired
by Musa’s ‘rediscoveries’ to open bistro-style lokantas across Istanbul.
Musa grew up in a family of bakers in southeastern Anatolia, and moved to Istanbul in the late
1970s to operate the wood-fire oven in his uncle’s kebap house. He became obsessed with
preserving the great regional repertoire that seemed to be disappearing in the rush towards
'modernisation’. Here’s a rough translation of his philosophy:

I travel all over the country to cook with people In their homes and also study old books to find new
leads. I get very excited when I discover new poor-people’s dishes, because I believe only poor
people can create great food. If a man has money, he can buy anything, but a person who has nothing
must create beauty from within.

Since he opened his first Çiya in 1987, Musa has regularly found himself in dispute with the Turkish
food establishment which is prone to engage in nationalist myth-making and wishful thinking about
our cuisine. He fights fantasies with facts, publishing a quarterly magazine called Yemek ve Kültür
(Food and Culture), which funds scholarship on the origins of Anatolian dishes. He’s setting up a
cooking school and research centre, with a seed bank that will preserve native ingredients.
Luckily for me, Musa opened his first restaurant close to my father’s tailor shop in Kadiköy, back
when I was a teenager who carried a McDonald’s cup to school to show how cool was. Çiya became
my favourite eating place and Musa became my food hero.
Many of the dishes in this chapter, whether rustic, regional or urban, were inspired by Musa’s food
philosophy. You would be more likely to find them in Turkish homes far from Istanbul rather than in
restaurants—unless you were lucky enough to live in Kadıköy.

Musa at one of his Çiya restaurants, with candied pumpkins, eggplants and olives.
PİRPİRİM AŞI
PURSLANE AND ANCIENT GRAINS STEW

Vegetarians are always surprised by how many interesting dishes the land of lamb lovers can offer. In
season, this stew appears regularly on the famous ‘Fifty Bowl’ display table at Çiya restaurant in
Istanbul’s Kadıköy market, using the kind of grains humans have been boiling for millennia. While it
is likely that lentils and chickpeas originated in Anatolia, black-eyed peas are recent arrivals—
brought from Africa in the fifteenth century for palace chefs eager to surprise the sultan.
The sour-salty green purslane, which contains more omega-3 than any other leafy vegetable, is
Turkey’s favourite weed, usually consumed fresh in summer and dried in winter. In the first great
work on botany, written in the fourth century BC, the Greek philosopher Theophrastus advises sowing
purslane in mid-spring so you can enjoy it in summer. If you can’t find purslane, the best substitute is
baby rocket (arugula).

SERVES 4

95 g (3¼ oz/½ cup) dried chickpeas

95 g (3¼ oz/½ cup) black-eyed beans
110 g (3¾ oz/½ cup) green lentils
45 ml (1½ fl oz) olive oil
1 onion
2 garlic cloves
1 tomato
½ tablespoon capsicum (pepper) paste
90 g (3¼ oz/½ cup) coarse bulgur
2 teaspoons freshly ground black pepper
1 bunch purslane (or baby rocket/arugula)
juice of ½ lemon
1 teaspoon sumac
1 tablespoon butter
2 teaspoons dried mint
2 teaspoons chilli flakes
pide bread, to serve

Cover the chickpeas with water and soak overnight. Cover the black-eyed beans with water and also
soak overnight.

Strain, then rinse the chickpeas and black-eyed beans. Rinse the lentils. Boil the chickpeas in plenty
of water for 20 minutes, covered, and then add the black-eyed beans and lentils and boil, covered, for
another 40 minutes.

Heat the olive oil in a saucepan over medium heat. Add the onion and cook for 3 minutes, then add the
garlic and cook for 1 minute more. Cut the tomato in half and then grate it into the onion, discarding
the skin.

Add the three pulses to the onion mixture. Dilute the capsicum paste in 250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) of warm
water and add it to the mix. Add the bulgur and the pepper. Bring to the boil, then reduce the heat to a
simmer.

Pick the leaves from the purslane and add them, whole, to the stew. Simmer, covered, for 10 minutes.
Add the lemon juice and stir in the sumac, then turn off the heat.

Melt the butter in a frying pan over medium heat. Add the mint and stir for 1 minute. Add the chill
flakes and stir for 1 minute more.

Divide the stew into four bowls and drizzle with mint butter. Serve with pide.
ANALI KİZLI
‘MOTHER AND DAUGHTER’ (DUMPLING
AND CHICKPEA STEW)

This complex combination of large and small dumplings in a lamb and chickpea stew comes from
Malatya in eastern Anatolia, an area best known for apricots. The mothers are a mixture of beef and
bulgur stuffed with minced lamb. The daughters are not big enough to have stuffing. You won’t find
this dish in many restaurants—only home cooks (and my friend Musa) have the time to do it properly.
For the mums’ outer coating it’s important to choose beef with a low fat content and to knead it
thoroughly so it dissolves into the bulgur.

SERVES 4

BASE
50 g (1¾ oz/¼ cup) dried chickpeas
400 g (14 oz) lamb leg
2 onions
1 tablespoon butter
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 tablespoon capsicum (pepper) paste
10 flat-leaf (Italian) parsley leaves, finely chopped
juice of ½ lemon

STUFFI NG
1 onion
1 tablespoon butter
150 g (5½ oz) minced (ground) lamb
½ tablespoon tomato paste
½ tablespoon capsicum (pepper) paste
½ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
½ teaspoon cumin

SHELLS
250 g (9 oz) fine bulgur
200 g (7 oz) lean minced (ground) beef
1 egg
1 tablespoon tomato paste
1 tablespoon butter
½ tablespoon cornflour (cornstarch)

TO PPI NG
2 tablespoons butter
½ tablespoon dried mint
½ tablespoon chilli flakes

Cover the chickpeas with water and soak overnight.

Strain and rinse the chickpeas, place in a saucepan with 500 ml (17 fl oz/2 cups) of water and
simmer, covered, for 1 hour.

While the chickpeas are simmering, make the stuffing. Finely chop the onion. Melt the butter in a
saucepan over medium heat. Add the onion and cook for 3 minutes until soft. Add the minced lamb
and cook for 2 minutes more.

Put the remaining ingredients in a bowl and mix with 125 ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) of water. Stir the mixture
into the onion and minced lamb, and bring to the boil, then simmer, with the lid on, for 5 minutes. Set
the stuffing aside.

Next, make the shells. Put all the ingredients in a mixing bowl. Slowly add 45 ml (1½ fl oz) of warm
water. Wet your hands and knead for 5 minutes to make a smooth paste.

Mould the shell mixture into spheres about the size of a ping-pong ball. Put a ball in your palm and
with the fingers of the other hand, make c well in the mixture. Place a teaspoon of stuffing in the
middle and fold the shell back around it. Repeat to make sixteen balls. With the rest of the bulgur
mixture, make about forty smaller chickpea-size balls.

Now, make the base. Chop the meat from the leg of lamb into small cubes, removing any sinews and
most of the fat. Finely chop the onions. Melt the butter in a frying pan over medium heat. Add the
olive oil and, when sizzling, cook the onion for 5 minutes until translucent. Add the capsicum paste
and fry for 1 minute. Add the cubed lamb. Cook for 2 minutes, then add 250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) of
water. Bring to the boil and simmerfor5 minutes.

Add the small balls (daughters) and the large balls [mothers), chickpeas and parsley to the lamb
mixture. Bring back to the boil, then reduce the heat and simmer for 10 minutes. Add the lemon juice.
Divide the mothers and daughters onto four plates, with the cubed lamb underneath.

For the topping, place a frying pan over medium heat and melt the butter. Add the dried mint and
chilli flakes and sizzle for 4 minutes. Drizzle the mint and chilli butter over the anali kizli and serve.
TÜRLÜ
SUMMER VEGETABLE CASSEROLE

The Turkish word türlü means ‘with variety’, and implies that you can use any kind of vegetable
that’s available in summer. This is sometimes called the Turkish ratatouille, but türlü has many more
ingredients than the French dish, and you can even include lamb or beef and still call it türlü.
You need to layer the ingredients in a deep pot (traditionally clay), with the slowest-cooking
vegetables at the bottom, and simmer it for a long time. So yes, it’s a casserole, which is normally
thought of as a winter warmer. But this version, which includes green beans and okra, is perfect
served cold on the hottest day, with a side of rice pilav and yoğurt. It tastes even better the next day.

SERVES 4

1 long eggplant (aubergine)

1 zucchini (courgette)
1 boiling potato
2 onions
3 garlic cloves
1 carrot
2 green bullhorn peppers (or 1 large green capsicum/pepper)
1 red capsicum (pepper)
150 g (5½ oz) green beans
100 g (3½ oz) okra
3 ripe tomatoes
45 ml (1½ fl oz) olive oil
1 thin slice of ginger
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
rice pilav, boiled rice or plain yoğurt, to serve (optional)

Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F/Gas 4).

Peel the eggplant and zucchini and chop both into 3 cm (1¼ in) pieces. Wash and peel the potato, and
chop into 3 cm (1¼ in) cubes. Finely slice the onions and chop the garlic. Peel the carrot and cut into
1 cm (½ in) pieces. Seed and chop the bullhorn pepper and capsicum into pieces about 3 cm (1¼ in)
long. Cut the tips off the green beans and chop into 3 cm (1¼ in) pieces.

Cut the stalks off the okra. Score a shallow cross in the base of the tomatoes, then transfer to a
heatproof bowl and cover with boiling water. Leave for 30 seconds, then plunge in cold water and
peel the skin away from the cross. Roughly chop. Very finely chop the ginger.

Heat the olive oil in a large saucepan over medium heat. Add the onion and cook for 5 minutes, or
until soft. Add the garlic and fry for another 2 minutes. Add the ginger, vegetables, salt, pepper and
500 ml (17 fl oz/2 cups) of water. Seal the pan with foil, then put the lid on. Simmer for 20 minutes.
Turn off the heat and leave to rest for 20 minutes without opening the lid.

Serve warm with rice pilav or boiled rice, or cold with yoğurt on a hot summer day.
KUL AŞI
BEEF GOULASH

There’s too much mythology and not enough research in discussions about food in Turkey. Turkish
chefs like to claim the Hungarians got their word ‘goulash’ from the Turkish term kul aşi (which
means ‘common man’s dish’—a stew served to soldiers 300 years ago). But, if they’d bothered to
check, they’d find that in Hungarian the word gulyas means a ‘cattle herder’, and since the ninth
century, the Hungarian herders have been in the habit of carrying beef and vegetables and making a
kind of stew out in the field.
Throughout the seventeenth century, the soldiers of the Ottoman Empire regularly met the soldiers
of the Austro-Hungarian Empire in battles for the control of Vienna. Presumably, the Turkish troops
were eating kul aşi on one side while the Hungarians were eating goulash on the other. Both would
have been flavouring their stews with peppers, which arrived from the Americas in the early 1500s
and were first cultivated by Turks living in Budapest.

SERVES 4

500 g (1 lb 2 oz) topside or chuck steak

2 tablespoons plain (all-purpose) flour
2 onions
4 garlic cloves
2 tomatoes
2 green bullhorn peppers (or 1 large green capsicum/pepper)
1 carrot
2 boiling potatoes
1 parsnip
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 tablespoon capsicum (pepper) paste
½ tablespoon tomato paste
1 bay leaf
8 celery leaves, chopped
1 tablespoon cumin
1 tablespoon chilli flakes
1 tablespoon salt
1 tablespoon freshly ground black pepper
rice pilav, to serve

Chop the beef into cubes about 3 cm (1¼ in) wide. Toss in the flour, then shake off the excess.
Finely chop the onions and the garlic. Roughly chop the tomatoes. Remove the stalks and seeds from
the peppers and chop. Chop the carrot, potatoes and parsnip.

Heat the vegetable oil in a heavy-based saucepan over medium heat. Add the onions and garlic and
sauté for 3 minutes. Increase the heat to medium-high and brown the beef cubes evenly for 5 minutes.
Add the tomatoes, peppers, capsicum paste and tomato paste. Stir for 2 minutes. Add the bay leaf,
celery leaves and 750 ml (26 fl oz/3 cups) of water, then bring to boil.

Add the vegetables and the spices. Continue to boil over medium heat for about 15 minutes, or until
the potato and parsnip are soft.

Serve with rice pilav.

PAPARA
GRANDMA’S BREAD AND BEEF STEW

I learned this dish from my mother’s mother, who died in 2010 at the age of 103. Living through two
world wars and three military coups, she raised three kids by herself. She knew how to survive, how
to improvise and how not to waste a single grain.
I remember when she made papara the first time, from leftover bread, rice and a handful of minced
meat. The origin of the dish is uncertain, but it is part of the peasant culture of Anatolia and the
Balkans. In Istanbul during the seventeenth century, there were shops that sold ‘papara cubed bread’
as an ingredient for this dish—because, of course, the rich gourmands didn’t have stale bread of their
own.

SERVES 4

375 g (13 oz/1½ cups) plain yoğurt

1 onion
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
200 g (7 oz) minced (ground) lamb or veal
500 ml (17 fl oz/2 cups) beef stock
1 tablespoon tomato paste
3 slices stale bread
2 tablespoons butter
185 g (6½ oz/1 cup) leftover rice (optional)
2 garlic cloves
1 teaspoon chilli flakes
1 teaspoon sweet paprika
1 tablespoon dried mint

Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F/Gas 4).

Place the yoğurt on a sheet of muslin (cheesecloth) and tie up the corners. Hang the muslin over a pot
for 3 hours to allow the yogurt to thicken.

Finely chop the onion. Heat the vegetable oil in a frying pan over medium heat. Add the onion and
sauté for 3 minutes. Add the meat and cook for 5 minutes. Add the beef stock and bring to the boil.
Mix in the tomato paste and simmer for 15 minutes.

Chop the stale bread into 2 cm (about 1 in) cubes. Melt half the butter in a frying pan over medium
heat. Brush the bread with the melted butter, then roast in the oven for 5 minutes, or until golden.
Add the bread to the minced meat and mix it through. If you want to thicken it with rice, stir that into
the mixture now. Simmer for 5 minutes.

Pour the papara into a serving bowl.

Crush the garlic into a smooth paste using a mortar and pestle (or in a bowl with a wooden spoon)
and fold it into the yoğurt. Pour the garlic yoğurt over the dish.

Melt the remaining butter in a small frying pan, add the chilli flakes and paprika, and sizzle for 2
minutes. Pour the butter mixture onto the yoğurt. Top with dried mint and serve.
Every village has a day of the week devoted to a fresh food market where local farmers’ wives off er their produce.
The local market also sells many brands of olive oil.
KARNIYARIK
‘SPLIT BELLY’ (BAKED EGGPLANT
STUFFED WITH BEEF)
As a chef, I often get asked: ‘What would be your last meal?’ I always reply: ‘My grandmother’s
karnıyarık’. She put something in there that I have never been able to replicate.
The name ‘split belly’ is not a reference to what this dish will do to you, but to what you need to do
to the eggplant. This dish first appeared in the nineteenth century on palace menus, but now it’s a
lokanta favourite.
There’s a mistaken belief that the next recipe, İmam bayıldı (‘The priest fainted’), is just a
vegetarian version of this one. The recipes both include eggplant and they look alike, but the other
ingredients and the cooking methods are different. And the priest fainted years before the belly got
split.

SERVES 4

4 long eggplants (aubergines)

135 ml (4½ fl oz) vegetable oil, plus extra for greasing
1 onion
1 garlic clove
250 g (9 oz) minced (ground) beef
1 tomato
2 tablespoons tomato paste
½ tablespoon sugar
4 cherry tomatoes, halved
4 long sweet chillies (or 1 green bullhorn pepper)
½ tablespoon capsicum (pepper) paste
½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
½ teaspoon salt
10 flat-leaf (Italian) parsley leaves
rice pilav or boiled rice, and plain yoğurt, to serve

Slice three strips off the skin of each eggplant, starting about 2 cm (¾ in) below the top and finishing
2 cm (¾ in) above the base. The eggplants should now look like they’re wearing striped pyjamas.

Heat 125 ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) of the vegetable oil in a frying pan over high heat. Add a drop of water to
the oil. If it sizzles, the oil is ready. Carefully add the eggplants and cook for 2 minutes on each side,
or until the exposed flesh is golden. Place the eggplant on paper towel to absorb the excess oil.
Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F/Gas 4).

Finely dice the onion and slice the garlic. Heat the remaining ½ tablespoon of vegetable oil in a
saucepan over medium heat. Add the onion and cook for 5 minutes or until translucent. Add the garlic
and cook for 2 minutes more. Add the beef and cook for 3 minutes, stirring regularly.

Cut the tomato in half and grate it over the mixture, discarding the skin. Dilute 1 tablespoon of tomato
paste in 1 tablespoon of water and stir it into the beef. Cook for 3 minutes more, stirring regularly.

Slit each eggplant lengthways, starting 2 cm (¾ in) from the tip and finishing 2 cm (¾ in) from the
base. With the slit facing upwards, use the back of a tablespoon to push the slit open and give the
eggplant a canoe shape. Brush a baking tray with oil. Put the eggplant boats into the greased tray. Add
a pinch of sugar to each eggplant and fill each boat with the beef mixture. Cut the chillies in half (or
cut the bullhorn pepper in quarters) and remove the stalks and seeds. Place 1 sweet chilli (or a slice
of bullhorn pepper) and 1 halved cherry tomato on top of the beef stuffing in each eggplant.

Dilute the remaining 1 tablespoon of tomato paste and the capsicum paste in 250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) of
boiling water. Spoon the liquid over the eggplants to prevent them drying out while baking. Put the
karnıyarık in the oven and bake for 20 minutes, until the pepper starts to brown.

Serve one boat per person, hot, with rice pilav or boiled rice, and yoğurt on the side.
İMAM BAYILDI
‘THE PRIEST FAINTED’ (BRAISED
EGGPLANT STUFFED WITH PEPPERS AND
TOMATOES)

Why did this dish (first discussed in an 1844 cookbook) make the priest faint? Some say it was with
pleasure, some say because of the extravagant amount of oil in it and some say because it used up
every ingredient in his pantry. The story I like comes from Moveable Feasts: The History, Science
and Lore of Food, where Gregory McNamee says the imam married the daughter of an olive oil
seller. Every day after the wedding she made him an eggplant dish cooked in her father’s olive oil.
On the thirteenth day the oil ran out and her husband collapsed in shock.
Most Turkish cooks would start this dish by frying the eggplant, but the famous Istanbul chef Şemsa
Denizsel of Kantin showed me what she says is the original method—steaming the eggplants in a pot
with the stuffing mixture before filling them. This makes them a lot lighter, and more delicious. With
this recipe, the imam might have lasted a few more days.

SERVES 4

4 tomatoes
25 flat-leaf (Italian) parsley leaves
4 onions
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon sugar
4 long eggplants (aubergines)
150 ml (5 fl oz) olive oil, plus extra for greasing
16 garlic cloves, whole and peeled
1 red bullhorn pepper (or ½ large red capsicum/pepper)

Score a shallow cross in the base of the tomatoes, then transfer to a heatproof bowl and cover with
boiling water. Leave for 30 seconds, then plunge in cold water and peel the skin away from the cross.
Cut the tomatoes in half and scoop out the seeds with a teaspoon. Roughly chop.

Finely chop the parsley leaves. Put the onions, tomato, parsley, salt and sugar in a large saucepan and
knead the mixture for 2 minutes.

Slice three strips off the skin of each eggplant, starting about 2 cm (about 1 in) below the top and
finishing 2cm (about 1 inch) above the base. The eggplants should now look like they’re wearing
striped pyjamas. Put them on top of the mixture. Pour in the olive oil and simmer over low heat for 30
minutes, with the lid on. Add the garlic cloves and simmer for another 20 minutes.

Remove the eggplants from the pan and slit lengthways, starting 2 cm (¾ in) from the tip and finishing
2 cm (¾ in) from the base. With the slit facing upwards, use the back of a tablespoon to push the slit
open and give the eggplant a canoe shape. Brush a baking tray with oil. Put the eggplant boats into the
greased tray. Remove the garlic cloves from the tray and set aside. Spoon the onion mixture from the
pan into each eggplant.

Remove the stalk and seeds from the pepper and cut into four slices, length ways. Place one slice of
pepper and four garlic cloves on top of each canoe. Spoon the remaining sauce over the top, then set
aside until you’re ready to serve.

Serve the İmam bayıldı at room temperature, or do what I do in my restaurant and reheat them in a
180°C (350°F/Gas 4) oven for 10 minutes.
PASTIRMALI KURU FASULYE
BAKED WHITE BEANS WITH SPICE-CURED
BEEF

The beans in this recipe are native to South America and didn’t reach Anatolia until the eighteenth
century. But they quickly became a staple food.
Stewed white beans in tomato sauce is the cheapest and most popular snack in lokantas throughout
Turkey and generally served with rice and pickles.
Back in 1960, a political columnist named Çetin Altan kept having his columns banned or heavily
censored by the government. In exasperation, he finally began a column with the words ‘Let’s talk
about the benefits of white beans’. That phrase has become a kind of code to signal when a journalist
is being censored.
Don’t try to rush this preparation. If you don’t soak the beans overnight and change the water
several times, be prepared for digestive difficulties.

SERVES 6

500 g (1 lb 2 oz) dried cannellini beans

1 tablespoon dried oregano
1 teaspoon cumin
2 onions
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 tablespoon tomato paste
1 tablespoon capsicum (pepper) paste
2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 tomato
3 green chillies
2 tablespoons butter
150 g (5½ oz) thinly sliced pastırma

Wash the beans, transfer to a large saucepan and cover with water. Bring to the boil. Change the
water and then leave to soak overnight.

Strain and rinse the beans thoroughly. Put the beans back in the pan and cover with water (to about 5
cm/2 in above the beans). Stir in the dried oregano and cumin. Bring to the boil, then reduce to a
simmer and cook for 20 minutes, or until the water evaporates from the top and the beans are soft but
not mushy.
Meanwhile, place a clay pot or casserole dish in the oven and preheat to 180°C (350°F/Gas 4).

Roughly chop the onions. Heat the vegetable oil in a deep frying pan over medium heat. Add the onion
and cook for 5 minutes, or until translucent. Stir in the tomato paste, capsicum paste, salt and pepper.
Strain the beans and add them to the pan. Cook for 15 minutes.

Slice the tomato into rounds. Remove the stalks from the chillies and slit down one side to remove the
seeds. Chop the chillies into pieces about 1 cm (½ in) wide.

Carefully take the pot out of the oven. Add the butter and pour in the bean mixture. Spread the slices
of pastırma over the top, then layer with the tomato and chilli. Put the pot back in the oven and cook,
covered, for 10 minutes.

Serve the pastırmali kuru fasulye in the pot for people to help themselves.
Hatice Kalan and friends tell stories and prepare tiny yuvalama at Yörem restaurant, Gaziantep.
YUVALAMA
‘STORYTELLER SOUP’ (LAMB AND
BEEFBALL SOUP)

Because this dish takes a long time, it was traditional in the town of Gaziantep to hire a professional
storyteller to keep the cooks entertained while they rolled hundreds of tiny balls of meat and rice.
Yuvalama is consumed in vast quantities during the three-day eating festival called Bayram that
follows Ramadan.
The word yuvalama means ‘rolled’, and it is said that it takes one person four hours to roll 1 kilo
of meatballs. Few restaurants serve yuvalama these days, because their kitchen staff just don’t have
the time, but it remains a signature dish at the Gaziantep restaurant Yörem. Hatice Kalan, a rare
female restaurateur in this male-dominated town, sits rolling and storytelling through the afternoon
with a bunch of friends and employees. The meatballs they make go into her soup (decorated with a
yin and yang of mint oil and paprika oil) and also get sold as takeaway to locals who add them to
their own soups at home—grateful not to do all that rolling themselves (but missing out on the
stories).

SERVES 4

95 g (3¼ oz/½ cup) dried chickpeas

440 g (15½ oz/2 cups) medium-grain rice
1 tablespoon salt
750 g (1 lb 10 oz) plain yoğurt
250 g lean minced (ground) beef
1 teaspoon white pepper
165 g (5¾ oz/1 cup) rice flour
2 onions
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
400 g (14 oz) lamb (preferably lamb leg), trimmed and cubed
1 egg
2 tablespoons butter
1 tablespoon dried mint
½ tablespoon chilli flakes

Cover the chickpeas with water and soak overnight. Cover the rice with water, add half the salt, and
also soak overnight.

Place the yoğurt on a sheet of muslin (cheesecloth) and tie up the corners. Hang the muslin over a pot
for 3 hours to allow the yoğurt to thicken.

Strain and rinse the chickpeas, place in a saucepan with 500 ml (17 fl oz/2 cups) of water and
simmer, covered, for 1 hour.

Strain and rinse the rice, then blend in a food processor or blender. Transfer the rice to a mixing bowl
and add the beef and white pepper. Knead the mixture with wet hands for at least 5 minutes, or until it
becomes a thick paste-almost like a dough.

Spread the rice flour onto a baking tray. Shape the dough into chickpea-size balls, regularly dipping
your hands into the rice flour on the tray to keep them dry. You can roll the balls between your palms
three or four at a time. Even so, this will take a long time, so enlist other family members to help, or
have a storyteller ready. When all the mixture has been made into balls, space them out on the rice
flour so they don’t stick together.

Roughly chop the onions. Heat the vegetable oil in a saucepan over medium heat. Add the onion and
cook for 2 minutes. Add the cubed pieces of meat and brown for 5 minutes, stirring regularly. Add 1
litre (35 fl oz/4 cups) of water, bring to the boil and simmer, covered, for 20 minutes.

Toss the rice balls lightly in the flour and add them to the lamb. Simmer, covered, for another 15
minutes.

Whisk the yoğurt and egg in a bowl, then whisk in 250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) of the lamb cooking liquid.
Slowly pour the yoğurt mixture into the pan, whisking constantly. Add the chickpeas. Bring the liquid
back to the boil and simmer, covered, for 5 minutes.

Melt the butter in a frying pan over medium heat. And the mint and chilli flakes and stir for 2 minutes.

Ladle the soup into four bowls, drizzle the mint and chilli butter over the top and serve.
LAHMACUN
THIN-CRUST PIDE WITH SPICY LAMB
TOPPING

When I say thin-crust pizza is Italy’s answer to lahmacun (pronounced ‘lah-mahjun’), I’m not trying to
start a fight. The idea of putting spiced mince on a disc of dough would have occurred to human
beings long before there were nations called Italy or Turkey—or for that matter Armenia, Greece or
Syria—all of whom have claimed to be the originators of this addictive pastry. What we do know is
that nowadays lahmacun is a speciality of the town of Şanhurfa, in southeastern Turkey where they
pride themselves on the crispness of their bases.
Lahmacun should not be confused with the heavier kıymalı pide, well known in and out of Turkey
for the thickness of its dough and the coarseness of its meat topping. For lahmacun you need a light
touch.
In Şanliurfa, they turn out hundreds of lahmacuns every lunchtime from big stone ovens. The best
way to get the same effect at home is to use a pizza stone or an unglazed terracotta tile, and to ensure
your oven is preheated to the max.

SERVES 4

BASE
200 g (7 oz/11/3 cups) plain (all-purpose) flour, plus extra for dusting
1 teaspoon salt
70 g (2½ oz/½ cup) wholemeal flour (if using a baking tray)

TO PPI NG
2 tomatoes
1 red capsicum (pepper)
75 g (22/3 oz) capsicum (pepper) paste
5 garlic cloves
½ bunch flat-leaf (Italian) parsley
2 teaspoons chilli flakes
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 teaspoon salt
200 g (7 oz) minced (ground) lamb (about 25 per cent fat)

RED O NI O N AND SUMAC SALAD ( O PTI O NAL)

½ red onion, finely sliced
1 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon sumac
1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
juice of ½ lemon, plus extra to serve

Preheat the oven to its maximum temperature (as close to 300°C/570°F as possible). If you have a
pizza stone or tile, place it in the oven. Or leave your baking tray in the oven so it will preheat.

Sift the flour into a mixing bowl and add the salt. Make a well in the middle and slowly pour in 125
ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) of lukewarm water. Knead the dough for 5 minutes. Sprinkle some flour on your
work surface and then divide the dough into four balls. Cover the bowl with a damp cloth and leave
to rest.

Score a shallow cross in the base of the tomatoes, then transfer to a heatproof bowl and cover with
boiling water. Leave for 30 seconds, then plunge in cold water and peel the skin away from the cross.
Cut the tomato in half and scoop out the stalks and seeds with a teaspoon. Roughly chop. Remove the
seeds from the capsicum and roughly chop. Coarsely blend the tomatoes and capsicum with the
capsicum paste, garlic, parsley, chill flakes, pepper and salt. Combine the mixture with the lamb
mince and stir thoroughly.

Place a ball of dough on the floured work surface and, with floured hands or a rolling pin, flatten into
a round about 25 cm (10 in) wide and less than 5 mm (¼ in) thick. Repeat with the remaining dough
balls.

Using a tablespoon, thinly spread the lamb mixture onto the rounds. Then press in with your hands.

If you are using a baking tray, take it out of the oven and put a piece of baking paper over it. Dust the
baking paper with a little wholemeal flour. Place the rounds of dough on the baking paper and bake
for about 5 minutes, or until the edges are crisp.

Meanwhile, if you are making the salad, finely slice the onion and place in a bowl. Sprinkle with salt
and sumac, add the lemon juice and olive oil, then mix together with your hands.

Sprinkle the salad over the lahmacuns, squeeze on some lemon juice, and serve.
A butcher shop in Gaziantep preparing lamb to mince with peppers for the topping of lahmacun.
SAMSUN PİDE
PIDE WITH FOUR CHEESES

Samsun is a city on the Black Sea famous for its pide (a thick form of flatbread that’s not the same as
pita or pizza). The defining qualities of a Samsun pide are: the dough contains the highest quality
butter, flour and eggs; it is rolled out by hand, not with a rolling pin; it is pulled into a boat shape that
can hold a stuffing; and it is baked in a wood-fire oven. In this case, the passengers on the boat are
cheeses, tomatoes and a fried egg, but don’t get hung up on finding four different cheeses—three or
even two will do, as long as they contrast in texture and flavour. And by the way, we do not agree
with the claim by some bold Turks that our pide gave birth to Italy’s pizza.

SERVES 4

DO UGH
1 tablespoon dry yeast
1 teaspoon sugar
300 g (10½ oz/2 cups) plain (all-purpose) flour, plus extra for dusting
150 g (5½ oz/1 cup) strong flour
50 ml (12/3 fl oz) milk
1 teaspoon salt

FO UR- CHEESE FI LLI NG

4 tablespoons each four different cheeses—such as feta, kaşar (or provolone or mozzarella or any
semi-hard yellow cheese), tulum (or aged ricotta or any sharp crumbly white cheese) and
gorgonzola (or any piquant mouldy cheese)
1 egg
2 teaspoons chopped oregano

TO PPI NG
2 large tomatoes
2 green bullhorn peppers (or 1 large green capsicum/pepper)
4 eggs
2 tablespoons vegetable oil

spoon salad to serve

Dissolve the yeast in 50 ml (12/3fl oz) of lukewarm water. Stir in the sugar and set aside for 5 minutes.
It should start to form bubbles.
Sift the flours into a mixing bowl, make a well in the middle and pour in the yeast mixture and the
milk. Knead the dough for10 minutes, or until it reaches earlobe softness. Cover the bowl with a
damp cloth and rest for 30 minutes to let the dough rise.

Add the salt to the dough and knead for 3 minutes. Place the dough on a floured work surface and
form it into a cylinder. Then cut it into four equal pieces. Rest for another 10 minutes.

Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 200°C (400°F/ Gas 6). If you have a pizza stone or tile, place it in the
oven. Or leave your baking tray in the oven so it will preheat.

Crumble the four cheeses together in a mixing bowl. Break the egg into the bowl and fold it through
the cheeses. Pick the oregano leaves off the stalk and finely chop, then stir the oregano through the
cheese mixture.

Place the dough on the floured work surface and, with floured hands or a rolling pin, flatten it into an
oval about 30 x 20 cm (12 x 8 in) wide and 5 mm (¼ in) thick. Repeat with the remaining dough.

Spoon a thick strip of cheese filling into the middle of each oval, leaving a 5 cm (2 in) gap around the
edge. Fold over the two longer edges so they touch the filling but don’t cover it. Join the folded edges
at the top and bottom to make a boat shape. Press each end into a point and twist to close tightly.

Finely slice the tomatoes. Halve the pepper, remove the stalk and seeds, and finely slice. Put six
slices of tomato and four slices of pepper on each pide, and break an egg into the middle.

If you are using a baking tray, take it out of the oven and put a piece of baking paper over it. Dust the
baking paper with a little flour. If you are using a pizza stone or tile, sprinkle a little flour on it. Place
the pides on the baking paper (or stone or tile) and brush the tops with oil. Bake for 15 minutes or
until golden brown.

Serve warm with a spoon salad.

ÇIĞ BÖREK
HALF MOON PASTRY WITH BEEF AND
CHILLI

My ancestors are Tartars who moved to central Anatolia from an area that is now close to Russia on
the Black Sea. This is one of their dishes. Using raw beef (the meaning of the word çiğ in the Turkish
name), you must knead it tenderly before stuffing inside yoğurt pastry in a half moon shape. It is vital
to seal the pastry tightly so the meat steams inside without making contact with the frying oil.

SERVES 4

2 tablespoons plain yoğurt

100 ml (3½ fl oz) vegetable oil
2 teaspoons salt
juice of ½ lemon
1 egg
750 g (1 lb 10 oz/5 cups) plain (all-purpose) flour, plus extra for dusting

STUFFI NG
1 brown onion
250 g (9 oz) minced (ground) beef
1 tablespoon chilli flakes
1 tablespoon freshly ground black pepper
½ tablespoon salt
5 ice cubes
500 ml (17 fl oz/2 cups) vegetable oil
ayran or basil lemonade, to serve

Mix the yoğurt vegetable oil, salt and lemon juice in a bowl. Break the egg into the mixture and
whisk. Sift the flour into the mixture, add 250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) of water and knead for 10 minutes
into a soft dough. Cover the bowl with a damp cloth and rest for 30 minutes.

Sprinkle a little flour on your work surface and divide the dough into ten pieces, then roll into balls.
Return the dough to the bowl, cover again with a damp cloth and rest for 15 minutes.

Finely chop the onion. Combine it with the minced beef, chilli flakes, pepper and salt.

Wrap the ice in a tea towel (dish towel) and crush into small pieces. Add the crushed ice to the meat
mixture and knead until it dissolves. The meat mix should be very moist, but not runny. If it seems
watery, pour off the excess water.

Place a ball of dough on the floured work surface and, with floured hands or a rolling pin, flatten into
a round 25 cm (10 in) wide and about 2 mm (about 1/16 in) thick. Imagine each round is two half
moons joined together. Put 2 tablespoons of the meat mix in the middle of the right half moon, leaving
a 5 cm (2 in) gap around it. Fold the other half of the dough over. Dip your fingers in water and press
down all around the edges to tightly seal the package. Fold 1 cm (½ in) of the outer edge over to
‘double lock’ it. This ensures the filling will stay moist when cooked. Repeat with the remaining
dough and stuffing.

Heat the vegetable oil in a deep frying pan over high heat. Add a drop of water to the oil. If it sizzles
the oil is ready. Add the böreks, two at a time, and cook for 2 minutes until they start to puff up. Turn
over and cook for 1 minute more, or until the böreks have golden-brown spots. Scoop the böreks out
of the oil and rest on paper towel. Repeat with the remaining pastries.

Serve two böreks per person, with a glass of ayran or basil lemonade.
TALAŞ BÖREĞİ
FLAKY PASTRY WITH LAMB AND PEAS

The puff pastry in this dish is what the French would call a mille-feuille (thousand leaves)—which
suggests the dish appeared in Turkey with European influences during the past 300 years. In the
absence of an origin story, I’ll tell a personal one. When I was at high school I used to jump the fence
to eat lunch in the neighbouring high school because its cook made fabulous flaky börek. When I
graduated, I pretended to be an old boy of the other high school so I could attend their reunions and
eat the flaky börek, which became famous throughout Istanbul and caused other high schools to start
serving the dish at their own reunions. As with most French-influenced dishes, the use of too much
butter is essential, along with infinite patience.

SERVES 4

600 g (1 lb 5 oz/4 cups) strong flour

1 teaspoon salt
juice of ½ lemon
210 ml (7½ fl oz) soda water
155 g (52/3 oz/1 cup) fresh shelled peas
1 small sweet potato
1 baby carrot
1 brown onion
500 g (1 lb 2 oz) lamb backstrap or trimmed lamb leg
2 tablespoons plain (all-purpose) flour, plus extra for dusting
2 tablespoons vegetable oil, plus extra for greasing
½ bunch flat-leaf (Italian) parsley
½ teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
250 g (9 oz) butter
2 eggs
wild thyme salad and ayran, to serve (optional)

To make the dough, sift the strong flour into a mixing bowl. Make a well in the middle and add the
salt and lemon juice. Slowly add the soda water and 80 ml (2½ fl oz/1/3 cup) of water. Knead for 5
minutes into a hard dough. Cover the bowl with a damp cloth and rest for 30 minutes.

Put the peas in a heatproof bowl and cover with boiling water. Leave for 1 minute, then plunge them
into iced water for 30 seconds. Strain and set aside.
Peel and chop the sweet potato into 1 cm (½ in) cubes. Peel and chop the carrot into 1 cm (½ in)
rounds. Finely slice the onion. Chop the meat into 2 cm (¾ in) cubes. Toss in the plain flour, then
shake off the excess.

Heat the vegetable oil in a frying pan over medium heat. Add a drop of water to the oil. If it sizzles,
the oil is ready. Add the chopped lamb and brown for 2 minutes. Add the onion, carrot and sweet
potato and sauté for 3 minutes. Reduce the heat and simmer for 5 minutes. Finely chop the parsley.
Add the peas, parsley, salt and pepper to the pan and simmer for 5 more minutes. Remove from the
heat.

Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F/Gas 4).

Melt the butter in a small frying pan (or microwave for 30 seconds). Sprinkle some flour on your
work surface. Divide the dough into four pieces and, using a thin rolling pin, roll out each piece as
thinly as possible. Brush the butter onto the dough and fold each piece twice (to make four layers).
Rest for 5 minutes. Roll each dough piece out, butter and fold again. Repeat the fold and butter
process twice more. Finally, roll each piece of dough into a square, roughly 20 cm (8 in) wide and 5
mm (¼ in) thick, using your fingers to create the shape.

Separate the eggs and keep the whites and the yolks handy in two bowls. Spoon 3 tablespoons of the
meat mixture into the middle of each square, leaving a margin about 6 cm (2½ in) wide on each side.
Fold each corner in like an envelope, slightly overlapping them and brush the edges with egg white to
help them stick together.

Line a baking tray with baking paper and brush with oil. Arrange the böreks on the tray, folded side
down, and brush the tops with egg yolk. Bake for 30 minutes, or until golden.

Serve the talaş böreği warm, with wild thyme salad and ayran.
SU BÖREĞI
WATER PASTRY WITH FETA AND KALE

Although the börek translated as ‘water pastry’ is usually credited to the central Anatolian cities of
Ankara and Çorum, ancient cookbooks reveal the Romans were layering lasagne, under the name
laganum, in the first century—which was when they moved into Byzantion in northwest Anatolia. So
we should probably credit the Romans with starting the fad for layering dough with cheese and greens
between. Getting it right is a laborious process, because you must boil and butter each of the eleven
layers, then fry or bake the whole thing. But the result is worth the effort, as our Italian culinary
cousins would agree.
Normally in my restaurant I cook water börek in the oven in a rectangular tray, and slice it into
squares (as shown in the picture opposite). For this recipe though, I’m suggesting you use a round,
deep frying pan, and slice the börek into wedges, which makes it look less like lasagne but is easier
to work with.

SERVES 4

8 kale leaves
1 bunch flat-leaf (Italian) parsley
3 garlic shoots (or 1 garlic clove)
1 heaped tablespoon plain yoğurt
250 g (9 oz) hard feta
4 eggs
2 teaspoons salt
500 g (1 lb 2 oz) strong flour
2 tablespoons olive oil
300 g (10½ oz) butter
ayran, to serve

Put the kale in a heatproof bowl and cover with boiling water. Leave for 30 seconds, then plunge in
cold water. Remove the white stalks and finely chop the leaves.

Discard the parsley stalks and finely chop the leaves. Finely chop the garlic shoots (or crush the
garlic) and mix in a bowl with the yoğurt. Crumble the feta into the mixture.

Whisk the eggs in a deep mixing bowl. Add 1 tablespoon of water and the salt. Sift the flour into the
bowl and mix well. Knead for 10 minutes, or until the mixture becomes a hard dough. Dust your work
surface with flour and divide the dough into eleven balls. Dust the dough with flour and rest in a
bowl, covered with a damp cloth, for 15 minutes.
Flour a board and, using a thin rolling pin, roll each ball into a 30 cm (12 in) wide round. (Turning
the dough on the work surface 90 degrees at a time will ensure a circular pastry.) You can stack the
eleven sheets while you do the next step, but be sure to scatter plenty of flour between the sheets so
they don’t stick together.

Pour the olive oil into a large non-stick frying pan and brush to coat. (The pan should be at least 25
cm/10 in across and 10 cm /4 in deep.) Warm the butter in a small saucepan.

Fill a deep saucepan with water and bring to the boil. Using a thin rolling pin or the handle of a long
wooden spoon, lift one round of dough at a time and dunk it into the pan for 2 minutes. Lift out and pat
dry on a clean cloth. Repeat with the remaining rounds of dough.

Place a round of dough in the large oiled non-stick frying pan and brush with butter. Slice around it to
remove any overlap, and scatter the sliced-off bits on top of it. Place another dough round loosely on
top, and brush with butter. Continue to stack to make six layers. Spread the kale and cheese mixture
on the sixth layer, then continue to stack another four buttered layers. Cut the final (eleventh) layer to
fit as a round over the top (discarding any leftover pastry). Pour the remaining butter on top.

Place the pan over medium heat and cook for 10 minutes, constantly tilting the pan to prevent the
bottom layer sticking. Place a large plate over the frying pan and, with one hand on the plate and the
other hand on the handle, upend the pastry onto the plate.

Brush the inside of the pan again with olive oil and slide the upturned börek into the pan—with the
cooked layer now on top. Cook for 8 minutes.

Cut across the börek to make four quarters (with one wedge per person). Serve in the pan with
glasses of ayran to accompany the meal.
CEVİZLİ ERİŞTE
EGG PASTA WITH WALNUT AND
BOTTARGA

Here’s another dish where we acknowledge an Italian connection. Italians are known in Turkey as
makarnacı, which literally translates as ‘macaroni maker’ or ‘pasta maker’, because the suffix -ci
means ‘maker of or ‘doer of’. On the same principle, an Argentinian is a tangocu (a maker of the
tango) and Brazilians are sambaci.
What the Turks call erişte is the kind of flat ribbon pasta the macaroni makers call tagliatelle or
fettuccine. But we can trace the Turkish version as far back as the fifteenth century, when a central
Anatolian doctor called Şirvani wrote that erişte should be made from flour kneaded with egg whites,
cut into thin strips and dried in the sun. In the sixteenth century the palace chefs were boiling it in
soup.
The Turks like to eat their pasta bland, usually just tossing it with butter. I decided to boost the
flavour with dried mullet roe—what the Italians call bottarga and what the Turks call mumlu havyar
(a word which sounds like caviar for a very good reason). The best havyar comes from the beautiful
Dalyan region, at the point where the Mediterranean coast meets the Aegean coast. There they eat
their bottarga with bread, and take their erişte straight.

SERVES 4

EGG PASTA
3 eggs
150 ml (5 fl oz) milk
500 g (1 lb 2 oz) plain (all-purpose) flour (preferably durum wheat), plus extra for dusting
1 teaspoon salt, plus extra for cooking the erişte

WALNUT SAUCE
1 tablespoon butter
100 g (3½ oz) walnuts
1 teaspoon turmeric
45 ml (1½ fl oz) thickened (whipping) cream
100 g (3½ oz) sharp white cheese (such as barrel-aged feta)
1 tablespoon chopped tarragon
1 tablespoon finely grated bottarga (or 2 tablespoons fresh mullet roe)

Whisk the eggs and milk together with a fork. Sift the flour into a mixing bowl, make a well in the
middle and add the salt. Pour in the egg mixture and knead for 10 minutes until it’s stretchy. Cover the
bowl with a damp cloth and rest for 30 minutes.

Knead the dough for 5 minutes, making sure there are no bubbles. Dust your work surface with flour
and divide the dough into three balls. With floured hands or a rolling pin, flatten into a round 30 cm
(12 in) wide and less than 5 mm (¼ in) thick. Repeat with the remaining dough. Rest in a warm spot
(preferably in direct sunlight) for 30 minutes. (You could drape them over your clothesline, or over a
rolling pin between two chairs).

Place the rounds on the floured work surface and cut into strips about 5 mm (¼ in) wide and 5 cm (2
in) long. Don’t worry if the shapes are irregular. If you have a pasta machine, you can follow the
same process and make the strips as if they were fettuccine.

Bring a large saucepan of salted water to the boil. Add the erişte and boil for 2 minutes. Melt the
butter in a large frying pan over low heat, then add the walnuts, turmeric and cream. Toss the pasta in
the sauce for 1 minute over low heat. Transfer to a bowl and grate the cheese over the top. Sprinkle
on the chopped tarragon. Finely grate the bottarga over the top and serve.
KAYSERİ MANTI
TWICE-COOKED MINI BEEF DUMPLINGS

If I had to nominate three dishes that I am confident originated with the ethnic group called the Turks
(who arrived in Anatolia from Central Asia in the eleventh century), I would say yoğurt pastırma and
the wrapped dumplings we call mantı (pronounced ‘mant-uh’). Mantı are often labelled ‘the Turkish
ravioli’, but given their Asian origin, it would be more appropriate to call them ‘the Turkish wonton’.
Versions are served all around Turkey and in several countries to the northeast, but the most
famous are the ridiculously small ones from Kayseri in central Anatolia. Apparently they were
designed as a torture test by mothers-in-law, because ‘a good bride should be able to make Mantı so
small you can fit 40 of them on one spoon’. So I’m not being cruel here by asking you to cut the dough
into 3 cm (1¼ in) squares—the usual size in Kayseri is around 1 cm (½ in) square.

SERVES 4

EGG PASTA
375 g (13 oz/2½ cups) plain (all-purpose) flour, plus extra for dusting
½ teaspoon salt
2 eggs

BEEF MI NCE STUFFI NG

2 onions
250 g (9 oz) lean minced (ground) beef
½ teaspoon nutmeg
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

CO O KI NG WATER
1 tablespoon butter
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 tomato
1 tablespoon tomato paste
1 tablespoon salt

YO ĞURT SAUCE
2 garlic cloves
500 g (1 lb 2 oz/2 cups) plain yoğurt

PAPRI KA BUTTER
4 tablespoons butter
2 tablespoons smoked paprika
1 tablespoon chilli flakes

1 tablespoon dried mint

1 tablespoon sumac

Sift the flour into a mixing bowl, make a well in the middle and add the salt. Break in the eggs. Add 3
tablespoons of water and knead for 10 minutes until the dough is stretchy. Cover the bowl with a
damp cloth and rest for 30 minutes.

Meanwhile, to make the stuffing, grate the onions in a bowl, add the remaining ingredients and Knead
for 3 minutes to combine.

Dust your work surface with flour and divide the dough in half. Using a thin rolling pin, roll out each
piece as thinly as you can, using plenty of flour to prevent sticking. Using a sharp knife or a rolling
wheel, cut each dough sheet into 3 cm (1¼ in) squares.

Have a bowl of water handy for dipping your fingers. Using the tip of a teaspoon, place a lump of the
filling, about the size of a chickpea, into the middle of one square. Wetting your fingers, pull the four
corners of each square together above the filling and press the points together. Repeat with the
remaining dough sheets. You should end up with about 200 small dumplings (50 per person).
Warning: this will take a long time ...

Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F/Gas 4).

Sprinkle some flour on a wide baking tray. Place the Mantı on the tray as you finish them, making sure
they don’t stick to each other. Put the tray in the oven for 10 minutes to dry the Mantı but not
completely cook them.

To cook the Mantı, heat the butter and olive oil in a saucepan over medium heat. Halve the tomato and
grate it into the oil, discarding the skin. Add the tomato paste and stir for 2 minutes. Add 1 litres (35
fl oz/4 cups) of water and the salt, and bring to the boil. Reduce the heat to medium, add the Mantı
and boil for 8 minutes.

While the Mantı are cooking, crush the garlic and mix with the yoğurt.

To make the paprika butter, melt the butter in a small frying pan. Stir in the smoked paprika and the
chilli flakes and sizzle for 2 minutes.

Use a serving spoon to scoop the Mantı into four bowls. Discard the cooking water. Pour 3
tablespoons of garlic yoğurtinto each bowl, drizzle with paprika butter, top with a pinch of dried mint
and sumac, and serve.
 MARRIED AND FEASTED IN
ANATOLIA

The next three dishes are served at wedding feasts in rural Turkey. Here’s what happens first ...
Boy meets girl. Boy tells his mother this girl might be the one for him. Mother makes inquiries in
the village to check out girl’s suitability, then contacts her mother, saying: ‘We would like to visit you
for a good reason.’ Girl’s mother has a pretty good idea what this means, and replies: ‘Would you
like to come over for afternoon tea?’
Girl’s mother asks the girl if she’s interested in the boy, and if she gets the reply ‘It’s up to you’,
she tells the father there may be an offer to consider. (If the girl is not interested, the afternoon tea
would still go ahead, but it would not end happily.)
On the appointed day, boy’s family brings Turkish delight and baklava, beautifully packaged.
Girl’s family serves tea and other pastries, on the principle ‘Tatlı ye, tatlı konuş’ (‘Eat sweet, talk
sweet’).
Girl is not present during the family chat, but if the conversation goes well, her mother will ask her
to make coffee for everybody. She might then put salt instead of sugar into the cup intended for her
suitor, in order to test his manners. If he compliments her on the coffee, he will be a patient husband.
Assuming everybody is getting on well, boy and girl will now be allowed to go out together,
accompanied by a chaperone, of course. This will progress to a small ring, which means they are
‘promised’, followed by a bigger ring, which means they are engaged. Girl’s family will pay for the
engagement party.
On the day before the wedding, girl will have her hands coloured with henna, and on the morning
of the wedding, boy will be shaved by the town barber. Everyone in the village—and anybody who
happens to be passing through town—will be invited to the festivities.
After the imam has conducted the formalities, the bride will then ride into the town square on
horseback, carrying the possessions she will bring to the marriage and accompanied by drummers,
clarinet players and car horns. And so the feasting begins.
This was where we came in. Photographer Bree Hutchins and I were chatting to a farmer selling
peppers and eggplants in the markets at Bodrum, on Turkey’s west coast. The young farmer took a
liking to us (to be honest, more to Bree) and asked if we’d like to come to his cousin’s wedding feast.
We said of course.
We arrived on the third day of a five-day festival. The food was cooking in huge pots all around
the square. They’d slaughtered cattle and sheep specially for the occasion, which they were roasting
over open fires. The three dishes you are about to read about were a tiny part of the banquet.
The bride and her brother at a Yörük wedding in the Aegean village of Milas.
DÜĞÜN CORBASI
WEDDING SOUP WITH CHICKEN AND
YOĞURT

This is a yoğurt soup with chicken or lamb meat, usually cooked over an open fire and served early in
a wedding feast for up to 1000 invited guests from surrounding villages. A wedding feast can
continue for five days, with cooking duties alternating between the bride’s family and the groom’s
family. This dish takes 24 hours to prepare, so better hope the bride doesn’t change her mind.

SERVES 8

50 g (1¾ oz/¼ cup) dried chickpeas

500 g (1 lb 2 oz/2 cups) plain yoğurt
1 small chicken
220 g (7¾ oz/1 cup) medium-grain rice
1 teaspoon salt
1 egg
2 tablespoons plain (all-purpose) flour
2 tablespoons butter
2 teaspoons dried mint
2 teaspoons paprika

Cover the chickpeas with water and soak overnight.

Strain and rinse the chickpeas. Place the yoğurt on a sheet of muslin (cheesecloth) and tie up the
corners. Hang the muslin over a pot for 3 hours to allow the yoğurt to thicken.

Put the chicken and chickpeas in a large saucepan, cover with water and boil, with the lid on, for 30
minutes. Take out the chicken and remove the skin. Strip off the meat and shred, then set aside. Put the
chicken bones and skin back in the pan and boil for a further 15 minutes, with the chickpeas, to make
a stock.

Put 500 ml (17 fl oz/2 cups) of the stock in another saucepan. Rinse the rice. Add the rice and salt to
the pan and bring it to the boil. Boil for 10 minutes, until not quite soft.

Whisk the egg and flour together in a bowl. Add the yoğurt and 2 tablespoons of the warm chicken
stock and combine.
Take the carcass and skin out of the stock, and discard. Add the yoğurt mixture to the stock and slowly
simmer for 5 minutes, stirring constantly. Slowly pour in the strained rice and continue to stir. Bring
to the boil over medium heat and add the shredded chicken. Reduce the heat and simmer for another
10 minutes.

Divide the soup into four bowls. Heat 1 tablespoon of butter in a frying pan. Once it sizzles, add the
mint and stir for about 30 seconds. Drizzle it over the soup in splashes. Heat the remaining butter and
add the paprika. Sizzle for 30 seconds, then drizzle it over the soup in spaces not covered by the mint
butter.

Serve with pide (pee-day) and pride.

EZO GELİN
‘EZO THE BRIDE’ (RED LENTIL AND
BULGUR SOUP)

Ezo the Bride is a famous figure in Turkish folklore. Her real name was Zöhre Bozgeyik and she was
born in 1909 in southeastern Anatolia. She married a local musician and, following the regional
Berdel tradition, her brother married her husband’s sister. A few years later, her brother divorced his
wife, which meant that although Ezo dearly loved her husband, she had to follow local custom and
separate from him. Beautiful Ezo was forced to travel to Syria and marry a distant relative and,
according to a popular song, she died there in 1956 of sorrow and homesickness. Her deathbed wish
was for her remains to be buried in her home village, Dokuzyol. This soup comes from a happy time
in her life.

SERVES 8

1.5 litres (52 fl oz/6 cups) beef stock

2 onions
2 tablespoons sunflower oil
2 tablespoons tomato paste
1 tablespoon capsicum (pepper) paste
1 teaspoon hot paprika
110 g (3¾ oz/½ cup) medium-grain rice
205 g (7¼ oz/1 cup red lentils
90 g (3¼ oz/½ cup) fine bulgur
2 mint sprigs
2 teaspoons salt
2 teaspoons freshly ground black pepper

PAPRI KA BUTTER
1 tablespoon butter
1 tablespoon hot paprika
1 bird’s eye chilli, finely chopped (optional)

Put the beef stock in a pot and bring to the boil. Reduce to a simmer.

Meanwhile, finely chop the onions. Heat the sunflower oil in a frying pan over medium heat. Add the
onion and cook for 3 minutes until soft. Dissolve the tomato and capsicum pastes in 250 ml (9 fl oz/1
cup) of the beef stock, add the hot paprika, and then stir into the cooking onions. Pour the onion
mixture into the simmering beef stock.

Rinse the rice, red lentils and bulgur, then add to the pot. Cover and cook for 20 minutes, or until the
lentils are soft. Ladle the soup into four bowls.

Chop the mint. To make the paprika butter, melt the butter in a small frying pan, add the paprika (and
finely chopped chillies if you want extra heat), and sizzle for 1 minute.

Top each bowl with chopped mint and drops of paprika butter, and serve.
KEŞKEK
LAMB AND BARLEY PORRIDGE

Keşkek is now served at village weddings all over Anatolia, but it originated with the Yörük people
(nomadic Turks from Central Asia). For the authentic version, you’d need a brass pot as big as a
bathtub, a bonfire, and 200 single men with thick pounding poles. Traditionally, a whole sheep or
cow is boiled with pearl barley, then pulled out of the pot so the bones can be removed, then put back
in and pounded for about an hour by the single men of the village until it becomes a paste. This recipe
is a compromise.

SERVES 8

1 kg (2 lb 4 oz) pearl barley

1 lamb neck, about 1 kg (2 lb 4 oz)
1 teaspoon salt
2 onions
1 tablespoon sunflower oil
3 tablespoons butter, melted
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

TO MATO SAUCE
1 tablespoon butter
1 tablespoon tomato paste
½ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 teaspoon dried oregano

Cover the barley with water and soak for 8 hours.

Cut the lamb neck into four pieces and place in a large saucepan with the barley. Cover with water,
bring to the boil and then cook for 1½ hours, or until the barley and meat are tender.

Scoop out the pieces of neck and remove the bones. Shred the meat. Strain the barley and combine it
with the meat in a large bowl. Add the salt.

Dice the onions. Heat the sunflower oil in a frying pan over medium heat. Add the onion and sauté for
5 minutes, until translucent. Add the onion to the meat and barley, and pound the mixture with a
wooden spoon until it reaches a paste-like consistency.
To make the sauce, melt the butter in a frying pan over low heat. Stir in the tomato paste, salt, pepper
and oregano. When it sizzles, remove the pan from the heat.

Serve the keşkek in a big bowl in the middle of the table for people to help themselves. Pour the
melted butter over the top and sprinkle on the cinnamon.

The groom’s village (above) is empty because everybody is at the feast in the bride’s village.
GAVURDAĞ
‘SPOON SALAD’ (CHOPPED TOMATO,
WALNUT AND SUMAC SALAD)

This salad is served with kebaps all over Turkey, and is designed to be eaten with a spoon. It’s just a
finely chopped salad, with the tomato pieces no bigger than the pomegranate seeds, but you’ll see it
on menus in Istanbul described as the famous ‘Gavurdağ’ salad (apparently named after a mountain in
southeast Anatolia). My friend Musa points out in his scholarly journal Yemek ve Kültür (Food and
Culture) that there’s a trend in Turkey for chefs to give obscure names to standard dishes in an attempt
to suggest authentic regional origins. This could well be one of those.

SERVES 4

6 ripe tomatoes
1 red onion
1 bunch mint
½ bunch flat-leaf (Italian) parsley
115 g (4 oz/1 cup) walnuts
3 green bullhorn peppers (or 1 green capsicum/pepper)
1 green chilli
1 tablespoon sumac
2 tablespoons pomegranate molasses
60 ml (2 fl oz/¼ cup) olive oil
1 teaspoon apple vinegar
1 teaspoon sea salt
150 g (5½ oz/½ cup) pomegranate seeds

Quarter the tomatoes, remove the white centres and then finely chop. Finely chop the red onion.
Discard the mint and parsley stalks and finely chop the leaves. Finely chop the walnuts. Cut the
bullhorn peppers and the chilli in half, and remove the seeds and stalks. Finely chop. Mix all the
chopped ingredients together in a salad bowl.

Mix the sumac, molasses, olive oil, vinegar and salt together, pour onto the salad and toss.

Sprinkle the pomegranate seeds on top and serve.

ZAHTER SALATASI
WILD THYME AND BLOOD ORANGE
SALAD

Wild thyme (zahter) grows near the southeastern city of Antakya (once known as Antioch, where the
followers of Jesus were first called Christians). The locals use the fresh leaves to make salads and an
invigorating form of tea, and use the dried leaves as a substitute for oregano in meat dishes. The
region was formerly part of Syria, only added to the Turkish republic in 1938, so its food is
surprising to most Turks. In addition to this salad, we can credit the Antakyans with künefe and
muhammara sauce.

SERVES 4

10 thyme sprigs
5 oregano sprigs
3 spring onions (scallions)
1 green chilli (optional)
1 garlic shoot (if available)
2 blood oranges
3 teaspoons olive oil
½ teaspoon sea salt

Pick the leaves off the thyme and oregano. Discard the stalks. Wash the spring onions, then remove
and discard the roots and tough outer leaves. Finely chop. Remove the seeds and stalk from the chilli
(if you are using it) and finely chop. Finely chop the garlic shoot. Mix together in a salad bowl.

Peel the oranges and divide into segments, removing the white pith. Add to the salad bowl. Splash on
the olive oil and salt, toss together and serve.
BALIK EKMEK
WHITING SANDWICH WITH TARATOR

This is my attempt to recreate a memory. When I was a teenager, I used to buy sandwiches from
fishermen who would moor their boats next to one of the pillars of the Galata Bridge, just across the
road from Istanbul’s spice market. They would fillet their catch and cook fish pieces over a little
charcoal grill, then shove them inside pide. Nowadays, this has turned into a tourist experience,
where colourful boats, permanently moored, sell frozen fish cooked on flat griddles.
You can come close to the original experience by walking across to the other side of the Galata
Bridge and turning left into the fish market. There they sell genuine fish sandwiches from carts in the
street. They use locally caught fish and cook them over charcoal. They then add salad and lemon—not
the walnut tarator (sauce) in this recipe, which is my improvement on the memory.

SERVES 4

TARATO R
15 g (½ oz/¼ cup) breadcrumbs
60 g (2¼ oz/½ cup) walnuts
2 garlic cloves
juice of ½ lemon
pinch of salt
60 ml (2 fl oz/¼ cup) extra virgin olive oil

RO CKET SALAD
12 large rocket (arugula) leaves
1 bunch flat-leaf (Italian) parsley
1 red onion
1 tablespoon chilli flakes
1 tablespoon red wine vinegar
60 ml (2 fl oz/¼ cup) extra virgin olive oil
2 teaspoons salt
juice of ½ lemon

PAN- FRI ED WHI TI NG

8 school whiting
185 g (6½ oz/1¼ cups) plain (all-purpose) flour
2 teaspoons salt
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) soda water
250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) vegetable oil

pide bread, to serve

şalgam, to serve

First make the tarator. Soak the breadcrumbs in 50 ml (2 fl oz/¼ cup) of water for 5 minutes.

Put the breadcrumbs, walnuts, garlic, lemon juice and salt in a food processor, and pulse. While
you’re pulsing, slowly add the olive oil— you are aiming for a spreadable paste like mustard, so add
a little more water if it does not seem smooth enough.

Now make the salad. Remove the stalks from the rocket and the parsley. Finely chop the leaves.
Finely chop the onion. Mix the leaves, onion, chill flakes, red wine vinegar and oil together in a
bowl, then add the salt and lemon juice.

Next, prepare the fish. Slice each fish through the stomach, removing the gut. Butterfly each fish and
remove the spine and any bones. Cut off and discard the heads and tails and wash thoroughly Pat the
fish dry and dust in about 35 g (1¼ oz/ ¼ cup) of the flour.

Put the remaining flour in a mixing bowl and add the salt and pepper. Make a well in the middle and
whisk in the soda water to make a batter.

Heat the vegetable oil in a deep frying pan over high heat. Add a drop of water to the oil. If it sizzles,
the oil is ready.

Dip the fish in the batter, allowing the excess to drip off. Carefully lower the whiting into the hot oil
and fry for 2 minutes on each side, or until golden. Using a slotted spatula, remove the fish from the
pan and place on paper towel to absorb the excess oil.
Cut each pide in half. Spread the tarator on the top and bottom. Put the fillets from two fish on each
sandwich, then 2 tablespoons of salad, then close the lid. Serve with a glass of şalgam.
ŞALGAM
PICKLED CARROT AND BEETROOT JUICE

There are certain elements of the Turkish culinary repertoire with which an outsider will have a love-
hate relationship—lamb testicles, sheep’s head soup, fried pickles, boza beer, rakı, and şalgam— the
earthy refreshment in this recipe. I Love şalgam—especially washed down with rakı, which is a
pairing perfected in the Mediterranean town of Adana.

SERVES 16

1 round red turnip

1 beetroot (beet)
1 purple carrot
1 red or green chilli (optional)
165 g (5¾ oz/½ cup) rock salt
1½ tablespoons citric acid
100 g (3½ oz) dried chickpeas

Peel the turnip, beetroot and carrot. Quarter the carrots lengthways. Quarter the turnip and beetroot. If
you want your şalgam hot slit down one side of a green or red chilli so the liquid will pull the heat
out of the seeds.

Put the vegetables (and the optional chilli) in a 4 litre (140 fl oz/16 cup) preserving jar. Dissolve the
rock salt and citric acid in 250 ml (9 fl oz/ 1 cup) of lukewarm water. Pour into the jar. Wrap the
chickpeas in a parcel of muslin (cheesecloth) and knot tightly. Put the muslin parcel into the jar. Fill
the jar, to the brim, with water. Seal the lid tightly. Leave in a cool spot for 15 days.

After 15 days take out the chickpea parcel and discard. If you keep the jar in the fridge, you can drink
the juice, or eat the pickled vegetables for up to 3 months.
AYRAN
MINTED YOĞURT SHAKE

Ayran is the most popular cold drink in Turkey. Religious conservatives call it THE National Drink
—as opposed to rakı, alcohol of choice on any meze table. I love the frothy crema rural villagers
used to achieve with the traditional method of shaking the yoğurt in a sheepskin or wooden barrel.
I’ve found a simpler way using a cocktail shaker and a bit of milk.

SERVES 4

1 bunch mint
135 g (4¾ oz /1 cup) ice
750 g (1 lb 10 oz/3 cups) plain yoğurt
125 ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) milk
125 ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) soda water
1 tablespoon salt

Finely chop the mint. Put the ice and all the other ingredients in a cocktail shaker. Shake vigorously
for 30 seconds. Strain into four glasses and serve.
ISLAK
KIDS’ SOGGY BURGER

This is my adaptation of a relatively new street snack, usually found in takeaway joints around
Taksim Square in Istanbul, and designed for consumption when you are drunk. It’s a kind of slider,
except the sauce is not inside the bun but all around it.
When I first tried islak, I asked the shopkeeper what was in the sauce. He said it was a trade
secret. I hung around for a while, and soon saw him pouring the fat that had collected under his döner
kebap rotisserie into a mixture of tomato and peppers. I decided not to replicate this, and instead
boosted the sauce with ground herbs and spices, and a plum.
My kids love soggy burgers because they are messy and full of flavour. This version won’t give
them heart conditions.

SERVES 4

SPI CE MI X*
1 teaspoon dried oregano
2 teaspoons ground coriander
2 teaspoons cumin
¼ teaspoon pimento
1 teaspoon sweet paprika
1 teaspoon hot paprika
¼ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 dried bay leaf

KÖ FTE
100 g (3½ oz) breadcrumbs
1 tablespoon white vinegar
1 onion
2 tablespoons chopped flat-leaf (Italian) parsley
200 g (7 oz) minced (ground) lamb mince
(preferably from breast)
400 g (14 oz) minced (ground) veal
1 egg
1 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon vegetable oil

8 brioches or burger buns

BURGER SAUCE
1 tablespoon butter
2 tablespoons tomato paste
1 plum
500 ml (18 fl oz/2 cups) beef stock
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 teaspoon dried mint

Using a spice grinder or a food processor, grind the oregano into a powder. Mix all the spices
together with the bay leaf. You can keep this powder in a sealed container for up to 3 months.

Put the breadcrumbs in a mixing bowl and moisten with 1 tablespoon of water and the vinegar. Finely
grate the onion into the bowl. Stir in the parsley. Add the lamb and veal, break the egg in, then add the
salt and ½ tablespoon of the spice mix. Knead with wet hands for 10 minutes until the mixture turns
into a paste.

Cover the bowl with a damp cloth or plastic wrap and rest in the fridge for 1 hour.

Divide the meat mixture into eight balls about the size of billiard balls. With wet hands, flatten each
ball into a patty about 2 cm (¾ in) thick.

To make the sauce, melt the butter in a saucepan over medium heat, add the tomato paste and stir for 1
minute. Finely chop the plum and add. Add the beef stock, salt, pepper and mint, bring to the boil,
then reduce over low heat for 10 minutes.

Heat the vegetable oil over medium heat. Fry four patties at a time for 4 minutes on each side, until
brown, then place on paper towel to absorb the excess oil. Repeat with the remaining köfte.

Slice the buns in half. Put a patty in each bun. Dunk each bun into the hot sauce and squash down with
a wooden spoon. Remove from the pan and serve two buns per person, with plenty of paper towels
for wiping hands.

NOTE
If you have a spice mill, buy coriander, cumin and pimento seeds, and grind them with the dried
oregano. Alternatively, buy all ingredients except the bay leaf in powder form.
TEKİRDAĞ KÖFTE
VEAL MEATBALLS WITH WHITE BEAN
AND TAHINI SALAD

The west coast city of Tekirdağ is known for two things: its exceptional rakı, due to the grapes and
water of the region; and its delicious köfte, consumed in eateries devoted to this one experience and
recognised as the most beloved veal dish all across the land of lamb. Each köfte maker in town has a
personal secret ingredient, a common one being lungs. You may be relieved to hear my secret
ingredient is not lungs, but semolina.
The accompanying salad comes from much further south—the sea resort of Antalya, where they add
tahini to everything.

SERVES 4

KÖ FTE
3 tablespoons breadcrumbs
½ teaspoon bicarbonate of soda (baking soda)
1 onion
1 garlic clove
500 g (1 lb 2 oz) minced (ground) veal (about 20 per cent fat)
1 teaspoon cumin
1 teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon pimento
½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
½ teaspoon chilli flakes
1 egg
½ tablespoon fine semolina
4 long yellow chillies

WHI TE BEAN AND TAHI NI SALAD

390 g (13¾ oz/2 cups) dried white cannellini beans
½ teaspoon sugar
1½ teaspoons salt
3 tablespoons tahini
3 tablespoons olive oil
juice of 1 lemon
2 tablespoons apple cider vinegar
½ bunch flat-leaf (Italian) parsley
½ bunch spring onions (scallions)
1 French shallot (eschalot), chopped
8 cherry tomatoes
8 quail eggs
2 teaspoons sumac

Put the breadcrumbs in a mixing bowl and moisten with 2 tablespoons of water. Stir in the
bicarbonate of soda. Finely grate the onion and crush the garlic. Put the meat in the mixing bowl and
then add the onion, garlic and the remaining köfte ingredients. Knead with wet hands for 15 minutes
until the mixture becomes a smooth paste. Cover the bowl with a damp cloth or plastic wrap and rest
in the fridge overnight.

Cover the cannellini beans with boiling water and leave overnight.

Strain and rinse the soaked beans, place in a saucepan with the sugar, cover with water and bring to
the boil. Strain the beans and discard the water. Cover again with even more fresh water, add 1
teaspoon of the salt and boil, covered, for 1 hour.

Strain the beans and then transfer to a large salad bowl.

Dilute the tahini in 2 tablespoons of water. Add the olive oil, lemon juice, vinegar and the remaining
salt. Mix the tahini dressing through the beans.

Pick the leaves from the parsley and finely chop. Wash the spring onions, then remove the roots and
tough outer leaves, and finely chop. Stir the parsley and spring onions through the salad. Finely slice
the shallot. Sprinkle the pieces over the beans. Quarter the cherry tomatoes and spread them over the
shallot.

Preheat the barbecue hotplate or a grill pan. Add a drop of water. If it sizzles, the grill is ready.

Bring a small saucepan of water to the boil, add the quail eggs and boil for 3 minutes. Remove with a
slotted spoon and run them under cold running water. Remove the shells, slice in half and place the
halves on top of the salad. Sprinkle a little sumac over the eggs.

Divide the ball of köfte into patties about 1 cm (½ in) thick and about 6 cm (2½) wide. Make
indentations with your hand across the top. Put the patties on the barbecue and cook for 2 minutes on
each side, until brown. (If you are using a grill pan, cook fir 4 minutes each side.) Char the yellow
chillies until the skin is slightly blackened

Serve four köfte per person, with the bean salad and chilli.
KADINBUDU
‘LADIES’ THIGHS’ (VEAL MEATBALLS
WITH RICE AND EGGS)

Probably because of the puritanism of their governments over the centuries, Turks have expressed
their fascination with anatomy in their approach to naming foodstuffs. There are treats called
woman’s bellybutton, vizier’s finger, lady’s lips, sluts’ dumplings and brothel donuts. The plump
patties in this recipe made from young cows obviously reminded some nineteenth-century chef of a
pleasant experience. The first published mention of this kind of köfte, using mince, watercress and
eggs, appears in a Persian dictionary published around 1800— under a more polite name.

SERVES 4

1 onion
2 garlic cloves
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
500 g (1 lb 2 oz) minced (ground) veal mince
110 g (3¾ oz/½ cup) medium-grain rice
2 teaspoons salt
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 teaspoon cumin
1 teaspoon ground pimento
2 tablespoons chopped marjoram leaves
3 eggs
150 g (5½ oz/1 cup) plain (all-purpose) flour
250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) vegetable oil, for frying
spoon salad, to serve

Finely chop the onion and garlic. Heat the vegetable oil in a frying pan over medium heat. Add the
onion and garlic and sauté for 3 minutes, until soft. Add half the mince and stir. Cook for 5 minutes, to
evaporate any water it puts out. Transfer to a mixing bowl.

Wash the rice under cold running water. Put 250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) of water in a saucepan. Add the
rice and salt, and bring to the boil. Boil for 10 minutes, until soft. Strain.

Add the rice to the cooked mince, then add the spices and marjoram. Break 1 egg into the mixture.

Add the remaining (raw) mince. Knead with wet hands for 5 minutes to combine. Cover the bowl
with a damp cloth or plastic wrap and rest in the fridge for 30 minutes. Divide the mixture into eight
rounds, each about the size of an egg, then flatten each into a patty about 1-2 cm (½-¾ in) thick. Put
the flour in a bowl. Lightly beat the remaining eggs in a separate bowl. Coat both sides of each patty
in the flour and dip in the egg. Heat the vegetable oil in a frying pan over medium heat. Toss a drop of
water into the oil. If it sizzles, the oil is ready. Carefully add the four patties to the pan and cook for 3
minutes on each side, or until golden brown. Using a spatula, remove the patties from the pan and
place on paper towel to absorb the excess oil. Repeat with the remaining patties.

Serve two kadınbudu per person, with the spoon salad.

SİMİT KEBABI
LAMB KEBAPS WITH BARBECUED SALAD

Kebap restaurants in Turkey never buy lamb mince. They always make their own using leg and belly
meat, and a mighty machete called a zırh. A kebap master will choose an apprentice by putting a
piece of paper between the chopping board and the lamb and asking the candidate to mince the meat
using only a zırh. If there are no cuts in the paper, the candidate gets the job.
With this kebap it’s important to use the finest bulgur, which is known in Gaziantep as simit. This
is not to be confused with the sesame rings we discussed in the breakfast chapter. In Antep dialect,
simit means the smallest grains of wheat that fit through a sieve. Their other name is elek altı, which
means ‘under the sieve’.
This is a perfect dish for a barbecue, because the salad is char-grilled along with the meat.

SERVES 4

LAMB KEBAPS
90 g (3¼ oz/½ cup) extra fine bulgur
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 tablespoon cumin
1 teaspoon chilli flakes
10 mint leaves
600 g (1 lb 5 oz) minced (ground) lamb (about 30 per cent fat)
3 garlic cloves
½ onion

SALAD KEBAPS
4 tomatoes
4 shallots
4 green bullhorn peppers (or 2 large green
capsicums/peppers)
8 garlic cloves
2 tablespoons pomegranate molasses
1 tablespoon sweet paprika
1 tablespoon hot paprika
2 tablespoons tomato paste
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon pepper
1 piece pita bread, for holding the skewer

Put the bulgur, salt, pepper, cumin and chilli flakes in a mixing bowl. Add 60 ml (2 fl oz/¼ cup) of
hot water. Knead the mixture with wet hands for 1 minute. Finely chop the mint leaves and stir
through the mixture.

If you’re using a charcoal grill, you should light it 1 hour before you want to cook. Burn the charcoal
for at least 45 minutes and when the flames have died down, and the coals are glowing with a
covering of white ash, the barbecue is ready. (If you’re using a gas barbecue, turn it on to medium
heat about 5 minutes before you’re ready to cook.)

Put the lamb in a separate bowl. Finely grate the garlic and the onion, and add it to the mince. Add the
bulgur mixture and knead with wet hands for 8 minutes, to make a smooth paste. Cover the bowl with
a damp cloth and rest for 30 minutes.

Using eight thick metal skewers (ideally 2 cm/¾ in thick), divide the lamb and bulgur into four balls
and squash each ball around a skewer, pressing the mixture so it spreads 5 cm (2 in) from the top to
10 cm (4 cm) from the bottom.

To make the salad, cut the tomatoes in half. Skin the shallots. Cut the bullhorn peppers in half. Push
the salad pieces onto the four remaining skewers.

Place the eight kebaps on the charcoal grill or barbecue. Cook for 2 minutes, then when the meat on
that side is seared, turn and cook the other side for 2 minutes. Turn again, and grill for another 2
minutes on each side. (The fat from the meat will drip on the charcoal and burn, but that smoke adds
to the flavour.) Constantly check to see if the meat is at risk of falling off the skewer, and if so, turn it
over. Take all the skewers off the heat.

Pull the salad ingredients off their skewers and pulse in a food processor to make a chunky purée.
Add the pomegranate molasses, sweet paprika, hot paprika, tomato paste, salt and pepper, and stir.

Divide the salad mix onto four plates. Using the pita bread as a mitten, pull the kebaps off the skewers
and place on top of the warm salad. Serve immediatley.
TAVUK ŞIŞ
CHICKEN KEBAPS WITH PRUNE ORZO
PILAV

Chicken kebaps are mostly served with a rice pilav in Turkey. I find that a bit boring, and since I
share the Ottoman taste for combining meat with dried fruits, I’ve added prunes. Sour plums are
popular as summer fruits in Turkey, while the dried version (prunes) are handy in winter. We prefer
damsin plums, which are named for their supposed point of origin—Damascus. They were brought to
Byzantion by the Romans.
Instead of rice I’ve used a kind of pasta called orzo (the Italian word for barley) or risoni (which
translates as ‘big rice’). It’s called kritharáki (little barley) by the Greeks and arpa şehriye (barley
grains) by the Turks, but I most like the Arab name lisân al-uşfür, which translates as ‘songbird
tongues’.

SERVES 4

KEBAPS
8 chicken thigh fillets
4 thyme sprigs
250 g (9 oz/1 cup) plain yoğurt
100 g (3½ oz/½ cup) capsicum (pepper) paste
125 ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) olive oil
1 teaspoon cumin
1 teaspoon chilli flakes
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

O RZO PI LAV
80 g (2¾ oz/½ cup) blanched almonds
750 ml (26 fl oz/3 cups) chicken stock
2 tablespoons butter
2 tablespoons olive oil
270 g (9½ oz/2 cups) orzo pasta
½ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
10 prunes, seeded and chopped
200 g (7 oz) crumbly feta
Gut the chicken thighs in half, crossways. Pick the leaves from the thyme sprigs and discard the stalks.
Mix the yoğurt capsicum paste, olive oil, cumin, chilli flakes, salt, pepper and thyme leaves in a large
non-metallic bowl. Add the chicken and thoroughly coat in the yoğurt mixture. Cover the bowl with
plastic wrap, transfer to the fridge and leave to marinate for at least 6 hours.

About 1 hour before serving, start making the orzo pilav. If you’re using an oven rather than a grill,
preheat it to 220°C (425°F/Gas 7).

Halve the almonds. Put the chicken stock in a saucepan over a low heat and bring to a simmer.

Meanwhile, melt the butter in a saucepan over low heat. Add the olive oil. When it begins to sizzle
add the almonds and half the orzo. Brown for 3 minutes. Add the remaining orzo and stir for another 3
minutes. Add the heated chicken stock. Stir and add the salt and pepper. Bring the orzo to the boil,
and simmer, covered, for 8 minutes.

Preheat the barbecue hotplate or a grill pan. Add a drop of water. If it sizzles the grill is ready.

Chop the prunes and stir them through the orzo mixture. Simmer, covered, for another 5 minutes. Turn
off the heat and stir in the feta. Let the mixture rest, covered, for 10 minutes.

Meanwhile, prepare the kebaps. Using eight metal skewers (ideally 1 cm/½ in wide), push each
skewer through two pieces of chicken and place them on the hot grill. Grill for 7 minutes on one side,
then 5 minutes on the other side. (If you are using the oven, put the chicken pieces on an oven rack and
bake for 10 minutes.)

Divide the orzo pilav onto four plates. Place two skewers on each portion of pilav and serve.
YAPRAK KEBAP
HOME-STYLE VEAL DÖNER KEBAP

Sadly, the world sees döner kebap (also known by the Greek word gyro or the Arabic word
shawarma) as the pinnacle of Turkey’s cooking culture. Tourists in Turkey are often told that this
vertical way of grilling sliced meat was invented by the Iskender family in the 1860s in the town of
Bursa as a way to avoid fat dripping onto the coals and creating a lot of smoke. In one tale we hear
that Mr Iskender skewered slices of meat on his sword and stuck it in the ground next to a stack of
burning wood. My scholarly friend Musa has discovered that this way of cooking was used
throughout Anatolia and the Middle East long before Mr Iskender opened his restaurant.
The Iskender family from Bursa now has a chain of restaurants around Turkey serving döner kebap
with yoğurt pide and their own barbecued tomato sauce. They call it Iskender kebap—a name that has
been copied and a dish that has been bastardised all over the world. This recipe is my suggestion of
how to get a similar effect when you don’t have a vertical rotisserie. Most offerings outside Turkey
use pressed mince. The real döner kebap should be made with slices of veal, with minced meat only
used to stick the veal slices together.

SERVES 4

VEAL KEBAP
800 g (1 lb 12 oz) veal backstrap
8 onions
2 garlic cloves
1 tablespoon capsicum (pepper) paste
1 tablespoon plain yoğurt
1 tablespoon dried oregano
1 dried bay leaf
6 slices day-old bread (or 3-day-old pide bread)
2 tablespoons butter, plus extra for greasing

DÖ NER KEBAP SAUCE

2 tablespoons butter, melted
2 tablespoons tomato paste
500 ml (17 fl oz/2 cups) beef stock
½ tablespoon salt
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 teaspoon sugar
1 teaspoon dried mint
250 g (9 oz/1 cup) plain yoğurt, to serve

The day before you are planning to serve this, clean the outer fat and sinews off the backstrap. Slice
as thinly as you can, then pound each slice with the back of a wooden spoon (or a meat tenderiser if
you have one) to make a slice about 8 cm (3¼ in) across and less than 5 mm (¼ in) thick. Cut the
slices in half.

Finely grate the onions. Squeeze all the onion juice through a fine sieve or muslin (cheesecloth) into a
non-metallic bowl.

Crush the garlic and add it to the onion juice, along with the capsicum paste, yoğurt oregano and bay
leaf. Mix well. Add the veal and coat in the onion mixture. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap, transfer
to the fridge and leave to marinate overnight.

If you’re using a charcoal grill, you should light it 1 hour before you want to cook. Burn the charcoal
for at least 45 minutes and when the flames have died down, and the coals are glowing with a
covering of white ash, the barbecue is ready.

(If you’re using a gas barbecue, turn it on to medium-high about 5 minutes before you’re ready to
cook.)

Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F/Gas 4).

Cut the bread into 2 cm (¾ in) cubes. Brush with butter. Grease a baking tray, place the bread in the
tray and bake for 5 minutes until golden.

To make the sauce, melt the butter in a saucepan over medium heat, add the tomato paste, cook for 1
minute, add the beef stock, salt, pepper, sugar and mint, and then bring to the boil.

Cook the veal slices on the charcoal grill or barbecue for 2 minutes each side.

Divide the bread pieces onto four plates. Put five or six pieces of veal on each plate, pour over the
sauce, dollop with yoğurt and serve.
Turks prefer to eat lunch all day long outside casual ‘salons’ that serve döner kebabs sliced from a giant ball of meat and a vertical grill.
YENİ DÜNYA KEBABI
LOQUAT KEBAPS

This is one of the many seasonal kebaps of Gaziantep in southeastern Anatolia, appearing at the
beginning of spring and served for only three weeks. It uses loquats picked just before they are ripe
(if you can’t find loquats, try to use almost-ripe apricots). Usually a family will layer the fruit and
meat in their own baking tray and get the kids to carry the tray to the nearest bakery to be cooked in a
wood-fire oven. At other times of the year they might layer garlic, shallots and eggplant (aubergine)
with the meat.
There are two ways of cooking this dish: one over charcoal, the other in the oven. I mix both
methods here, first giving the kebaps a smoky flavour on the barbecue, then finishing them off in the
oven. If you don’t have a barbecue, do the whole thing in the oven.

SERVES 4

500 g (1 lb 2 oz) lamb mince (with about 25 per cent fat)

1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
20 loquats (or apricots)
2 spring onions (scallions)
3 garlic shoots (or 1 garlic clove)
8 cherry tomatoes
2 tablespoons pomegranate molasses
1 tablespoon sumac
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 tablespoon chilli flakes

pita bread, to serve

If you’re using a charcoal grill, you should light it 1 hour before you want to cook. Burn the charcoal
for at least 45 minutes and when the flames have died down, and the coals are glowing with a
covering of white ash, the barbecue is ready. (If you’re using a gas barbecue, turn it on to medium
heat about 5 minutes before you’re ready to cook.)

Put the lamb in a mixing bowl. Add the salt and pepper, and knead with wet hands for 2 minutes.
Divide the meat into twenty balls about the size of walnuts.

Slit each loquat (or apricot) down one side, pull the halves partly apart and remove the seeds and the
surrounding membrane. Stuff a ball of meat into each loquat.
Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F/Gas 4).

Using four flat metal skewers (ideally 1 cm/½ in thick), push five loquats onto each skewer. Each
loquat should have the open side facing upwards, so the skewer passes through both sides of the fruit
and also the meat.

Put the kebap skewers on the charcoal grill or barbecue, with the open sides of the loquats facing
upwards. Cook for 3 minutes on each side then remove from the heat. Remove the loquats from the
skewers and put them in a round baking dish (preferably terracotta) leaving a space in the middle.

Wash the spring onions, then remove the roots and tough outer leaves. Roughly chop the spring onions
and the garlic shoots (or garlic clove). Halve the cherry tomatoes and mix them with the spring onions
and garlic shoots in a salad bowl. Add the pomegranate molasses, sumac, olive oil and chill flakes.
Toss the salad.

Make a mound of the tomato salad in the middle of the loquats (pushing the loquats to make it fit). Put
the tray in the oven and cook for 15 minutes.

Serve with pita bread.

ALİ NAZİK
‘THE GENTLE KEBAP’ (LAMB AND
SMOKED EGGPLANT)

The literal translation of the Turkish name for this dish is ‘gentle Ali’, leading to the theory that the
creator was a chef named Ali. More likely, though, the name is a corruption of ala nazik (good and
gentle) or eli nazik (gentle hand). In the land of dubious etymologies, the name is often said to have
come from an event in the early 1500s, when Sultan Selim I ate a dish of eggplant and lamb and
asked: ‘What gentle hand made this?’ Hopefully the answer was a good chef named Ali.
While I have adapted many of the regional recipes in this book to modern forms, this one is exactly
as I first consumed it in Gaziantep. It won us the ‘Best in Taste’ award at the Taste of Sydney festival
in 2012. Thanks, Ali.

SERVES 4

1 red capsicum (pepper)

700 g (1 lb 9 oz) lamb (at least 25 per cent fat), coarsely minced (ground)
1 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon paprika
1 tablespoon chilli flakes
500 g (1 lb 2 oz/2 cups) plain yoğurt
4 large eggplants (aubergines)
juice of 1 lemon
4 garlic cloves
2 teaspoons salt
75 g (22/3 oz) butter

CHI LLI AND CAPSI CUM BUTTER

75 g (22/3 oz) butter
1 red capsicum (pepper), chopped
50 g (1¾ oz) chilli flakes

1 piece pita bread, for holding the skewer

Cut the capsicum in half and remove the stalk and seeds. Chop into quarters and pulse in a blender
until finely minced. Transfer the capsicum to a mixing bowl and add the lamb, salt, paprika and chilli
flakes. Knead the mixture for 5 minutes with wet hands to make a smooth paste. Cover the bowl with
plastic wrap, transfer to the fridge and leave to marinate overnight.
Place the yoğurt on a sheet of muslin (cheesecloth) and tie up the corners. Hang the muslin over a pot
overnight to allow the yoğurt to thicken.

In the morning, take the meat mixture out of the fridge and divide it into four balls, each about 180 g
(6½ oz). Wrap the meat around four flat metal skewers (ideally 2 cm/¾ in thick). Squash each ball
around the skewer, pressing the mixture so it spreads 5 cm (2 in) from the top to 10 cm (4 in) from the
bottom. Once all four skewers are firmly covered, put them back in the fridge for at east 1 hour.

If you’re using a charcoal grill, you should light it 1 hour before you want to cook. Burn the charcoal
for at least 45 minutes and when the flames have died down, and the coals are glowing with a
covering of white ash, the barbecue is ready. (If you’re using a gas barbecue, turn it onto medium heat
about 5 minutes before you’re ready to cook.)

Char the eggplants on an open flame until the skin is blackened. When they are cool, scoop out the
flesh and put the pieces in a colander for 10 minutes to lose some of their water. Drizzle on the lemon
juice to help them retain their colour.

Roughly chop the eggplant into a chunky purée. Crush the garlic with 1 teaspoon of the salt. Mix the
strained yoğurt with the crushed garlic. Set aside.

To make the chilli and capsicum butter, melt the butter in a frying pan over low heat. Add the
capsicum and chilli flakes. Cook for 2 minutes. Set aside.

Melt the butter in a frying pan. Add the chopped eggplants and the remaining salt. Heat the mixture for
1 minute then divide onto four plates. Spread the garlic yoğurt over the eggplant.

Put the kebaps on the charcoal grill or barbecue. Cook for 2 minutes, until the meat on one side has
seared, then turn over and cook the other side for 2 minutes. Turn again, and cook for 2 minutes on
each side. The fat will drip on the charcoal and burn, but that smoke adds to the flavour. Constantly
check to see if the meat is at risk of falling off the skewer, and if so, turn it over.

Use the piece of pita bread as a mitten to grip the meat and pull it off the skewer. Cut the meat from
each skewer into three and place the three pieces on the yoğurt. Pour the chilli and capsicum butter
into a jug (pitcher) for people to help themselves and serve immediately.
AFTERNOON TEA
If you’ve a sweet tooth like the average Turk, these are the signs you’ll be looking for
as you wander through the streets of any Turkish town. A tatlıcı will sell you helva,
Turkish delight and ice creams; a şekerci will sell confectionery; a muhallebici will sell
milky puddings; and a pastane will sell pastries (often including baklava, but if you’re
a connoisseur of the prince of pastries, you should look for a baklavacı, which serves
nothing else). And at street stalls in Tarsus, on the Mediterranean coast, you’ll find the
iced rosewater pudding called bici bici (pronounced ‘beegee beegee’).

A Turk would drink tea with any of those desserts, but if you insist on coffee, you should look for a
sign saying ‘Café’, which will offer a European mix of snacks. If you see the older word Kahve,
you’ll encounter a hole in the wall where men play cards and backgammon.
As you’ll gather, Turks have a sugary treat for every occasion. For example, on the tenth day of the
month of Muharram in the Islamic calendar, they share a desert called aşure, which has up to forty-
one ingredients, supposedly based on the dried fruits, nuts and pulses that Noah had in the cupboard
when his ark finally settled on dry land. In Ottoman times, the fifteenth day of the month of Ramadan
was associated with the gift of baklava to the janissaries—the soldiers of the sultan in the Topkapı
Place. They were kept from staging military coups for two centuries by their annual sweet crunchy
bonus.
There’s even a pastry called kerhane tatlısı, which translates as ‘brothel sweet’ because it is sold
outside houses of ill repute. If you buy one of these syrupy pretzels, the street seller won’t wish you
the usual Afiyet olsun (bon appétit) but rather Beline kuvvet (power to your back).
Sweet treats are more usually associated with the other end of the morality spectrum. In my
parents’ day, it was customary for a young man, seeking to get to know a young woman, to ask
nervously: ‘Would you like to meet me in the pudding shop?’ The couple might bond over a sütlaç
(rice pudding) and a house-made lemonade before he asked his mother to ask her mother if a marriage
might be possible. Then the families would meet over pastries and Turkish delight. With tea, of
course.
For 500 years, the Ottoman sultans were mad for rice puddings but their chefs showed off by
inventing micro-thin filo pastry and forty-layer baklava some time in the late fifteenth century. In the
nineteenth century, the fad for cakes spread from the palace to the people as French pâtissiers arrived
in Istanbul to serve the tourist trade from Europe.
Lokum (Turkish delight) is a vital element in Turkish hospitality, surrounded by rituals. You never
eat it before midday, and it’s better with coffee than with tea. And you should never arrive at
somebody’s house without a package of it to conclude an afternoon.
A sacred site for pastry lovers is the Markiz Pastanesi in the Istanbul suburb of Beyoglu—not for
the pizzas and kebaps it serves nowadays, but because it started life in the 1880s as Café Lebon, a
magnificent art-nouveau salon where the former chef of the French Embassy served crunchy creamy
confections to passengers from the Orient Express. His slogan was ‘Chez Lebon, tout est bon’.
In the early twentieth century, Albanian patissiers took over from the French, opening Inci
(specialising in profiteroles); Sariyer Muhallebicisi (specialising in sütlaç, aşure, and keşkül); and
Baylan in my suburb of Kadıköy (the first pudding shop I visited as a child—specialising in ice
cream with caramel and bitter almonds).
Outside of Istanbul, certain regions are identified with certain desserts. The western town of Afyon
is the place to go for kaymak (clotted cream). For the crunchy cheesy pastry künefe, you’d go south to
Antakya (formerly Antioch). For dondurma (stretchy ice cream), you’d move east to Kahraman
Maraş.
Or you could stay in your own kitchen and make this chapter your journey through the sweet history
of Anatolia.
Contrary to popular belief, Turks drink more tea than cofee—7.5 kilos per person a year—especially if they’re retired gents meeting in
the local kahve.
ASTARLI SÜTLAÇ
SAFFRON-LAYERED RICE PUDDING

This layered dessert is a speciality of the southeastern city of Gaziantep (best known for baklava). In
the Turkish name, the word sütlaç (pronounced ‘sutlatch’) means ‘milky rice pudding’ and the word
astarlı means ‘the lining of a jacket’.
Saffron—either home-grown or imported from Persia—was an important ingredient in Ottoman
cuisine, because it allowed the sultans to show off their wealth. Pretentious people got into the habit
of leaving the saffron threads in the pudding so their guests could say: ‘Wow, that must have cost a
bit!’ There’s actually no reason to leave the threads in, since all the flavour and colour you need is
extracted by the warm water within 20 minutes.
I like to decorate my astarlı sütlaç with candied chickpeas, which you should be able to find in
Middle Eastern food shops. But the dessert works perfectly well without them.

SERVES 4

RI CE PUDDI NG
100 g (3½ oz/½ cup) rice
1 piece mastic crystal (less than 1 g/1/25 oz)
1 tablespoon sugar
750 ml (26 fl oz/3 cups) milk
2 tablespoons rice flour
pinch of salt

SAFFRO N TO PPI NG
5 saffron threads
1 drop geranium oil (or rose water)
1 tablespoon currants
1 tablespoon pine nuts
50 g (1¾ oz/¼ cup) rice
110 g (3¾ oz/½ cup) sugar
1 tablespoon rice flour

DECO RATI O N ( O PTI O NAL)

20 candied or roasted chickpeas
4 tablespoons pomegranate seeds

Wash the rice in cold running water to remove the excess starch. Transfer to a saucepan, add 100 ml
(3½ fl oz) of water, bring to the boil and simmer for 10 minutes. The rice will absorb most of the
water.

Crush the mastic crystal into a powder, using a mortar and pestle or the handle of a knife, and then
combine with the sugar. Heat the milk, mastic mixture and strained rice in a saucepan over medium
heat, and bring to the boil. Combine the rice flour with 125 ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) of the boiling milk
mixture and then add to the pan. Add the salt and simmer for 10 minutes, stirring constantly, to
thicken. Remove the pan from the heat and leave to cool for 5 minutes, then divide the rice pudding
equally between four 250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) glasses. Leave to cool completely at room temperature
and then transfer to the fridge and chill for 30 minutes.

Next, make the topping. Put the saffron threads in a bowl and cover with 60 ml (2 fl oz/¼ cup) of
warm water. Stir in the geranium oil and then leave to rest for 20 minutes. Discard the saffron threads
and set aside.

Cover the currants in warm water, leave for 10 minutes and then strain. Toast the pine nuts in a frying
pan over medium heat for 2 minutes, shaking the pan constantly to evenly brown.

Rinse the rice in cold running water to remove the excess starch. Transfer to a saucepan and add 125
ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) of water. Bring to the boil and simmer for 10 minutes. Add another 375 ml (13 fl
oz/1½ cups) of water and half the sugar, and continue to simmer for 3 minutes, stirring constantly.
Combine 125 ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) of the cooking liquid with the rice flour in a bowl. Discard the
remaining rice mixture, and then pour the rice flour mixture into the pan. Add the remaining sugar and
cook for a further 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add the saffron-infused liquid and simmer for a
further 5 minutes until it starts to thicken. Add the currants and pine nuts, remove from the heat and
leave to cool.

Remove the rice puddings from the fridge, cover with saffron topping and then refrigerate again for 1
hour.

Decorate the chilled astarlı sütlaç with the chickpeas and pomegranate seeds, and serve.
YALANCI KAZANDİBİ
‘TRICKSTER’S POTSTICKER’(BURNT MILK
AND MASTIC PUDDING)

In the Turkish title, the word kazandibi means ‘bottom of the pan’, which I’ve loosely translated as
‘potsticker’. Yalancı (pronounced ‘yalanjuh’) means a liar or trickster—the kind of person who’d
promise a pudding that is usually made with chicken breast, but who’d then leave out the chicken
breast. In other words, me and most of the pudding shops in modern Istanbul.
The very last recipe in this book is a variant of that classic chicken breast pudding (called Tavuk
göğsü). In Turkey, it was customary to scrape up the bits left at the bottom of the pan after the chicken
breast pudding had been served, fold them over neatly, caramelise the outside, and present them as a
new dessert called ‘bottom of the pan’. Nowadays, cooks usually leave out the chicken breast. I’ve
followed the modern style because I wanted a dish suitable for vegetarians—or maybe just because
I’m a trickster.

SERVES 8

1 piece mastic crystal (less than 1 g/1/25 oz)

150 g (5½ oz) sugar
1 litre (35 fl oz/4 cups) milk
2 tablespoons rice flour
70 g (2½ oz) arrowroot powder
2 tablespoons butter, melted
100 g (3½ oz) icing (confectioners’) sugar
1 tablespoon ground cinnamon

Crush the mastic crystal into a powder, using a mortar and pestle or the handle of a knife, and then
mix with the sugar. Heat the milk and mastic mixture in a saucepan over medium heat. Meanwhile,
add the rice flour and arrowroot to 250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) of water and stir to combine. Pour the
arrowroot mixture into the milk and bring to the boil, then reduce to a simmer and cook, whisking
constantly, for 5 minutes.

Brush a 30 x 40 x 4 cm (12 x 16 x 1½ in) baking tray with the melted butter. Sprinkle the icing sugar
evenly over the tray. Place the tray over medium heat on the cook top and gently shake so that the
sugar caramelises evenly but does not burn. Pour the milk mixture over the caramelised sugar.
Remove the tray from the heat and tap it on a solid surface to make the pudding settle evenly. Put the
pudding back over the heat and gently shake so that the mixture cooks evenly. Once all corners of the
pudding have started to brown and the pudding starts to bubble, take the tray off the heat and sit it in a
larger tray of iced water. Leave to cool to room temperature and then place the pudding tray in the
fridge for 1 hour to chill.

Remove the pudding from the fridge and cut it into six slices (once lengthways and twice across).
Fold each strip of pudding over to expose the burnt underside. Push a plastic spatula under one end
and roll about a third of the strip over the top. Repeat with the remaining strips.

Dust each snail with cinnamon and serve at room temperature.

ELMA ÇAYI
APPLE AND CINNAMON TEA

A cheap version of apple tea—over-sweetened and made with crystals instead of real fruit—is
served to tourists in Istanbul’s grand bazaar by carpet sellers who think it will help seduce visitors
into paying twice as much as a carpet is worth. If you’re not a good negotiator, it could be the most
expensive tea you ever drink.
The first time I had apple tea was from a Turkish family in Australia—because the carpet sellers
never saw any reason to serve it to me in Istanbul. I’ve been trying to perfect it ever since. You can
use all the parts of the apple you would normally throw away, and the peppercorns, cloves and star
anise add intriguing complexity. Genuine apple tea, with no hidden agenda, is the ideal
accompaniment for the three little treats coming up next.

SERVES 4

2 apples
2 slices lemon
2 cinnamon sticks
2 black peppercorns
1 star anise
4 cloves
3 tablespoons honey, to taste

Preheat the oven to 100°C (200°F/Gas ½).

Thinly slice the apples across the core, place on a baking tray and bake for 1 hour until they are dried
and browned.

Put the baked apple, lemon, cinnamon, black peppercorns, star anise and cloves in a saucepan with 1
litre (35 fl oz/4 cups) of water over low heat. Bring to the boil and simmer for 15 minutes, and then
strain the tea into a teapot, gently pressing the apples. Sweeten with honey, then pour into tea glasses
and serve.
ÇİKOLATALI HURMA
CHOCOLATE DATES

Purists would say this is not a very Turkish dish, since dates tend to come from Arab countries further
to the south and east, and chocolate is a rare ingredient in our desserts (disappointing for a
chocoholic like me). But we certainly use almonds and pistachios, so I’ve included them to appease
the nationalists. Çikolatalı hurma has the great advantage of being easy to make with just a few
minutes’ notice—assuming your pantry is equipped with the right balance of Turkish and Arabic
pleasures.

MAKES 16

16 dates (preferably medjool)

150 g (5½ oz/1 cup) slivered almonds
150 g (5½ oz) bitter chocolate (70 per cent cocoa)
70 g (2½ oz/½ cup) ground pistachios

Slit each date and remove the pit. Stuff the cavity with slivered almonds.

Bring 750 ml (26 fl oz/3 cups) of water to the boil in a large saucepan. Reduce the heat to a simmer
and place a small metal mixing bowl over the pan, making sure it covers the sides like a lid but does
not touch the water below. Line a baking tray with baking paper and set aside. Break the chocolate
into small pieces and gradually add to the bowl, stirring constantly so that the chocolate melts but
doesn’t separate. Using tongs or a slotted spoon, place the dates, one at a time, in the hot melted
chocolate and coat completely. Remove the chocolate-coated dates, place them on the prepared tray,
and leave to cool slightly.

Put the pistachios in a small bowl. Dip the still-warm dates in the nuts to half cover, and then transfer
to a clean tray. Put the tray in the fridge for 30 minutes for the chocolate to set, and then serve.
BADEM EZMESİ
BEBEK ALMOND TRUFFLES

Bebek, on the European side of the Bosphorus, is Istanbul’s most expensive suburb, lined with
elegant restaurants and bars that will charge you $25 for a cocktail.
That was where I came across almond truffles, served in wooden boxes emblazoned with the
golden logo of a shop called Meşhur Bebek Badem Ezmesi (Famous Bebek Almond Paste). It opened
in 1904 and it sells only almond confectionery. If you make my version, you’ll save a fortune—even
when you include the orange blossom water and hazelnut liqueur.

MAKES ABOUT 10

50 g (1¾ oz) sugar

4 drops lemon juice
½ teaspoon orange blossom water
150 g (5½ oz/1 cup) blanched almonds
1 tablespoon Frangelico (or hazelnut liqueur)
50 g (1¾ oz) dark cocoa powder

Bring 50 ml (12/3 fl oz) of water to the boil over high heat. Add the sugar and stir to dissolve. Reduce
the heat to a simmer, then add the lemon juice and the orange blossom water. Put the almonds in a
mixing bowl and gradually add the syrup, in four batches, pounding the mixture with a wooden spoon
each time. Add the Frangelico and then knead the mixture for 5 minutes until a smooth paste forms.
Roll the almond truffles into about ten walnut-sized balls, coat with cocoa powder and serve.
In Mersin market (southeastern Anatolia), this stall specialises in every kind of confectionery—fruit candies, nougat, dried fruits, dried
molasses stuffed with nuts, and lokum (Turkish delight).
CEZERYE
MERSİN CARROT AND COCONUT BALLS

Every city in Turkey makes a sweet they claim is ‘a natural Viagra’. Cezerye (pronounced ‘jez-air-
yeh’) is the natural Viagra of Mersin on the southeast coast. It was once the ancient Greek city of
Zephyrion, and now it’s Turkey’s largest port.
I have no evidence to support the alleged aphrodisiac value of carrots, but you could say that this is
one of the healthier deserts you can consume from the region of excessive sugar and butter. I confess I
have added turmeric mainly for visual impact, because carrots outside of Turkey have a less vivid
colour—and presumably less potency.

MAKES ABOUT 20

75 g (22/3 oz/½ cup) hazelnuts

4 carrots
1 teaspoon honey
1 tablespoon cornflour (cornstarch)
110 g (3¾ oz/½ cup) sugar
4 cloves
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
½ teaspoon allspice
½ teaspoon ground ginger
½ teaspoon turmeric
30 g (1 oz/½ cup) flaked coconut

Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F/Gas 4).

Place the hazelnuts on a baking tray and bake for 5 minutes. Remove the tray and set aside to cool,
then rub off the skins using your fingertips. Put the nuts in a food processor and coarsely grind.

Put the carrots and 250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) of water in a saucepan over high heat and boil for 10
minutes. Put 2 tablespoons of the boiling water in a bowl with the honey and cornflour and stir to
combine.

Strain the carrots and then transfer to a blender. Add the sugar and blend into a purée. Put the carrot
purée back in the pan over low heat and stir in the spices. Add the honey and cornflour mixture and
then simmer for 10 minutes, stirring constantly. Remove the pan from the heat and discard the cloves.
Add the hazelnuts and then leave to cool to room temperature.
Using a teaspoon, shape the mixture into small walnut-sized balls. It should make about twenty balls.
Spread the coconut flakes on a tray and then roll the balls in the coconut to evenly coat. Put the tray in
the fridge and leave until you are ready to serve.

Put the cezerye on a plate (with toothpicks, if you like, so that people don’t have to use their fingers)
and serve.
AŞURE
NOAH’S ARK PUDDING

This could well be the oldest pudding in the world. The Turkish name aşure means ‘ten’ because
you’re supposed to eat it on the tenth day of the first month of the Islamic calendar (which, being
lunar, changes every year). It’s staggering how many important events need to be remembered on that
date—Moses crossed the Red Sea; Abraham’s son Ishmael was born; Adam’s plea for forgiveness
was accepted by God; the prophet Jesus was born; and Noah’s ark landed on Mount Ararat as the
waters receded after the Great Flood.
It’s the last event that explains why the full version of this pudding has forty-one ingredients. To
celebrate his return to dry land after forty days on the water, Noah cooked up all the remaining
supplies in the ark—nuts, pulses and dried fruits, but definitely no animals—and shared the resulting
stew with everybody who had survived the flood. We’ve simplified Noah’s recipe, but the spirit of
generosity remains—you’re supposed to offer this dish to anybody who could smell it cooking.

SERVES 16

100 g (3½ oz/½ cup) white haricot beans

100 g (3½ oz/½ cup) dried chickpeas
3 cloves
150 g (5½ oz) dried figs
200 g (7 oz) dried apricots
100 g (3½ oz) currants
100 g (3½ oz) sultanas
100 g (3½ oz) hazelnuts
50 g (1¾ oz/1/3 cup) blanched almonds
100 g (3½ oz) walnuts
350 g (12 oz/2 cups) pearl barley
880 g (1 lb 15 oz/4 cups) sugar
1 tablespoon cornflour (cornstarch)
250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) milk
1 tablespoon honey
zest of 1 orange

DECO RATI O N
2 tablespoons cinnamon
4 tablespoons toasted sesame seeds
80 g (2¾ oz) walnuts, coarsely ground
80 g (2¾ oz) hazelnuts, coarsely ground
140 g (5 oz/1 cup) pistachios, coarsely ground
75 g (75 g (22/3 oz/½ cup) dried apricots, finely chopped
200 g (7 oz) pomegranate seeds
zest of 2 oranges

Soak the white haricot beans and chickpeas in water overnight, in separate bowls. Strain and rinse
under cold running water and then place the beans and chickpeas, together, in a saucepan. Cover with
water, bring to the boil over medium heat, then boil for 40 minutes until they are soft.

Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F/Gas 4).

Crack the cloves with a wooden spoon and soak in warm water for 1 hour. Finely chop the dried figs
and apricots, and then place in a bowl with the currants and sultanas. Cover with lukewarm water and
leave to soak for 30 minutes.

Place the hazelnuts on a baking tray and bake for 5 minutes. Remove the tray and set aside to cool,
then rub off the skins using your fingertips. Halve the hazelnuts. Halve the almonds. Put the walnuts in
a food processor and coarsely grind.

Wash the barley in cold running water to remove the excess starch. Half fill a saucepan with water
and bring to the boil over high heat. Add the barley and cook for 10 minutes. Strain the barley, half
fill the pan with fresh water and boil the barley again for 10 minutes. Strain the barley a third time,
add to the pan with 1.5 litres (52 fl oz/6 cups) of water and boil for a further 40 minutes. Add the
strained chickpeas and beans and continue to boil for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add the
almonds and hazelnuts. Reduce the heat to a simmer and cook for 5 minutes, stirring slowly.

Next, add the strained dried apricots, sultanas, currants, figs and sugar. Dilute the cornflour in the
milk, then add to the cooking mixture. Simmer for 3 minutes, stirring constantly. Add the strained
cloves, honey and orange zest. Simmer for another 7 minutes until the mixture starts to thicken.

Divide the pudding into each serving bowl and then refrigerate for at least 2 hours.

Decorate the top of the pudding with cinnamon, sesame seeds, walnuts, hazelnuts, pistachios, chopped
dried apricots, pomegranate seeds and orange zest, and serve.

NOTE
Aşure will serve four people over four meals, and can be stored in the fridge for a week.
The cradle of civilisation, just north of the Garden of Eden, the Euphrates River in southeastern Anatolia, and the sunken city of Halfeti.
BİCİ BİCİ
STRAWBERRY AND ROSE SNOW CONE

It’s traditional to sprinkle rosewater on the hands of mourners at the wakes that take place forty days
after burials in Turkey. For that reason, many Turks associate the smell of rosewater with mourning.
In the Mediterranean town of Tarsus, near the Toros mountains, they associate rosewater with an iced
treat that is sold from carts in the streets. There, for five months of the year, the bici bici hawkers
would head up the hill and fill their carts with snow. Then they’d race back down, and for a lira coin
you’d get a generous scoop of pudding and snow spread on a plate and soaked with a sweet syrup
made from the petals of roses or pink tulips. Nowadays, bici bici is sold from refrigerated trucks all
year round.

SERVES 4

RO SE SYRUP
1 organic pink rose, about 20 petals (or non-organic rose petals thoroughly washed)
2 teaspoons citric acid
100 ml (3½ fl oz) grenadine (or raspberry cordial)

CANDI ED RO SE PETALS
1 organic pink rose, about 20 petals (or non-organic rose petals thoroughly washed)
2 egg whites
60 g (2¼ oz/½ cup) icing (confectioners’) sugar

PUDDI NG
60 g (2¼ oz/½ cup) cornflour (cornstarch)

TO PPI NG
150 g (5½ oz/1 cup) strawberries
100 g (3½ oz) icing (confectioners’) sugar

DECO RATI O N
2 tablespoons icing (confectioners’) sugar

You could use a commercial rose syrup with this dish, but if you want to make your own, remove the
petals from the pink rose and wash thoroughly. Sprinkle on the citric acid and place in a jar. Cover
the petals with 200 ml (7 fl oz) of water, seal the jar tightly, and then rest in a sunny spot for 3 days.

Mix the grenadine with 125 ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) of the homemade rosewater. Now you have the rose
syrup—you need 50 ml (12/3 fl oz) for the granita, 50 ml (12/3 fl oz) for the pudding, and 100 ml (3½ fl
oz) for the topping. Discard the petals. The remaining rosewater will keep in the fridge for 3 months,
and you can sprinkle it on other puddings—or use it at wakes.

Now make the granita. Mix 250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) of water with 50 ml (12/3 fl oz) of the rose syrup in
a small bowl, and then place in the freezer for 15 minutes. Remove the bowl and use a fork to break
up any ice that has formed. Put the bowl back in the freezer and repeat the process three more times
over the course of about 1 hour, to stop the granita from setting into a solid block. Once the granita
has crystallised into pink ice fragments, freeze again for 2 hours.

Next, candy the rose petals. Cut the white parts off the petals. Lightly whisk the egg whites for 1
minute to make a smooth liquid. Brush each petal on both sides with egg white. Sprinkle both sides
with the icing sugar.

Preheat the oven to 100°C (200°F/Gas ½).

Line a tray with baking paper. Place the petals on the tray and heat for 2 hours, with the oven door
ajar. Remove the dried petals from the oven and leave to cool for 15 minutes.

Bring 625 ml (21½ fl oz/2½ cups) of water to the boil over medium heat. As it is heating, add the
cornflour and whisk vigorously to combine. Continue to stir slowly for about 5 minutes, until the
mixture thickens to a pudding-like consistency.

Put the remaining 150 ml (5 fl oz) of rose syrup into a squeeze bottle and squeeze about 50 ml (12/3 fl
oz) into swirls over the pudding. Line a dinner plate with baking paper and pour the pudding onto it,
then refrigerate for 1 hour to set. Remove the pudding from the fridge, lift the pudding off the paper
and cut into 2 cm (¾ in) cubes.

Wash the strawberries, cut off the stems and slice into quarters. Pat dry with paper towel and then
sprinkle with the icing sugar.

Using four serving dishes, half-fill each dish with spoonfuls of the pudding. Add the sugared
strawberries to the top of each pudding and then cover with granita. Shape the granita into a cone and
decorate the base with five or six candied rose petals.

Sprinkle the icing sugar on top of each mound, to resemble a snowy peak, and then splash a little
more rose syrup from the squeeze bottle around the granita for added colour, if you like. Serve
immediately.
ÇATAL
FORK BISCUITS

The word çatal (pronounced ‘chatal’) means ‘fork’, and I can only imagine these savoury biscuits got
their name because somebody thought they looked like a two-pronged fork joined together at the top
(though if you ask me, they look more like spoons). You are supposed to eat them with your fingers,
not with a fork.
The secret ingredient here is a spice powder called mahlep, made from the seeds of the St Lucie
cherry. Its flavour is between bitter almond and cherry. I’m suggesting you roll these biscuits in
sesame and nigella seeds. That’s mostly for visual impact, but also because they add complexity to
the flavour and texture.

MAKES 4

1 egg
100 g (3½ oz) butter
50 ml (12/3 fl oz) olive oil, plus extra for greasing
50 g (1¾ oz) plain yoğurt
300 g (10½ oz/2 cups) plain (all-purpose) flour, plus extra for dusting
1 teaspoon mahlep powder (ground white cherry pits)
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons nigella seeds
2 teaspoons white sesame seeds

Separate the egg white and yolk. Set aside the yolk. Gently melt the butter in a frying pan (or
microwave for 30 seconds). Put the egg white in a bowl, add the olive oil, yoğurt and melted butter
and whisk to combine.

Sift the flour into a mixing bowl, make a well in the middle and add the mahlep, baking powder, egg
white mixture and salt. Knead the dough for 10 minutes, until smooth. Cover the bowl with a damp
cloth and rest for 15 minutes.

Preheat the oven to 170°C (325°F/Gas 3).

Divide the dough into eight balls. Place a ball of dough on a floured work surface and, with floured
hands, roll into 20 x 1 cm (8 x ½ in) lengths. Repeat with the remaining dough.

Set two pieces of the dough side by side and curve them towards each other like brackets. Join them
together at each end to form an oval shape, and twist the tips to make sure they stay together. Repeat
with the remaining dough to make four çatals. Brush the top of the dough with egg yolk and sprinkle
with nigella and sesame seeds.

Line a baking tray with baking paper and brush with oil. Put the ovals on the baking paper and cook
for 25 minutes or until golden brown. Remove çatals from the oven and rest for 10 minutes. Serve
warm.
KAVALA KURABİYESİ
KAVALA COOKIES

Kavala is a town in Greece, not far from the border of Turkey. I wanted to include what Turks call
Kavala cookies in honour of one of my food idols—the Sydney chef Janni Kyritsis, whose
grandparents were expelled from Turkey in the 1920s as part of a government policy of
monoculturalism. They ended up living in Kavala (just as my grandparents were expelled from
Greece and ended up living in the Turkish town of Mürefte, where Janni’s parents had started). But
when I asked Janni if he was familiar with Kavala cookies, he looked blank. The people of Kavala, it
seems, just call them almond cookies, and are unaware of their city’s fame throughout my country.

MAKES ABOUT 16

300 g (10½ oz/2 cups) plain (all-purpose) flour, plus extra for dusting
150 g (5½ oz/1½ cups) almond meal
150 g (5½ oz) butter
150 g (5½ oz) icing (confectioners’) sugar
1 vanilla bean
1 tablespoon baking powder
2 eggs
50 g (1¾ oz/½ cup) coarsely ground almonds
1 tablespoon vegetable oil, for greasing

Mix the flour and almond meal together in a non-stick frying pan over low heat for 3 minutes until it
begins to bake, then remove from the heat and set aside.

Gently melt the butter in a frying pan (or microwave for 30 seconds). Pour the melted butter in a bowl
and add 50 g (1¾ oz) of the icing sugar. Slice the vanilla bean and scrape the seeds into the butter
mixture. Add the baking powder and eggs, and whisk to combine. Put the flour and almond mixture in
a separate bowl. Make a well in the middle and pour in the butter and egg mixture. Knead for 5
minutes to make a soft dough. (If it seems too moist, add a little more flour.) Add the ground almonds
and knead for 5 minutes more until it forms a coarse paste. Cover the bowl with a damp cloth and rest
for 15 minutes.

Preheat the oven to 170°C (325°F/Gas 3).

Place the dough on a floured work surface and roll out the dough, using a rolling pin, into a sheet
about 30 cm (12 in) wide and 1 cm (½ in) thick. Use the rim of a glass to cut the sheet into rounds,
then slice each round in half to make sixteen half moons. (For a traditional shape, push the straight
edge of the half moon inwards to create a crescent.)

Line a baking tray with baking paper and brush with vegetable oil. Add the half moons and bake for
25 minutes or until golden. Remove the tray from the oven and leave to cool for 10 minutes, then
sprinkle generously with the remaining icing sugar and serve.
 WHERE THE BEST BAKLAVA BEGINS

Undoubtedly, Anatolian cooks were playing around with dough, butter and beet-sugar long before the
Ottoman Empire. The Romans in Constantinople and the Greeks in Byzantion loved their sweet
pastries. But the ingredient that was added by the chefs in the Topkapı Palace in the fifteenth century
was showmanship. They wanted their audience (the sultan, his family, his advisers and occasionally
his bodyguards) to exclaim, ‘My god, how can he roll out his filo so thin?’ and ‘My god, how does he
have the patience to create forty layers, and still get it so light?’ Nowadays, those questions are asked
every day by the customers at İmam Çağdaş, the best baklava maker in Gaziantep, which is the best
baklava town in Turkey.
Until I was twenty, I thought I was eating great baklava in Istanbul. Then the grandfather of one of
my student friends arrived at our shared house with a beautifully wrapped box he’d bought in
southeastern Turkey. As I tasted the contents, Şakir Dede, the grandfather, explained that the baklava
at İmam Çağdaş was designed to satisfy the five senses:
1. The Look: High-domed with a golden top and glimpses of the fluorescent green of pistachio nuts;
2. The Smell: The richness of the butter and a hint of caramel and wood smoke from the baking;
3. The Touch: The syrup and butter should be so well absorbed that instead of being soggy the filo is
crisp enough to crumble under your finger;
4. The Sound: You should hear ‘the tune of the crunch’ when you bite; and of course
5. The Taste.

I had to make the pilgrimage to Gaziantep where I met Telat Çağdaş and his son Burhan. Telat is the
grandson of Hacı Hüseyin, who opened a bakery in Gaziantep in 1887 and began the legend. Telat
spends all day in a fog of flour, supervising the thirty men who knead, roll out, sprinkle, layer, soak,
bake and slice the precious product from 6 am to 3 pm every day.
While Telat runs the baklava factory upstairs, Burhan runs the 200-seat restaurant downstairs
(which also serves excellent kebaps). Burhan’s son, Telat Jr, looks after the cash desk.
The youngest workers are the twelve-year-old apprentices who come in before and after school to
clean and carry, and bring cups of tea to the more senior workers. They can expect to rise, every two
years or so, through these ranks: caretaker of ingredients; dough maker; dough roller (with the thinnest
rolling pins in the world); baklava builder (layering with nuts and butter and sometimes clotted
cream); wood-fire oven baker; slicer and folder; and syrup master.
The current syrup master has been working with the Çağdaş family for thirty years, and started at
the age of twelve. Telat trusts him absolutely, but he still checks the syrup every day.
That perfectionism explains why the European Union has given the baklava of Gaziantep a
‘Protected Geographical Indication’ as a unique artisanal creation.
In Gaziantep, Telat Çağdaş and his grandson Telat Çağdaş Jr package their baklava to send all over the world.
The filo production room in Imam Çağdaş Baklava House, where the pastry is rolled so thin you can read a newspaper through it.
BAKLAVA
TRADITIONAL PISTACHIO BAKLAVA

The next three recipes are forms of baklava, which Turks rarely make at home. We hate to seem
defeatist, but honestly, you’re not going to be able to make your own filo pastry to anywhere near the
standard of a place like İmam Çağdaş —even if you possess a huge marble table, a long thin rolling
pin and the world’s strongest shoulders.
At İmam Çağdaş, they aim to roll out the pastry so thin you could read a newspaper through it, but
we don’t expect you to manage that (although if you insist on trying). For this recipe, just buy a couple
of chilled packs of filo. You’ll need at least forty-two sheets to make true baklava.
The recipe assumes your baking tray is what is known as a ‘quarter pan’, which is 33 cm long, 22
cm wide and 2 cm deep (13 × 8½ × ¾ in), so try to find filo of roughly those dimensions. If your tray
is a different size, however, just cut the filo to fit. The most important ingredient of baklava is
patience. Even with bought pastry, the recipe takes a long time—there are forty-two layers to butter,
place and sprinkle. But the process is satisfying, and it’s fun to get the kids to help.

SERVES 8

400 g (14 oz) ground pistachio kernels (preferably Turkish or Iranian, and definitely not salted)
500 g (1 lb 2 oz) ghee or clarified butter
375 g (13 oz) chilled filo pastry (at least 42 sheets)
500 g (1 lb 2 oz) caster (superfine) sugar
juice of ¼ lemon

Put the pistachios in a blender and blend into a coarse powder. Gently melt the ghee in a frying pan
(or microwave for 30 seconds).

Remove the top 12 layers of filo and place between two damp cloths, then set aside for the top of the
baklava. Divide the remaining filo into two equal stacks and place each stack between damp cloths.
Using a pastry brush, lightly brush the bottom and sides of a baking tray (traditionally 33 x 22 x 2
cm/13 x 8½ x ¾ in) with the warm ghee.

Place one filo sheet in the tray and lightly brush with ghee. Add two more layers, brushing with ghee
each time, and then lightly sprinkle 1 tablespoon of pistachios over the third filo layer. Reserve 2
tablespoons of pistachios to decorate the top. Repeat the process six more times, to make a 21-sheet
stack.

Top this layer with a thick, 5 mm (¼ in) layer of pistachios. Continue the layering process—three
sheets, then a light sprinkling of pistachios—four more times to make a 33-sheet stack. (Any broken
or offcut pieces of filo can be used to make the middle layer of any trio.) Take the remaining nine filo
layers and continue to stack, brushing between each sheet with ghee, but not adding pistachios.

Using a sharp knife, cut the baklava seven times lengthways and six times across to make forty-two
portions. (The Turkish style is square, but you can also make rectangular blocks.) Reheat the
remaining ghee and pour it between the cracks, and then set aside the pastry tray for 20 minutes to rest
and absorb the ghee.

Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F/Gas 4). Put the pastry in the oven and bake for about 30 minutes,
rotating the tray after 15 minutes to ensure even baking.

Meanwhile, make the sugar syrup. Heat 600 ml (21 fl oz) of cold water and the sugar in a saucepan
over medium heat. Add the lemon juice and bring to the boil, then reduce to a low simmer and cook
for about 20 minutes until the mixture becomes thick and syrupy, being careful not to let it caramelise.
Check the pastry regularly and remove it once the top is golden brown.

Carefully place the baklava tray over medium heat for 1 minute, moving the tray around to ensure the
base is evenly heated. Remove from the heat and pour the hot sugar syrup over the hot baklava. Leave
to rest for 1 hour to absorb the sugar. Decorate the top with the remaining pistachios and serve.

NOTE
Leftover baklava can be kept for 4 days. Don’t put it in the fridge, though, as this will ruin the texture.
SARIĞI BURMA
BLACK SEA ROLLED BAKLAVA

The name of this Ottoman recipe literally means ‘rolled turban’. In the sultan’s kitchen the cooks
would twist the pastry into a shape that resembled what they saw on the heads of the aristocrats
around them. We’re giving you a simpler version, but keeping the name.
We’ve already said Gaziantep has the greatest makers of baklava in Turkey and therefore the
world, but other parts of Turkey approach baklava in different ways. On the Black Sea they use
hazelnuts and their own butter, and they make the baklava into a roll shape. I’ve decided to use
walnuts instead of hazelnuts, because I’m not from the Black Sea.

MAKES 50 PIECES

500 g (1 lb 2 oz) plain (all-purpose) flour

3 eggs
100 ml (3½ fl oz) milk
100 ml (3½ fl oz) vegetable oil
3 tablespoons plain yoğurt
pinch of salt
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 tablespoon white vinegar
150 g (5½ oz) butter
100 g (3½ oz) potato flour
600 g (1 lb 5 oz) walnut kernels, roughly ground
500 g (1 lb 2 oz) sugar
juice of ¼ lemon

Sift the flour into a mixing bowl and make a well in the middle. In a separate bowl, whisk the eggs,
milk, vegetable oil, yoğurt, salt, baking powder, vinegar and 50 ml (12/3 fl oz) of water to combine.
Pour the egg mixture into the flour. Knead for 10 minutes to make a smooth dough, then cover the
bowl with a damp cloth and leave to rest for 15 minutes.

Melt the butter in a frying pan over high heat (or microwave for 30 seconds). Brush a baking tray with
a little of the melted butter.

Divide the dough into ten billiard-sized balls. Dust your work surface with the potato flour to prevent
sticking. Place a ball of dough on the work surface and flatten the dough using a thick rolling pin,
being careful not to let the dough stick. Roll the dough out as thin as possible, stretching it into a
square about 40 cm (16 in) wide, using your hands and the rolling pin. Brush the stretched dough with
butter and sprinkle with 50 g (1¾ oz) of walnuts.

Place a straightened wire coat hanger (or a very thin rolling pin at least 50 cm/20 in long) across the
dough sheet, on the edge nearest you, and roll the sheet into a tight cylinder around the wire. Push the
cylinder ends towards each other and squeeze into a crinkly concertina shape about 30 cm (12 in)
long. Lift it onto the prepared baking tray. Gently pull the wire out. Repeat with the nine remaining
balls of dough, tightly packing the concertinas into the tray. Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F/Gas 4).

Cut across the row of concertinas four times to divide each cylinder into five rolls, each about 6 cm
(2½ in) long. Reheat the remaining butter and then pour it over the pastry and between the cracks. Set
aside the pastry tray for 10 minutes to rest and absorb the butter.

Bake for about 30 minutes, rotating the tray after 15 minutes to ensure even baking. Meanwhile, make
the sugar syrup. Heat 600 ml (21 fl oz) of cold water and the sugar in a saucepan over medium heat.
Add the lemon juice and bring to the boil, then reduce to a low simmer and cook for about 20 minutes
until the mixture becomes thick and syrupy, being careful not to let it caramelise. Check the pastry
regularly and remove it once the top is golden brown.

Carefully place the baking tray over medium heat for 1 minute, moving the tray around to ensure the
base is evenly heated. Remove from the heat and immediately pour the hot sugar syrup over the hot
pastry. Leave the sarığı burma to rest for 1 hour to absorb the sugar. Decorate the top with the
remaining walnuts and serve.
SÜTLÜ NURİYE
‘THE GENERAL’S COMMAND’ (HAZELNUT
AND MILK BAKLAVA)

When the last military coup happened in Turkey (in 1980) I was nine years old. One of the generals
who took control of the government decided to involve himself in the details of daily life. He thought
some baklava houses were overcharging, so he ordered all baklava houses to standardise their price.
One of the artisan baklava houses in Istanbul, Güllüoğlu, was not prepared to sacrifice quality for
the sake of meeting cost regulations, so they decided to create a new type of baklava, with cheaper
ingredients. They used hazelnuts instead of pistachios (which are three times the price). To make it a
little creamier and lighter, they used milk syrup instead of sugar syrup.
The price controls were lifted many years ago but the revolutionary pastry can still be found as an
option in the Güllüoğlu branch at Karaköy, the port across the water from Istanbul’s spice market.

SERVES 8

250 g (9 oz) ghee or clarified butter

300 g (10½ oz) sliced hazelnuts (or coarsely ground hazelnuts)*
375 g (13 oz) chilled filo pastry (at least 42 layers)
750 ml (26 fl oz/3 cups) milk
440 g (15½ oz/2 cups) sugar

Gently melt the ghee in a frying pan (or microwave for 30 seconds). Divide the sheets of filo into two
equal stacks and place each stack between two damp cloths.

Using a pastry brush, lightly brush the bottom and sides of a 40 x 30 x 4 cm (16 x 12 x 1½ in) baking
tray with a little of the warm ghee. Place the first filo sheet in the tray and lightly brush with ghee.
Add another layer of filo, brush with ghee and continue to layer with the rest of one stack. Repeat the
process until you have layered and buttered the first stack. (Any broken or offcut pieces of filo can be
used towards the bottom of the stack), and then cover with the hazelnuts, reserving 2 tablespoons of
nuts to decorate the top. Continue to layer and brush the pastry in the baking tray using the second
stack of filo.

Once all the pastry has been layered, cut the baklava using a sharp knife, five times lengthways and
seven times across to make thirty-five blocks. Reheat the remaining ghee and pour it between the
cracks, and then set aside the pastry tray for 20 minutes to rest and absorb the ghee.

Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F/Gas 4). Bake the pastry for about 30 minutes, rotating the tray after
15 minutes to ensure even baking.

Meanwhile, make the milk syrup. Heat the milk and sugar in a saucepan over very low heat for 8
minutes, stirring constantly, being careful not to boil the milk (keep the temperature around
75°C/165°F if you have a thermometer). Check the pastry regularly and remove it once the top is
golden brown.

Carefully place the baklava tray over medium heat for 1 minute, moving the tray around to ensure the
base is evenly heated. Turn off the heat and pour over the warm milk syrup. Leave to rest for 1 hour to
absorb the sugar. Decorate the top with the remaining hazelnuts and serve.

NOTE
Sliced hazelnuts are preferred for presentation, but if these are not available, use coarsely ground
hazelnuts instead. To make these, preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F/Gas 4) and then roast 300 g (10½
oz) whole hazelnuts for 5 minutes, remove from the oven, leave to cool and then rub the skins off with
your fingers. Finally, coarsely chop the nuts using a blender or food processor.
TULUMBA
OTTOMAN DONUTS

This snack, from the late Ottoman period, is soft inside and crunchy outside. Fried batter soaked in
syrup is a favourite in Greece and the Balkan countries. Or you might consider it similar to Spanish
churros or Egyptian balah el sham (Damascus dates). Tulumbas are particularly popular during the
fasting month of Ramadan, where they give a sugar and carbohydrate hit for people who haven’t eaten
all day.

MAKES ABOUT 20 DONUTS

LEMO N SYRUP
440 g (15½ oz/2 cups) sugar
juice of ¼ lemon

DO NUTS
50 g (1¾ oz) butter
pinch of salt
1 tablespoon sugar
300 g (10½ oz/2 cups) plain (all-purpose) flour
3 eggs
1 tablespoon semolina
1 tablespoon cornflour (cornstarch)
1 litre (35 fl oz/4 cups) vegetable oil

Make the lemon syrup first. Put 500 ml (17 fl oz/2 cups) of water and the sugar in a saucepan over
medium heat and bring to the boil. Add the lemon juice, lower the heat and continue to simmer for 10
minutes. Remove from the heat and pour the syrup into a deep bowl. Set aside.

In a separate saucepan, mix 500 ml (17 fl oz/2 cups) of water with the butter, salt and sugar, and bring
to the boil over medium heat. Add the flour and continue to boil for 3 minutes, stirring constantly, to
make a dough. Remove from the heat and stir to help it cool. Set aside.

Put the dough in a mixing bowl and stir in the eggs, one at a time, until combined. Knead for 3
minutes. Add the semolina and cornflour, and knead for a further 5 minutes to make a soft moist
dough, adding 1 tablespoon of water if it seems dry. Cover the bowl with a damp cloth and set aside
to rest for 15 minutes.

Push the dough into a piping bag with a star nozzle. Squeeze out a long line of dough and cut into 6 cm
(2½ in) chunks. Pour the vegetable oil into a deep heavy-based saucepan. Add the tulumbas and place
the pan over low heat. Once the oil starts bubbling, simmer for 5 minutes or until the donuts turn
golden brown. Remove the tulumbas with a slotted spoon and transfer into the bowl with the lemon
syrup. Leave to soak for 5 minutes, then remove from the syrup and serve.
KADAYIF DOLMA
APRICOT AND WALNUT DOLMAS

This traditional dish is from Erzurum, in eastern Anatolia, where they stuff it with walnuts. I’ve
reduced the amount of syrup and boosted the stuffing with apricots. It uses the crunchy ‘string’ pastry
called Kadayıf, which means there are interesting texture contrasts between the inside and the outside.

MAKES 20

SUGAR SYRUP
500 g (17 fl oz) sugar
¼ lemon

FI LLI NG
250 g (9 oz) chopped walnuts
50 g (1¾ oz) dried apricot, finely chopped

PASTRY
50 g (1¾ oz) butter
300 ml (10½ fl oz) milk
2 egg yolks
500 g (17 fl oz) chilled fresh kadayıf pastry
1 litre (35 fl oz/4 cups) vegetable oil

DECO RATI O N
2 tablespoons chopped walnuts

To make the syrup, put the sugar and 750 ml (26 fl oz/3 cups) of water in a saucepan over medium
heat and bring to the boil. Reduce the heat, squeeze the quarter lemon into the water, and throw in the
lemon skin. Simmer for 15 minutes and then remove the lemon skin and discard. Remove from the
heat and set aside to cool. (Do not refrigerate.)

Put the chopped walnuts and apricots in a bowl and mix together.

Gently melt the butter in a frying pan over low heat (or microwave for 30 seconds). Transfer to a
deep mixing bowl, add the milk and egg yolks and whisk to combine.

Loosen the pastry using your fingers and then roughly chop the strands. Using clean hands, take a
handful of pastry and press together between your palms to make a round. Still holding the round in
your palm, place 2 teaspoons of the walnut and apricot mixture in the middle and use your other hand
to fold over the sides of the pastry and roll up the ends, and then squeeze into a tight tube. Dip your
fist into the milk mixture, letting the pastry absorb some of the liquid through your fingers, pushing the
pastry back inside your fist as it slightly expands. Shake off the excess liquid and then set aside on
paper towel. Repeat with the remaining pastry to make about twenty rounds.

Heat the vegetable oil in a deep frying pan over high heat. Add a drop of water to the oil. If it sizzles
the oil is ready. Carefully add the dolmas, ten at a time, and then fry for 3 minutes until golden and
crunchy. Remove with a slotted spoon and transfer into the bowl with the syrup. Leave to soak for 2
minutes, then remove and serve, decorated with the chopped walnuts.

Murat Muhallebicisi (pudding shop) in Kadıköy, Istanbul, famous for pastries and milk puddings.
BOZA
BOZA ‘BEER’ WITH TOASTED CHICKPEAS

Boza is a sweet slightly fermented drink that originated in the Balkans in the ninth century and is now
associated with the suburbs of Istanbul. When I was a kid, I would look forward to hearing the cries
of the food sellers who would pass by our house in the afternoon. The one I enjoyed the most came
past at the end of a winter’s day as the sky was darkening. He would stretch out the cry as long as he
could: ‘Bohhhhh-zaaaaa’. You would bring him a bottle, and the boza man would fill it by turning a
tap in a big tank he carried on his back.
The street sellers are gone now. If you want to drink boza in Istanbul, you must go to the shop
known as Vefa, which opened in 1876 in a suburb called Vefa. Between October and April they sell
boza (and pickles). The rest of the year they sell grape sherbet, lemonade and ice cream. If it’s a quiet
day, they’ll show you the glass from which Kemal Atatürk drank Vefa boza the year before he died
(1937). Presumably he couldn’t hear the cry of the street seller from inside his palace.

SERVES 8

120 g (4¼ oz) fine dark bulgur

25 g (1 oz) rice
175 g (6 oz) sugar
20 g (¾ oz) dry yeast
95 g (3¼ oz/½ cup) dried chickpeas
1 tablespoon olive oil, for greasing
1 tablespoon ground cinnamon

Wash the bulgur and rice in cold running water to remove the excess starch. Put the grains in a
saucepan with 1 litre (35 fl oz/4 cups) of water over medium heat. Bring to the boil, reduce the heat,
and simmer for 30 minutes, stirring regularly. Strain the liquid into another pan, pressing on the grains
to extract as much juice as possible. Discard the boiled bulgur and rice. Put the pan over medium
heat, add the sugar and bring to the boil, then remove from the heat.

Dilute the yeast in 125 ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) of warm water. Set aside for 5 minutes. It should start to
form bubbles.

Slowly pour the yeast into the grain mixture, stirring constantly, then leave to cool to room
temperature, stirring occasionally. Cover with a lid between stirs. Once completely cool, transfer the
pan to a cool spot and leave to ferment for at least 24 hours. Every 6 hours or so, stir with a wooden
spoon. Meanwhile, prepare the chickpeas.
Strain and rinse the soaked chickpeas, place in a saucepan, cover with water and bring to the boil
over medium heat. Lower the heat and simmer for 30 minutes. Wash the cooked chickpeas and then
strain and pat dry with paper towel.

Preheat the oven to 200°C (400°F/Gas 6). Grease a baking tray with the olive oil, then add the
chickpeas and bake for 15 minutes. Remove the tray from the oven and gently shake it to roll the
chickpeas around. Return the tray to the oven and bake for a further 15 minutes. Remove the tray and
set aside to cool. Store the chickpeas in a covered container at room temperature until you are ready
to add them to the boza.

After 24 hours, check the boza. Depending on the season, the temperature and the humidity, it may
take up to 3 days for the drink to ferment. Once bubbles form on the top, it is ready.

Stir the boza with a metal spoon just before serving. Pour into four glasses, spoon the chickpeas over
the top (or on the side for people to add themselves), sprinkle each glass with cinnamon and serve.

NOTE
Stored in the fridge, boza will keep for about 3 days.
LİMONATA
BASIL LEMONADE

Lemonade has been a staple for decades in pudding shops all over Turkey, and when my mother was
young, the usual way to ask someone out on a date was to say: ‘Would you like to have a lemonade
together?’ Limonata is currently making a comeback in Istanbul’s coolest cafés. But do not confuse
limonata with some commercial fizzy drink. It must be made in-house with fresh lemon juice.
The secret to a good lemonade is to rub the lemon skin with sugar before grating it—this sharpens
the flavour. Normally we add fresh mint leaves, but I thought I’d twist the formula with a herb that is
more unusual in Turkey—basil.

SERVES 4

8 lemons
220 g (7¾ oz/1 cup) sugar
about 30 basil leaves

Grate the zest from the lemons into a bowl. Sprinkle in the sugar and knead for 5 minutes to make a
paste. Add 250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) of warm water and stir to dilute the paste.

Cut the lemons in half and squeeze out as much juice as you can. Transfer to a jug (pitcher) and set
aside. Put the squeezed halves in a bowl, cover with warm water and leave to soften for 1 hour.

Discard the soaking water. Wrap the lemon pulp in muslin (cheesecloth) and squeeze out any
remaining juice, then add to the jug. Add the sugared zest paste. Add 250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) of water
and 270 g (9½ oz/2 cups) of crushed ice. Finely chop half the basil leaves and stir through the
lemonade. Pour into glasses, top with a few whole basil leaves, and serve.
ŞEKERPARE
SEMOLINA DOMES

This is one I learned from my grandma, who would make vast quantities of şekerpare (which means
‘piece of sugar’ in old Turkish) and invite twelve or more people at a time to share it for afternoon
tea or dinner. I like it because semolina makes a lighter texture than you find in flour-based desserts.
It is vital to pour the syrup over the domes while they are hot, so there is maximum absorption, and
to leave plenty of space around each dome so they can expand—along with your waistline.

MAKES 20

½ lemon
550 g (1 lb 4 oz/2½ cups) sugar
125 g (4½ oz) butter
300 g (10½ oz/2 cups) plain (all-purpose) flour
95 g (3¼ oz/½ cup) fine semolina
1 egg
1 tablespoon baking powder
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
20 blanched almonds

First, make the syrup. Using a fine grater or a microplane, grate the lemon zest into a bowl and set
aside. Squeeze the lemon into a cup. Mix 440 g (15½ oz/2 cups) of the sugar and 625 ml (21½ fl
oz/2½ cups) of water in a saucepan over medium heat and bring to the boil. Add the lemon juice,
reduce the heat and simmer for a further 15 minutes. Remove from the heat and set aside to cool.

Gently melt the butter in a frying pan over low heat (or microwave for 30 seconds). Sift the flour into
a mixing bowl and add the semolina. Make a well in the middle and pour in the butter. Break in the
egg. Add the remaining sugar, then add the lemon zest and the baking powder. Knead for 5 minutes.
Cover the bowl with a damp cloth and set aside to rest for 15 minutes.

Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F/Gas 4).

Knead the dough again for 5 minutes, then divide into about twenty ping pong-sized balls. Brush the
oil onto a baking tray. Place the balls on the tray and push into a dome shape. Push an almond into the
top of each dome and then bake for 25 minutes.

Remove the şekerpare from the oven and pour the syrup over the top. Leave to cool for 15 minutes
before serving.
The lokum factory in Bodrum (on the Aegean coast) specialises in Turkish delight made with the juice of the local satsuma mandarins.
LOKUM
TURKISH DELIGHT

With most classic dishes, the precise origin story is lost in the mists of history. With Turkish delight
we can actually put a date on it. In the year 1777, a bunch of British businessmen visiting Istanbul
gave the name to a sticky sweet they discovered in the shop of a cook named Bekir. He was calling it
lokum, which was his abbreviation of an Arab phrase meaning ‘throat relaxant’.
He told them he had created it when the sultan put out the word to confectioners that he was looking
for a sweet that wouldn’t break his teeth. Bekir won the contest with lokum flavoured with rosewater,
and was appointed chef pâtissier in the kitchen of the Topkapı Palace. He then went on to open his
own shop in the Bahçekapı district, near the railway station where the Orient Express ended its
journey.
The British businessmen started selling Bekir’s product in their homeland, and his shop became a
place of pilgrimage for tourists from Europe. Confectioners all over Turkey (and Greece) started
copying his lokum, flavouring it with seasonal ingredients from their neighbourhood. A painting of a
turbaned Bekir feeding lokum to children (The Confectioner by Preziosi) now hangs in the Louvre,
and the original shop, beautifully restored, is classified as a protected site. The people behind the
counter will tell you lokum was the favourite sweet of Picasso, who said it helped his concentration.
I’ve attempted to reproduce the original recipe here, but to be honest, I’m not partial to rosewater
(like most Turks). You can add any flavouring you like. I sometimes replace the rosewater with mint
and cinnamon. A popular version replaces the almonds with twice-roasted pistachios. A friend of
mine in Bodrum does a great version with the juice from local satsuma mandarins. Guess what they
use in the Black Sea town of Safranbolu (the name means ‘plenty of saffron’).

MAKES ABOUT 75 PIECES

60 g (2¼ oz/½ cup) cornflour (cornstarch)

2 tablespoons rose water
600 g (1 lb 5 oz) caster (superfine) sugar
35 g (1¼ oz/¼ cup) slivered almonds
30 g (1 oz/¼ cup) icing (confectioners’) sugar

Put 30 g (1 oz/¼ cup) of the cornflour in a bowl with the rose water and 2 tablespoons of water, and
stir to combine. Put the caster sugar in a saucepan, add 500 ml (17 fl oz/2 cups) of water and bring to
the boil over medium heat, then reduce the heat and simmer for 5 minutes until it starts to thicken. Add
2 tablespoons of the hot sugar syrup to the cornflour mixture and mix thoroughly. Add the thickened
cornflour mixture to the pan. Add the slivered almonds and continue to cook, stirring constantly until
the mixture is runny enough to pour but thick enough to set. To check the consistency, spoon a drop of
the mixture into a glass of cold water. If it retracts into a ball, it is ready. (Or check using a
thermometer. It is ready when the temperature reaches 115°C/240°F.)

Line a quarter gastronorm tray (22 x 33 cm/8½ x 13 in) with muslin (cheesecloth). Sprinkle the
remaining cornflour evenly in the tray. Pour the mixture into the tray and then refrigerate for 1 hour to
set.

Remove the tray from the fridge and remove the gel block by lifting the edge of the muslin. Place the
block on a board, peel off the cloth and then slice into 3 cm (1¼ in) cubes using a sharp knife (or a
steel ruler). Separate the blocks slightly and then sprinkle half the icing sugar over the top. Put the
Turkish delight in an airtight container, and coat with the remaining icing sugar. Serve with Turkish
coffee.
TÜKENMEZ
THE NEVERENDING SHERBET

Tükenmez is a sustainable home version of the kind of sherbet you used to buy in the street from
hawkers with tanks on their backs—still seen occasionally in some parts of eastern Turkey. The street
sherbets were often made with tamarind or liquorice root, while the home version uses medlars. As
you’ll see in the ingredients list, I’ve suggested a variety of fruits that will contribute interesting notes
to the taste, but you can keep adding cores and skins of any hard fruits that take your fancy. To get
fermentation started, you need to keep the chickpeas in the water for at least five days. The liquid will
continue to ferment gently once the chickpeas are removed, and you can keep refreshing the drink with
water for three months. If it starts to taste like vinegar, use it as vinegar and make another batch.

SERVES MANY

1 red apple
1 granny smith (or sour green) apple
1 quince (or nashi pear)
1 pear
100 g (3½ oz) green grapes
200 g (7 oz) medlars (or loquats or firm red plums)
50 g (1¾ oz) dried or frozen sour cherries (or red grapes)
220 g (7¾ oz/1 cup) sugar
5 chickpeas

Quarter the apples, quince and pear without removing the seeds. Remove the stalks from the grapes.
Mix all the fruits, including the medlars and sour cherries together in a bowl.

Put the mixed fruit into a 2 litre (70 fl oz/8 cup) jug (pitcher) with a sealing lid and then add the sugar.
Wrap the chickpeas in muslin (cheesecloth) and add to the jug. Fill the jug with 1 litre (35 fl oz/4
cups) of water, up to the brim. Seal tightly and then store in a cool spot for 10 days before serving.

NOTE
Each time you want a drink of sherbet, pour it out and replace it with 250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) of water
and 2 tablespoons of sugar. Stored in the pantry, the sherbet can be kept and replenished for up to 6
months.
 KAHVE—TURKISH COFFEE WITH
ADDED PATIENCE

When I was growing up, Istanbul was changing, adapting to a faster way of life, but my grandma was
determined to keep making perfect coffee. She used a cezve (the traditional copper pot), which she
placed over burnt charcoal for 15 minutes but regularly removed from the heat to ensure it did not
overcook.
In my grandmother’s day, a prospective wife was judged by her coffee-making skills—not just her
technique, but more importantly her patience. If she’s patient with her coffee, she will be patient with
her husband—or so the men thought at the time. Now it’s possible to judge a Turkish café on the same
principle. A second-rate place will boil the coffee too quickly, degrading the taste and producing
little of the froth that needs to form gradually and cover the top of the liquid.
These days, you don’t need charcoal to make a perfect Turkish coffee. An electric or gas stove top
works perfectly well—as long as you have the technique and the patience.
To make your own Turkish coffee, you will need a cezve (pronounced ‘jezweh’)—a heavy-based
pot with a long handle, and you will need to buy finely ground medium-roast Arabica coffee (or, if
you’re a purist, you’d grind medium-roast beans in a cylindrical brass coffee mill called a kahve
değirmeni). Here’s the process:

1. Pour cold water into the pot—one cup for each person you are serving and an extra half cup ‘for
the pot’.
2. Add a heaped teaspoonful of the ground Turkish coffee for each cup and stir. The amount of
coffee may be varied to taste, but don’t forget, there should be a thick layer of grounds left at the
bottom of each cup. Don’t fill the pot too much.
3. If you need to add sugar, this is the time to do it. Check with your guests and if they say ‘medium
sweet’, stir a teaspoon of sugar per cup into the cold water.
4. Heat the pot as slowly as you can—the lower the heat the better it will be. Make sure you watch
to prevent the cezve overflowing when the coffee boils.
5. When it boils, pour some (not all) of the coffee equally between the cups, filling each cup about a
quarter to a third of the way. This will ensure everybody gets a fair share of the foam forming on
top of the brew, without which coffee loses much of its taste.
6. Put the pot back on low heat until the coffee boils again (which will be very soon). Distribute the
rest of the coffee between the cups.

Since there is no filtering at any time during this process, you should wait for a few minutes before
drinking your coffee while the grounds settle at the bottom of the cup.
HERE’S HOW TO ORDER TÜRK KAHVESI WHEN YOU’RE
IN TURKEY:
Sade (‘sah-DEH’): plain, no sugar (fairly bitter)
Az şekerli (‘AHZ sheh-kehr-lee’): a little sugar (takes off the bitter edge; half a teaspoon per
cup)
Orta şekerli (‘ohr-TAH sheh-kehr-lee’): medium (about a teaspoon of sugar per cup)
Şekerli (‘sheh-kehr-lee’): sweet (two teaspoons of sugar per cup)

You never order coffee with milk. If you enjoy a milky coffee and you’re lucky enough to be in
the east of Turkey, you could ask for menengiç (‘men-en-GITCH’), which is made with crushed
wild pistachio nuts, milk and sugar. There’s no caffeine, so you can drink it all day.
In traditional cafés, coffee is cooked over charcoals that have been burning for more than an hour.
A kahve is a meeting place where men go to play cards, drink tea or coffee, and watch soccer games on TV. Kahves rarely serve food.
MEZE
Every great food culture has a tradition of small tasting plates served with a national
drink. The Italians have antipasto, the French have hors d’oeuvres, the Spanish have
tapas—all washed down with local wines. The Chinese have yum cha, served with
tea. The Russians have zakuski, served with vodka.

And the Turks have meze, served with raki (or occasionally wine or beer). Mezes are most likely to
be served in a meyhane, which is a kind of bar/ bistro/pub where people meet for a chat and a drink
and a bite from sunset until well after midnight. During the Ottoman period, the meyhanes were often
run by families of Greek or Armenian background, because those cultures do not have the Muslim
aversion to alcohol.
There’s an origin story for meze that sounds too good to be true. Supposedly the Ottoman sultans in
the fifteenth century were a paranoid lot, fearful of being poisoned by foreign spies who sneaked into
their kitchens, or by members of their own family. So they hired official food tasters, who would be
given small helpings of every dish offered by the chef. They would have to be seen to swallow all of
them and keep smiling before the sultan could begin his meal.
Other rich Turks thought they would look important if they followed the same ritual even when they
weren’t in fear of death threats and couldn’t afford official tasters. So they started serving small
quantities on small plates and called them meze, from the Persian word for ‘a taste’.
The reason I’m dubious about this tale is that there were meyhanes in the Middle East long before
the Ottoman emperors built their kitchens. The eleventh-century Persian poet Omar
Khayyam wrote this line: ‘You say rivers of wine flow in heaven—is heaven a meyhane to you?’
The rivers of wine would have flowed through Istanbul, a thriving trade hub, before the Muslims
started cracking down on alcohol sales. Smart meyhane-owners would have served salty high protein
snacks to make their customers thirsty and to line their stomachs so they wouldn’t fall unconscious
before ordering another drink.
The need for stomach lining became more pressing in the seventeenth century, when the favoured
drink in meyhanes changed to raki. Raki, like wine, is made from grapes but, as it is distilled, it is
much more alcoholic. Most people dilute raki with water, which turns it white and explains its
nickname—’lion’s milk’. Meyhanes started boasting about the variety of meze they had available to
keep the customer (relatively) sober.
The twentieth-century poet Nazim Hikmet wrote that a good meze table should feast the eye, the
conversation should feast the brain, and the raki should whet the palate: ‘You can drink raki with
spicy or sweet, with cucumber, melon or cheese, with water or without water, in winter or in
summer, in joy or in sorrow—the only thing you cannot drink raki with is idiots.’
So here’s a typical night out for me during my student years. You decide to meet your friends at a
meyhane (a decision that might take a while, because the second most divisive question in Istanbul,
after ‘What’s your soccer team?’ is ‘Which is the best meyhane in town?’).
 You find a table and order your raki (aniseed-flavoured), which arrives with a jug of water and a
bucket of ice. A waiter comes around with a tray displaying cold meze—maybe melon and white
cheese, yoğurt and mint, spicy tomato salsa, eggplant salad, marinated fish, braised vegetables,
stuffed mussels—and you point at the ones you fancy. Musicians pass by and you might have to pay
them to go away. Street sellers wander in and try to interest you in their wares.
After an hour or so, the waiter comes back and asks if you’d like any hot meze. He describes them,
emphasising what’s unique to the establishment, and maybe points to a tank from which a fish can be
scooped out and grilled. You pick a few tastes and you order another bottle of raki. Suddenly it’s
midnight. You stagger out and buy some kokoreç (stuffed intestines that look like sausage) from a
street stall to help you sober up.
This chapter gives you the tools to create your own meyhane, complete with cocktails. Turks think
of meze as sharing food, to be placed in the middle of the table as part of a spread, but any of the
dishes in this chapter could be served on its own as a starter or first course for lunch or dinner. We
have suggested ingredient quantities that will make enough for four, when you want to serve the dish
as a course by itself. If the dish is part of a meze platter or party table, then each guest is likely to take
a smaller quantity. So if one of our ‘serves 4’ dishes is served as part of a platter of three mezes, for
example, then you could say it will serve twelve (or six greedy people).
This is party food and party drink, served with conversation. The only thing you cannot serve it
with is idiots.
A typical laneway meyhene in Istanbul, where friends gather to chat, sing, get tipsy on rakı and eat an array of mezes.
SUCUKLU HUMUS
POMEGRANATE HUMUS WITH SPICY
SAUSAGE

A well-made humus is a wonderful form of comfort food. But it’s not Turkish. If you’re offered it in
Turkey you’re probably in a place run by someone with an Arabic background. (This is not to say that
I’m taking a side in the humus war. You won’t catch me making a declaration on whether its origin is
Syrian or Israeli or Palestinian or Lebanese. All I know is it’s not Turkish.)
At my restaurant in Sydney, we try to change our menu every three months. The discussion with my
cooks and waiters begins with me saying: ‘Lets lose the humus—it’s not Turkish.’ My manager, Fatih,
always replies: ‘Leave it alone. It’s been seven years, and the customers love it.’ So I’ve
compromised. I’ve turned an Arabic speciality into a Turkish dish by adding ingredients familiar to
me— pomegranates to sweeten it, capsicum to colour it and sucuk (spicy beef sausage) to give it heat.
My customers are right.

SERVES 6

HUMUS
200 g (7 oz/1 cup) dried chickpeas
1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda (baking soda)
2 garlic cloves
60 ml (2 fl oz/¼ cup) lemon juice
1 tablespoon pomegranate molasses
1 tablespoon capsicum (pepper) paste
4 tablespoons tahini
½teaspoon salt
125 ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) olive oil
½ teaspoon paprika

TO PPI NG
1 small cucumber
½ small red onion
½ red capsicum (pepper)
100 g (3½ oz) sucuk (or chorizo)
2 slices day-old sandwich bread
pide bread, grilled, or pita crisps, to serve
Put the chickpeas in a saucepan, cover with water and bring to the boil over high heat. Boil for 1
minute, and then strain. Put the chickpeas in a bowl with the bicarbonate of soda, cover with water
and soak overnight.

Strain the chickpeas and rinse under cold running water for 5 minutes. Transfer to a saucepan, cover
with plenty of water, and bring to the boil over medium heat. Cook for 1½ hours until the chickpeas
are soft enough to mash with your fingers. Put the cooked chickpeas in a food processor and blend
into a smooth paste. Finely crush the garlic and stir into the chickpea paste. Add the lemon juice,
pomegranate molasses, capsicum paste, tahini, salt, olive oil and paprika and blend into a smooth
purée. Spoon the humus into a bowl.

Peel the cucumber and finely chop. Finely chop the onion. Slice the red capsicum, remove the seeds
and stalk, and finely chop. Chop the sucuk very finely. Chop the day-old bread into small cubes.

Put the sucuk in a small frying pan over low heat and bring to a simmer, then cook until the fat begins
to sizzle and emerge. Add the bread cubes and capsicum, and cook for 2 minutes until crisp. Remove
the sucuk, bread and capsicum from the pan and mix with the cucumber and red onion.

Using a spoon, swirl the humus so it looks like a whirlpool, and then scatter the sucuk mixture into the
swirls. Serve the bowl of humus with grilled pide or pita crisps.
FAVA
MUM’S BROAD BEAN PÂTÉ

My mother, who was a great home cook, became a professional restaurateur when I was sixteen. It
was great experience for me to work in her meyhane as a kitchenhand while I was studying. I became
the fallback cook every time she sacked her chef, which, on average, was about once a month. I got a
crash course in meze preparation, barely having time to learn one new recipe from each chef before
they disappeared.
One dish mum would never let anyone else touch was the fava, which she made with her own
hands in spring, using a mixture of dried and fresh broad beans and adding black olive paste because
she liked the colour contrast. She said fava should be like a cake—able to endure a long sitting at a
meze table. If the cake collapses, it’s a dip, not a fava.
In this recipe I have used dried beans, so you can make fava all year round, but if you’re making it
in spring, you could include fresh broad beans (double peeled).

SERVES 4

FAVA PURÉE
190 g (6¾ oz/1 cup) split broad beans
1 small onion
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon sugar
70 ml (2¼ oz) olive oil, plus extra for greasing
2 tablespoons black olive paste
3 dill stalks

TO PPI NG
1 red bullhorn pepper (or ½ red capsicum/pepper)
¼ red onion
8 black olives, pitted
2 tablespoons olive oil

Wash the broad beans and then transfer to a bowl, add 750 ml (26 fl oz/3 cups) of water and soak
overnight.

Rinse the soaked beans under cold running water. Heat the beans, onion, salt, sugar, 50 ml (12/3 fl oz)
of the olive oil and 750 ml (26 fl oz/ 3 cups) of water in a saucepan over medium heat for 15 minutes.
Reduce the heat and simmer for 15 minutes, stirring regularly. Remove the pan from the heat and
purée the mixture using a hand-held blender (or leave to cool slightly and blend in a food processor).
Spoon half the purée into a bowl, add the olive paste and mix together thoroughly, then set aside.

Pick the leaves off the dill and discard the stalks. Fold the leaves into the remaining broad bean purée
and leave to cool to room temperature.

Brush four teacups (or rice bowls) with the remaining olive oil. Half fill each cup with the broad
bean-dill purée and refrigerate for 30 minutes.

Remove the cups from the fridge and fill the rest of each cup with the olive paste mixture. Refrigerate
for a further 30 minutes.

Now make the topping. Slice the bullhorn pepper and discard the stalk and seeds. Finely chop the red
onion. Finely chop the black olives. Mix the chopped ingredients in a bowl with the olive oil and then
set aside.

Remove the cups from the fridge and upend each one onto its own plate. Use the back of a teaspoon to
dent the top of each dome, spoon on the topping, then serve.
BORANİ
POOR MAN’S SAFFRON AND CARROT DIP
A meal in a meyhane usually starts with an assortment of cold plates, designed to sit on the table for
hours. Most customers are there primarily to drink alcohol, and they may just pick at their food,
expecting it to taste as good at midnight as it did when they sat down at 7 pm. Borani is a model of
this kind of meze. The centrepiece is braised carrot, which lines the stomach nicely. I’ve called this a
dip, but it’s denser than the usual dips made with yoğurt and coloured with beetroot, chillies or
parsley. This one is coloured with turmeric—known in Turkey as the poor man’s saffron because it
provides visual impact without the exotic fragrance.

SERVES 6

1 tablespoon caraway seeds

4 carrots
50 ml (12/3 fl oz) olive oil
1 teaspoon turmeric
2 garlic cloves
200 g (7 oz) plain yoğurt
2 dill stalks, finely chopped
pide bread, to serve

Toast the caraway seeds in a frying pan over medium heat, shaking frequently, for about 2 minutes
until fragrant.

Peel and grate the carrots. Heat the olive oil in a frying pan over medium heat. Add the grated carrots
and sauté for 5 minutes. Add the caraway seeds and turmeric, sauté for 5 minutes more and then
remove from heat.

Crush the garlic and mix it in a bowl with the yoğurt. Add the chopped dill and spiced carrots and
mix together. Serve the bowl of borani, warm or chilled, with pide bread.
ANTEP EZME
CHILLI AND CAPSICUM SALSA

I’ve translated the word ezme, which literally means ‘crushed’, as ‘salsa’ because it’s chunkier than a
sauce but runnier than a dip, and because it contains the New World ingredients chillies and
tomatoes. The secret to making a great ezme is never to use a food processor. Instead, you should
chop it finely just before you take it to the table.
Ezmes are served in kebap houses to lubricate the palate before the meat arrives. The waiter just
plonks a few small plates on the table when you sit down, and you spoon them up while you discuss
what kind of kebap you might order. The spiciest ezmes are made in Gaziantep.

SERVES 6

6 ripe tomatoes
4 green bullhorn peppers (or 2 green capsicums/peppers)
1 bunch flat-leaf (Italian) parsley
3 red onions
3 garlic cloves
1 tablespoon isot (or chilli flakes)
1 tablespoon capsicum (pepper) paste
50 ml (12/3 fl oz) pomegranate molasses
100 ml (3½ fl oz) extra virgin olive oil
juice of ½ lemon
1 tablespoon sea salt
pomegranate seeds, to decorate (optional)
pide bread, grilled, to serve

Score a shallow cross in the base of the tomato. Put in a heatproof bowl and cover with boiling
water. Leave for 30 seconds, then plunge in cold water and peel the skin away from the cross.

Cut the peeled tomatoes into quarters and scoop out the seeds. Slice the peppers and discard the
stalks and seeds. Pick the parsley leaves and discard the stalks. Preferably using a mezzaluna, finely
chop the tomatoes, parsley, peppers, red onions, garlic and parsley together into a chunky purée.

Drain off any excess water from the chopping board and then transfer the purée into a bowl. Add the
isot, capsicum paste, pomegranate molasses, olive oil, lemon juice and sea salt, and stir well to
combine.

Decorate with pomegranate seeds, if using, then serve the bowl of antep ezme with grilled pide.
PATLICAN SALATA
CHARRED EGGPLANT SALAD

If you’ve been in Turkey for more than a day, you’ve had a version of this salad, which would have
arrived automatically when you sat down for lunch or meze. It’s a candidate for the title of National
Dish.
The flesh of the eggplant has a lovely texture but does not have much flavour of its own. It’s a great
carrier of flavours, though—particularly the smokiness that comes when the skin is burnt on a
barbecue or char-grill or open gas flame. The other key flavour here is apple cider vinegar.
One of my closest friends is vegetarian by choice and allergic to eggplant. Life in Turkey is
difficult for her.

SERVES 6

EGGPLANT SALAD
2 large eggplants (aubergines)
1 large red capsicum (pepper)
½ bunch flat-leaf (Italian) parsley
2 spring onions (scallions), finely chopped
1 teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
60 ml (2 fl oz/¼ cup) extra virgin olive oil
2 tablespoons lemon juice
1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar

PO MEGRANATE TO PPI NG
2 tablespoons pomegranate molasses
1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
20 pomegranate seeds

Pierce the eggplants with a fork and char the skins by placing the eggplants directly onto the flame of
your stove. Using tongs, move the eggplant around to evenly blacken and then remove from the flame.
Peel off the skins and put the eggplant pieces in a colander to drain for about 10 minutes.

Blacken the skin of the capsicum over an open flame in the same way. Put the capsicum in a bowl and
cover with plastic wrap to sweat. Leave to cool. Once the capsicum is cool enough to handle, peel off
the skin under cold running water. Discard the stalk and seeds.

Pick the parsley leaves, discard the stalks, and finely chop the leaves. Wash the spring onions,
remove the roots and tough outer leaves, and finely chop. Roughly chop the eggplant into a chunky
purée. Finely dice the capsicum. Mix the vegetables and parsley together in a salad bowl. Add the
salt, pepper, olive oil, lemon juice and apple cider vinegar and mix thoroughly.

Mix the pomegranate molasses and olive oil together in a small jug (pitcher). Serve the patlican
salata at the table for people to help themselves. Swirl the pomegranate dressing over the eggplant.
Decorate with the pomegranate seeds.
ZEYTİN PİYAZI
GREEN OLIVE AND WALNUT SALAD

This dish appears on every meze table near the Aegean Sea. It’s best made with what we call
‘scratched green olives’ (early harvested and lightly crushed before being soaked in salty water).
They come from the Edremit area in the northwest.
The world’s first known edible olives were cultivated in Anatolia 6000 years ago, long before
anybody talked about nations called Greece or Turkey. These days Turkey is one of the largest olive
oil producers in the world and arguably the most enthusiastic eater of olives in the Mediterranean.
The word piyaz in the Turkish name comes from Ottoman times, and suggests a salad that contains
onions. In fact, the onions are the least interesting part of this dish.

SERVES 6

125 g (4½ oz) green olives

2 garlic cloves
125 ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) extra virgin olive oil
½ bunch flat-leaf (Italian) parsley
4 spring onions (scallions), chopped
50 g (1¾ oz) walnuts
½ green apple
1 red bullhorn pepper (or ½ red capsicum/pepper)
juice of 1 lemon
2 tablespoons pomegranate molasses
1 teaspoon chilli flakes
½ tablespoon dried thyme

Slice the olives into quarters, and remove the seeds. Squash the garlic cloves and remove the skin.
Put the olive slices and garlic in a small container with half the olive oil, and leave to marinate
overnight.

Finely chop the parsley leaves. Wash the spring onions, remove the roots and tough outer leaves, and
finely chop. Roughly chop the walnuts. Slice the apple. Slice the bullhorn pepper, remove the seeds
and the stalk, and finely chop. Transfer the olives from the garlic marinade into a large bowl. Add all
the other ingredients and mix thoroughly. Serve the bowl of zeytin piyazi at the table for people to
help themselves.
ÇIĞ KÖFTE
NIMROD’S VENISON TARTARE

Çiğ köfte (raw meatball) is usually made with veal because of its low fat content. But I’m suggesting
you try venison because it is hallowed by history (and has an even lower fat content).
Let me take you back 4000 years to the city of Şanlıurfa in southeastern Anatolia. As the story goes,
the ruler at the time was a man named Nemrut (translated as Nimrod in English) who was a great
grandson of Noah. Nimrod became paranoid after a dream in which he was told he was about to be
replaced by a leader named Abraham, who would try to persuade Nimrod to worship one god. So he
ordered his solders to collect all the wood they could find so they could burn Abraham at the stake.
When a hunter returned home to his village after killing a deer, his wife was unable to cook it because
she, of course, had no wood. Instead, she chopped the raw meat and kneaded it with spices and bulgur
— thereby presenting a new dish to the world. (And God saved Abraham by turning the fire to water
—the site of which is recognised today by the famous pond in the middle of Şanlıurfa, full of sacred
carp.)

SERVES 4

250 g (9 oz) venison loin fillet (or veal loin), trimmed

2 onions
5 garlic cloves
2 tablespoons capsicum (pepper) paste
½ tablespoon tomato paste
4 heaped tablespoons isot (or chilli flakes)
1 tablespoon pimento
1 tablespoon cumin
½ tablespoon cinnamon
½ tablespoon salt
½ tablespoon freshly ground black pepper
450 g (1 lb/2½ cups) very fine bulgur
15 ice cubes
5 flat-leaf (Italian) parsley stalks
5 mint stalks
3 spring onions (scallions)
lettuce leaves (or pita bread), to serve

Finely cut the venison. Put the meat in a food processor and blend into a coarse paste, then transfer to
a round baking tray with indentations on the bottom (or a mixing bowl). Finely grate the onions. Crush
the garlic cloves. Add the capsicum and tomato pastes, onion and garlic to the meat and combine. Stir
in the six dry spices. Knead the meat mixture for 10 minutes to make a smooth paste. Add 90 g (3¼
oz/½ cup) of the bulgur and three of the ice cubes, and continue to Knead until the ice has melted.
Repeat with the remaining bulgur and ice cubes until all the bulgur is well combined with the meat.

Pick the parsley and mint leaves and discard the stalks. Finely chop the leaves. Wash the spring
onions, then remove the roots and tough outer leaves. Finely chop. Add the mint, parsley and spring
onions to the veal mixture and knead for 10 minutes until it holds together as a large ball.

To make the çig köftes, take a handful of the mixture and squeeze tightly in your fist to make a log
about 3 cm (1¼ in) across and 6 cm (1¼ x 2½ in) long. Repeat to make about thirty patties.

Place about three köfte in each lettuce leaf and serve on a platter for guests to help themselves.
MERCİMEK KÖFTESİ
RED LENTIL MEATBALLS

Here’s another dish with history. The Bible tells how Esau, a hunter who normally ate venison, saw
his brother Jacob eating a bowl of red lentils and was so hungry he offered to give up his inheritance
for it.
This is a rare vegetarian version of köfte, which is normally associated with raw veal or lamb, and
is a staple winter dish in the eastern half of Turkey. Even if you love it as much as Esau, be careful
not to overload, as bulgur will continue to expand in your stomach.

SERVES 6

410 g (14½ oz/2 cups) split red lentils

175 g (6 oz/1 cup) fine bulgur
2 onions
2 tablespoons vegetable oil, for frying
1 tablespoon capsicum (pepper) paste
1 tablespoon tomato paste
1 bunch flat-leaf (Italian) parsley
6 spring onions (scallions)
1 tablespoon cumin
1 tablespoon chilli flakes
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 teaspoons salt
1 cos lettuce
1 lemon

Wash the red lentils in cold running water, then place in a saucepan with 1 litre (35 fl oz/4 cups) of
water and bring to the boil over high heat. Reduce the heat and simmer for 15 minutes, with the lid
partly closed. Put the bulgur in a large mixing bowl and pour over the hot lentils and the cooking
water. Rest for 15 minutes, covered, to soften the bulgur.

Finely chop the onions. Heat the vegetable oil in a frying pan over medium heat and then add the
onion. Cook for 5 minutes until the onion is translucent. Meanwhile, mix the capsicum and tomato
pastes in a small bowl with 1 tablespoon of water. Stir the mixture into the pan and cook for 3 more
minutes until the whole mixture is mushy. Remove the pan from the heat and set aside.

Pick the leaves from the parsley, discard the stalks, and finely chop the leaves. Wash the spring
onions, then remove the roots and green outer layer. Finely chop.
Once the bulgur has softened, stir in the parsley, spring onion, cumin, chilli flakes, olive oil, salt and
onion mixture. Knead for 3 minutes and then divide the mixture into about twenty-four balls, using
your hands. Slightly flatten each ball.

Wash the cos lettuce, and break it up into leaves. Place three köftes in each lettuce leaf.

Cut the lemon into 6 slices. Place on a platter with the köftes for guests to help themselves.
KISIR
BULGUR MINT AND CUCUMBER SALAD

This salad is associated with southeastern Anatolia, but it has spread all round the country, with
regional variations. In my mother’s restaurant in Bodrum I learned to include pickles and pickle juice
to add saltiness and contrast to the sweetness of the molasses. The trick here is to use just the right
amount of boiling water—too little and the grain will be crunchy, too much and it will be mush. The
Turkish name is strange—the word kisir literally means ‘infertile’, which is hardly the case here.

SERVES 8

200 g (7 oz) fine bulgur

60 ml (2 fl oz/¼ cup) extra-virgin olive oil
1 tablespoon tomato paste
1 teaspoon capsicum (pepper) paste
3 large tomatoes
1 long green chilli
1 teaspoon chilli flakes
2 pickled cucumbers or gherkins
10 flat-leaf (Italian) parsley stalks, picked
10 mint leaves, chopped
5 spring onions (scallions)
2 tablespoons gherkin juice
1 teaspoon white pepper
juice of 1 lemon
1 teaspoon pomegranate molasses

Bring 125 ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) of water to the boil water over high heat. Place the bulgur in a large
bowl and pour over the boiling water. Leave to rest for 15 minutes. Stir the olive oil, tomato paste
and capsicum paste into the bulgur.

Score a shallow cross in the base of each tomato, then transfer to a heatproof bowl and cover with
boiling water. Leave for 30 seconds, then plunge into cold water and peel the skin away from the
cross. Cut the tomatoes in half and scoop out the seeds with a teaspoon. Finely chop.

Slice the chilli and remove the stalk and the seeds. Finely chop. Finely chop the cucumbers, parsley
leaves, mint leaves and spring onions. Add all the chopped ingredients to the bulgur and mix well.
Finally, add the gherkin juice, pepper, lemon juice and pomegranate molasses. Stir and serve the kisir
in the bowl for people to help themselves.
TOPİK
ARMENIAN CHICKPEA DOMES

Topik is a vegetarian dish originally consumed during Lent by the Armenian community who are
Orthodox Christians. Now it’s one of the most treasured delicacies to go with a bottle of raki in
Armenian meyhanes. As a child I fell in love with topik when our Armenian neighbours invited me to
stay for supper while I was playing with their kids. I rediscovered it as a teenager in a meyhane
called Madam Despina, which was opened in 1946 in the multicultural suburb of Kurtuluş by a Greek
lady whose signature dish happened to be Armenian. She’s been immortalised in a nostalgic folk
song, which goes: ‘Set the table, Madam Despina. Are we tipsy again? Did you just run out of topik?
We love you anyway.’ Madam Despina died in 2006, but she’s still a hot topik in Istanbul.

SERVES 6

SHELL
400 g (14 oz/2 cups) dried chickpeas
3 potatoes
½ tablespoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 teaspoon sugar
100 g (3½ oz) tahini

FI LLI NG
10 onions
100 ml (3½ fl oz) olive oil
30 g (1 oz) currants
30 g (1 oz) pine nuts
1 teaspoon cinnamon
½ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
½ teaspoon allspice
½ teaspoon sugar
250 g (9 oz) tahini

½ tablespoon cinnamon, to serve

juice of 1 lemon, to serve

Bring a large saucepan of water to a rapid boil. Add the chickpeas and blanch for 1 minute. Transfer
the chickpeas into a bowl, cover with fresh water and leave to soak overnight.

The next day, start making the filling. Finely slice the onions. Heat the olive oil in a frying pan over
medium heat. Add the onion and cook for 10 minutes until translucent and slightly caramelised.
Reduce the heat and simmer for 2 hours with the lid partly closed, stirring occasionally.

Strain and rinse the chickpeas, and then rub in a rough cloth to remove as much skin as possible.
Place the skinned chickpeas in a large saucepan, cover with plenty of water (at least three times the
volume of chickpeas) and boil for 1 hour, without the lid. Remove the pan from the heat and leave to
cool. Once the chickpeas are cool enough to handle, remove any more skin, using your fingers, and
then set aside.

Cut the potatoes in half, place in a large saucepan, cover with salted water and bring to the boil. Cook
for 15 minutes or until the potatoes are tender, then drain well. Leave to cool and then remove the
skin.

Place the potatoes, chickpeas, cinnamon, salt, pepper and sugar in a food processor and blend to
make a thick paste. Transfer to a mixing bowl, add the tahini and combine. Knead the mixture together
for 2 minutes to make a smooth paste. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and leave to rest for 10
minutes.

Meanwhile, place the currants in a bowl, cover with warm water, and leave to soak for 15 minutes.
Toast the pine nuts in a frying pan over medium heat for 3 minutes, shaking often. Remove the onions
from the heat. Strain the currants and then add to the onions. Add the pine nuts, cinnamon, salt,
pepper, allspice and sugar. Stir in the tahini.

Cut twelve 30 cm (12 in) squares of plastic wrap.

To make the topik, put 4 tablespoons of the chickpea mash in the middle of a square of plastic wrap.
Flatten the mash into a round about 15 cm (6 in) across, pushing outwards so the centre is thicker than
the edge. Put 2 tablespoons of the onion mixture in the middle of the mash. Lift one corner of the
plastic wrap and fold the mash over the filling. Bring the other three corners up to meet the first
corner and fold the other edges over. Pull the four corners of plastic wrap together and form the
mixture into a ball. Twist the corners of plastic into a strand. Tie a knot in the strand just above the
ball. Repeat to make twelve balls. Place the parcels on a tray and refrigerate overnight to set.

When you are ready to serve, snip off the top of the plastic wrapping (below the knot) and take the
balls out of the plastic wrap. Sprinkle a little cinnamon on top, and a few drops of lemon juice, then
serve.
The Aegean village of Türkbükü, where geese, normally confined to fresh water, have been breeding in the salt water since they were
left at the beach by Somer’s stepfather in 1995.
MİDYE DOLMA
STREET HAWKER’S STUFFED MUSSELS

If you wander through the Istanbul suburb called Beyoğlu, you’ll soon encounter men carrying circular
aluminium trays full of mussels stuffed with spiced rice. Give the first man you see a lira and you’ll
get three or four mussels and a slice of lemon on a paper plate. You’ll then become addicted, and feel
compelled to go to the street called Nevizade where, with any luck, you’ll find a meyhane that will
serve you mussel dolmas sitting down.
When I came to Sydney, I met an Armenian lady named Bercük Anne, who made mussel dolma far
superior to any I’d found in the streets of Istanbul. Her recipe had a lot of onions, spices and herbs,
and very little rice. So here’s how you can make the true Armenian mussel dolma better than any
you’ll find in the streets of Istanbul.

SERVES ABOUT 4
(5 MUSSELS PER PERSON)

5 onions
100 ml (3½ fl oz) vegetable oil, for frying
30 g (1 oz) currants
30 g (1 oz)pine nuts
110 g (3¾ oz/½ cup) short-grain rice
2 tomatoes
2 teaspoons freshly ground black pepper
2 teaspoons pimento
1 teaspoon cinnamon
5 flat-leaf (Italian) parsley stalks
3 dill stalks
20 black mussels
2 tablespoons tomato paste
2 teaspoons capsicum (pepper) paste
2 tablespoons olive oil
4 lemons, cut into wedges, to serve

First make the stuffing. Finely chop the onions. Heat the vegetable oil in a frying pan over medium
heat. Add the onions and cook for 5 minutes. Reduce the heat and simmer, covered, for 20 minutes,
stirring occasionally.

Place the currants in a bowl, cover with warm water, and leave to soak for 15 minutes. Toast the pine
nuts in a frying pan over medium heat for 3 minutes, shaking often.
Wash the rice under cold running water and then add to the simmering onions. Increase the heat to
medium. Grate the tomatoes over the rice. Strain the currants and add to the pan. Add the pine nuts,
pepper, pimento and cinnamon, and stir. Simmer the mixture for 5 minutes, then remove from the heat
and leave to cool.

Pick the parsley leaves, discard the stalks and finely chop the leaves. Finely chop the dill. Mix the
parsley and dill into the stuffing, then set aside.

Now, open the mussels. If you’ve bought the mussels in a vacuum bag, open the bag over a bowl to
catch any liquid inside. Scrub the shells clean. Using a blunt knife, carefully force the point of the
knife into the gap at the pointy end of each mussel, and slice through the meat so the shell opens with
half the meat attached to each half shell—once you cut through the thick, round connecting muscle at
the bottom of the mussel, it will be easy to open. Pour the juice into a bowl. Snip off the beards and,
using your finger, remove any grit at the base. Spread the half shells to tear the muscle of the mussel,
but leave the two halves connected. Put 2 teaspoons of the stuffing into the middle of each mussel and
push the half shells together again.

Place a bread and butter plate, face down, in the bottom of a saucepan about 25 cm (10 in) wide.

Place the mussels in the pan, with the tips pointing outwards towards the edge of the pan with the
shells slightly overlapping (to prevent them opening). Build a tight spiral of shells in the centre of the
pan. There should be one layer of mussels. Strain the mussel juice through a sieve lined with a double
layer of muslin (cheesecloth) three times, to remove any grit.

Mix 250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) of mussel juice in a small bowl with the tomato paste and capsicum paste.
Pour the mixture over the mussels. Splash on the olive oil. Place another bread and butter plate over
the mussels, then put the lid on the pan. Place the pan over medium heat and bring to the boil, then
reduce the heat and simmer for 15 minutes.

Remove the mussels from the heat and leave to cool to room temperature. (You can also keep them in
the fridge overnight.) Serve the midye dolma on a big platter with lemon wedges for guests to help
themselves. The best way to eat them is with your hands, using the top shell to scoop the mixture out
of the bottom shell.
SOMON PASTIRMA
SALMON PASTIRMA AND BABY ZUCCHINI

This is an example of the new Turkish cooking. When you say pastirma to traditional Turks, they think
beef. But the word simply means ‘pressed’, so there’s nothing to prevent you from wrapping the
wonderful paste around any form of protein.
Since the process involves leaving the protein to dry for at least a week, you need to be careful if
you’re using seafood. For me, the fish that works best is salmon—it can absorb the flavours of the
paste while retaining its own.
Unlike beef pastirma, soman pastirma is kept in the fridge during the drying process, which means
the coating will stay moist and crumble away when you’re slicing the salmon. This is a good thing—
it’s the salmon you want to eat, not the wrapper.
Because somon pastirma has a strong taste, I decided to accompany it with the simple freshness of
raw zucchini.

SERVES 6

CURED SALMO N
500 g (1 lb 2 oz) sashimi-grade salmon fillet
1 kg (2 lb 4 oz) rock salt
440 g (15½ oz/2 cups) caster (superfine) sugar
15 cloves garlic
3 tablespoons ground fenugreek
3 teaspoons cumin
2 tablespoons sweet paprika
1 tablespoon hot paprika
1 teaspoon ground coriander
1 teaspoon salt

ZUCCHI NI AND DI LL TO PPI NG

500 g (1 lb 2 oz) small zucchini (courgettes)
60 ml (2 fl oz/¼ cup) extra virgin olive oil
juice of 1 lemon
4 tablespoons dried yoğurt cheese (or crumbly feta)
2 dill stalks, picked and chopped

Place the salmon (which should already be skinned and filleted) on a board and remove any small
bones, blood lines and white pieces of fat.
Spread a tea towel (dish towel) over a cake rack (or steamer tray or large colander). Sit the rack on
top of a baking tray or large pan. You will use this for the drying process.

Mix the rock salt and caster sugar together in a bowl. Spread half the rock-salt mixture onto the
towel-covered rack, about 1 cm (½ in) thick. Put the salmon fillet in the middle of the rack and cover
it thoroughly with the rest of the rock salt mixture. Fold the muslin cloth over the top of the salt. Place
a flat-bottomed tray over the salmon with a 3 kg (6 lb 12 oz) weight on top (using anything from a bag
of potatoes to the Oxford Dictionary), to flatten out the salmon as it dries. Place the baking tray in the
fridge and rest for 2 days.

Take the salmon out of the fridge, wash the salt off and plunge in iced water. Rest the salmon (in the
water) in the fridge for 1 day.

Remove the salmon and pat dry. Put the salmon on a rack with a drip tray underneath and refrigerate
for 24 hours. Turn the salmon over and return to the fridge for one more day.

Meanwhile, make the paste. Mix the garlic and spices and salt together in a blender to make a thick
paste. If the mixture seems dry, drizzle about ½ teaspoon of water into the mix.

Remove the salmon from the fridge and coat it with the paste, making sure every part is completely
covered. Put the salmon on the cake rack with the tray underneath, but without the muslin cloth, and
return to the fridge for at least another 48 hours.

When you are ready to serve, finely slice the zucchini lengthways. Place in a bowl and toss with the
olive oil, lemon juice and yoğurt cheese. Finely chop the dill and then add to the zucchini mixture
Thinly slice the somon pastirma, diagonally, to make at least 24 slices, and serve with the topping.
VOTKALI LEVREK
VODKA AND MUSTARD-CURED BREAM

This is another of my mum’s specialities, perfected in her restaurant in Bodrum, where the visitors
love their vodka cocktails and the favourite fish is levrek (normally translated as ‘sea bass’). At my
restaurant, we use sea bream. I like using vodka as a curing alcohol because it has a neutral taste,
which does not interfere with the hints of ginger, bay leaves and dill in the votkali levrek.

SERVES 4

20 whole black peppercorns

1 tablespoon sea salt
3 fresh or dried bay leaves
2 thin slices ginger
50 ml (12/3 fl oz) vodka
100 ml (3½ fl oz) lemon juice
1 tablespoon mild French mustard
4 fillets deep sea bream (or another firm white-fleshed fish, such as snapper or cod)
50 ml (12/3 fl oz) olive oil
3 dill stalks, finely chopped, for decoration

Mix all the ingredients, except the fish and olive oil, together in a bowl.

Place the bream on a board and remove any small bones and blood lines. Thinly slice each bream
fillet into five ‘leaves’. Place the fillet pieces in the bowl and cover with the marinade. Cover the
bowl with plastic wrap, put in the fridge and leave for at least 6 hours (ideally, overnight).

Remove the fish from the bowl and place one fillet on each plate. Drizzle with olive oil, sprinkle on a
little dill and serve.
AYVALI KEREVİZ
BRAISED CELERIAC WITH QUINCE AND
ORANGE

It is thought that the Greek island of Samos, very close to the Turkish mainland, is where the ugly
celeriac first grew. On that island, fossil remains of celeriac were found in a grove sacred to the
goddess Hera created in seventh century BC. We’re entitled to speculate that the warriors on both
sides of the Trojan War were eating it. Homer writes in The Iliad that the horses of Achilles’ soldiers
were eating what we assume were wild celeriac leaves.
In Turkey, celeriac is better known than celery (which tends to appear mostly as sticks in bloody
marys). It’s often cooked with sour apples, but I agree with the Ottoman cooks in preferring to use
quince if it’s in season.

SERVES 4

½ lemon
1 celeriac (up to 500 g/1 lb 2 oz)
1 quince
1 onion
1 carrot
125 ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) olive oil
2 oranges
1 teaspoon sugar
2 teaspoons salt

Put 500 ml (9 fl oz/2 cups) of water in a bowl. Squeeze in the juice from the lemon and then add the
lemon. Peel the celeriac and chop into pieces, roughly 2 cm (¾ in) square. Add the celeriac to the
bowl. Cut the quince in half, remove the pit and thinly slice. Add the slices to the bowl and set aside.

Finely chop the onion. Finely chop the carrot. Heat the olive oil in a frying pan over medium heat.
Add the onion and cook for 4 minutes, until soft. Add the carrot and cook for 2 minutes. Drain the
quince slices and celeriac cubes, pat dry with paper towel and then add to the pan. Fry for 4 minutes
until the mixture starts to change colour and softens a little.

Cut the oranges in halves. Finely grate the zest of one half into the mixture. Squeeze the juice from
both oranges into a cup and add enough warm water to fill the cup. Pour the orange mixture into the
pan and add the sugar and salt. Bring to the boil, then simmer, covered, for 15 minutes. Check the
softness of the celeriac, and if it’s still hard, simmer for another 10 minutes. Turn off the heat, and
rest, covered, for 15 minutes.

Divide the ayvali kereviz between four serving plates. Serve at room temperature.
ÇERKEZ TAVUĞU
CIRCASSIAN CHICKEN

Circassia is a mountainous region in southern Russia where walnut trees grow in abundance. In the
nineteenth century, many Circassians were driven out of Russia and took refuge in parts of the
Ottoman Empire where they proceeded to introduce new cooking techniques. Turks, who thought
chicken came on skewers, now learned they could eat it cold, smothered in a walnutty paste.
Coriander is one of my pet hates, and I don’t use it in my restaurant, but I’ve included it here to
honour the Circassians, who brought it to Turkey.

SERVES 6

2 flat-leaf (Italian) parsley stalks

2 coriander (cilantro) stalks
1 onion, quartered
1 carrot quartered
1 tablespoon salt
1 tablespoon black peppercorns
1 whole chicken (about 1.2 kg/2 lb 10 oz)
3 slices day-old sandwich bread
200 g (7 oz) walnuts
1 garlic clove
2 tablespoons sweet paprika
60 ml (2 fl oz/¼ cup) walnut oil
pide bread, to serve

Pick the leaves off the parsley and coriander, and set aside. Put the parsley and coriander stalks in a
saucepan. Add the onion, carrot, salt, peppercorns, chicken and about 3 litres (105 fl oz/12 cups) of
water. Place the pan over high heat and bring to the boil, then reduce the heat and simmer, partly
covered, for 1½ hours. Remove any scum that forms on the surface.

Take the chicken out of the pan, place on a rack and leave to cool to room temperature. Leave the
cooking liquid in the pan and set aside.

Remove the skin from the chicken and pick the meat off the bones. Place the skin and bones back in
the cooking liquid and bring to the boil over high heat. Continue to boil vigorously for 1½ hours,
uncovered, so the liquid reduces to half its original volume.

Strain the bones, skin and vegetables out of the chicken stock, and discard. Shred the chicken meat
and spread the pieces on a deep serving platter. Pour on 2 tablespoons of stock, cover with plastic
wrap and place the platter in the fridge. Discard the crusts from the bread. Dunk the bread into the
stock for a few seconds then squeeze out any excess liquid. Blend the bread, walnuts, garlic and 1
tablespoon of the paprika in a food processor. Gradually add some stock, tablespoons at a time, to
make a smooth paste.

Remove the serving platter from the fridge. Put the chicken in a bowl, stir one-third of the paste
through the chicken pieces, then spread them across the platter again. Chop the parsley and coriander
leaves and mix them with the remaining paste, then pour this paste over the chicken. Mix the walnut
oil and the remaining paprika together, and drizzle over the chicken.

Serve the çerkez tavuğu platter cold, with pide bread, for people to help themselves.
YAPRAK SARMA
SOUR CHERRY-STUFFED VINE LEAVES

The traditional cold vegetarian dolma stuffing involves spiced rice with currants and pine nuts. In
recent years, Turkish chefs have started replacing the currants with sour cherries, which contribute
great colour as well as flavour. They may think they are doing something new, but actually a sour
cherry-stuffing recipe appears in the first published Turkish cookbook, Melceu’t-Tabbahin (The
Cook’s Shelter) from 1844—of course, those adventurous Ottomans thought of it first. This recipe
was inspired by my friend Batur, whose yaprak sarma is a signature dish at his scholarly Ottoman
restaurant Asitane.

SERVES 4

100 g (3½ oz/½ cup) sour cherries (dried, frozen or tinned), pitted
½ lemon
30 vine leaves
150 ml (5 fl oz) olive oil
2 tablespoons pine nuts
4 onions
185 g (6½ oz/1 cup) short-grain rice
1 tomato
½ teaspoon cinnamon
½ teaspoon allspice
½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon sugar
5 mint stalks
2 dill stalks

If you are using dried sour cherries, soak their in warm water for 1 hour. If frozen, thaw for 30
minutes. If tinned, rinse to remove the syrup. Halve the sour cherries. Set aside. Zest the lemon half,
and squeeze the juice. Set both aside.

If you are using fresh vine leaves, place them in a bowl, cover with boiling water, add 1 tablespoon
of salt, and leave to soak for 10 minutes. If they are in brine, wash to remove the salt. Set aside.

Heat the olive oil in a frying pan over medium heat. Add the pine nuts and fry for 2 minutes. Finely
slice the onions, add to the pan and cook for 5 minutes until soft. Wash the rice under cold running
water and then add to the onion mixture. Grate the tomato into the rice, sauté for 2 minutes and then
reduce the heat to a simmer. Stir in the cherries, cinnamon, allspice, pepper, salt, lemon zest and
sugar. Add 50 ml (12/3 fl oz) of water and simmer for 5 minutes. Remove from the heat—the rice
should be softened but still slightly crunchy. Finely chop the mint and dill, add the lemon juice and
combine with the rice mixture.

Pat the vine leaves dry with paper towel. Snip off any stems and, if the spine in the centre of the leaf
is woody, soften it by crushing with the back of a knife. Put aside the five least attractive-looking
leaves.

Next, stuff the vine leaves. Put a leaf on a board, shiny side down. Put a strip of rice mixture in the
middle of the vine leaf, fold over the base of the leaf, then fold over each long side and roll into a
çigar shape, about 6 cm (2½ in) long. Repeat to make about 25 stuffed vine leaves.

Place a bread and butter plate face side down in the bottom of a saucepan. Spread the five reserved
vine leaves over the back of the plate. Arrange the stuffed leaves in a tightly packed spiral shape on
top of the plate. Thinly slice the half lemon and scatter over the vine leaves. Put another bread and
butter plate on top. Add 250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) of warm water and bring to the boil over medium heat.
Reduce the heat and simmer, partly covered, for 30 minutes.

Remove from the heat, leave to cool and then serve, or keep in the fridge for up to 3 days.
BAKLALI ENGİNAR
BRAISED ARTICHOKES WITH BROAD
BEANS

Artichokes are common in the Greek-influenced western part of Turkey—the easterners have barely
heard of them. But the artichoke fields that once fed the Ottoman palace have in recent years been
turned into shopping centres. Now artichokes are grown way out of town.
If you’re in Istanbul in early spring make sure you try a type of artichoke called bayrampaşa, which
is the name of the suburb where they used to grow. They are sold already cleaned by street sellers,
soaking in lemon water to retain their colour. They have a wider heart than most artichokes, and lend
themselves to stuffing with broad beans. Once summer comes around, their texture becomes too
woody for eating.
Artichokes became a staple on meze tables because Turkish drinkers believe these vegetables have
liver-cleansing properties.

SERVES 6

6 globe artichokes
½ lemon
1 teaspoon salt
10 spring onions (scallions)
175 g (6 oz/1 cup) fresh broad beans
125 ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) olive oil
1 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons sugar
2 dill stalks, leaves only

Clean the artichokes, discard the stalk and remove the leaves until you reach the heart. Put the hearts
in a large bowl and cover with water. Cut the lemon and squeeze the juice into the water. Add the two
squeezed lemon quarters and the salt, and set aside.

Wash the spring onions, remove the roots and tough outer leaves, and then slice into 3 cm (1¼ in)
pieces. Make a slit in each broad bean skin, place them in a saucepan, cover with water, and bring to
the boil. Boil for 5 minutes. Strain the beans and leave to cool, then double peel.

Place the spring onions in a saucepan. Add the broad beans and the drained artichoke hearts. Add the
olive oil, salt, sugar and 375 ml (13 fl oz/1½ cups) of water, and then bring to the boil over high heat.
Reduce the heat and simmer for 15 minutes, covered, until the broad beans are soft.
Lift the lid and scoop 2 tablespoons of the spring onion and broad bean mixture over the top of each
artichoke heart. Simmer, covered, for another 15 minutes. Remove the lid and place 2 dill leaves on
each artichoke. Cover again, turn off the heat, and leave to rest for 15 minutes.

Carefully lift each artichoke with its bean and onion topping out of the pan and place on a serving
platter for people to help themselves.
MÜCVER
NETTLE AND FETA FRITTER

Usually the classic dish called mücver is made with zucchini, dill and feta. In some parts of the
country they add carrots or spinach. I decided to sharpen the flavour with the wild weeds that grow
near Bodrum, the west-coast resort town where my mother had her restaurant.
Turks who use wild weeds in their cooking were probably originally taught by the descendants of
the Cretans, who used to live along the Aegean coast (until they were expelled in the 1920s). If you
can’t find nettles, you could substitute spinach.
This is the first of three zucchini dishes, which can complement each other when served together.
You can use the zucchini skins you peel off in this recipe for the next one.

SERVES 4

ZUCCHI NI PATTI ES
15 flat-leaf (Italian) parsley stalks
10 dill stalks
3 spring onions (scallions)
50 g (1¾ oz) hard feta
20 g (¾ oz) parmesan
1 egg
35 g (1¼ oz/¼ cup) plain (all-purpose) flour
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
2 zucchini (courgettes)
½ teaspoon salt
30 nettle leaves (or 3 spinach stalks)
60 ml (2 fl oz/¼ cup) olive oil

MI NT YO ĞURT
1 garlic clove
130 g (42/3 oz) plain yoğurt
1 teaspoon dried mint

Pick the parsley leaves, discard the stalks, and finely chop the leaves with the dill. Wash the spring
onions, remove the roots and tough outer leaves, and finely chop. Grate the feta and parmesan.

Whisk the egg in a mixing bowl. Add the flour, feta, parmesan, dill, parsley and pepper, and mix
together to make a runny paste.
Peel the zucchini (and reserve the skins for the next dish, kaskarikas, if you like). Finely grate the
zucchini. Place the zucchini shreds in a colander and sprinkle on the salt. Leave for 5 minutes—the
salt will help extract the moisture from the shreds. Wrap the zucchini in muslin (cheesecloth) and
tightly squeeze out the excess water.

If you are using nettles, use gloves to handle them. To remove the sting, put in a heatproof bowl and
cover with boiling water for 30 seconds. Transfer to cold water for 5 minutes. Pick the green leaves
and discard the stems. Pat the leaves dry with paper towel and then roughly chop. (If using spinach
instead, wash thoroughly and remove the stalks, then chop.)

Mix the zucchini and nettle (or spinach) with the flour and egg mixture. Divide this dough into eight
small patties, flattening them in your palm.

Heat the olive oil in a frying pan over high heat. Add a drop of water to the oil. If it sizzles the oil is
ready. Add the patties, four at a time, and fry for 2 minutes on each side until golden. Transfer to
paper towel to drain the excess oil.

Crush the garlic and mix in a small bowl with the yoğurt and dried mint. Place the patties on four
plates and serve with the mint yoğurt.
KASKARİKAS
ZUCCHINI AND GOAT’S CHEESE SALAD

This dish was brought to the Ottoman Empire by the Sephardic Jews who migrated to Anatolia when
they were expelled from Spain in the sixteenth century. Some of their descendants lived in my
apartment block in Istanbul when I was growing up, and sometimes I was lucky enough to be invited
to dinner when they made kaskarikas. They tossed zucchini skins with almonds and pine nuts, and
served yoğurt on the side. I decided to make it a more complete salad in this version, adding goat’s
cheese.

SERVES 6

2 zucchini (courgettes), skin only

1 sour plum, halved (or 3 crushed unripened grapes or 1 teaspoon lemon juice)
2 tablespoons olive oil
½ teaspoon salt
pinch of sugar
2 tablespoons slivered almonds
1 tablespoon soft goat’s cheese

Cut the zucchini skins into 5 cm (2 in) long strips. Put the strips in a small saucepan and just cover
with water. Add the sour plum (or grapes or lemon juice). Add the olive oil, salt and sugar, then bring
to boil over high heat. Reduce the heat and simmer for 5 minutes until the skins are soft. Remove from
the heat and leave to cool to room temperature.

Serve in a salad bowl with slivered almonds, and a dollop of soft goat’s cheese.
CİCEK SARMA
AEGEAN STUFFED ZUCCHINI FLOWERS

You don’t say no to my friend Musa Dağdeviren, the custodian of Turkish traditional values in
cooking. So when he told me to meet him outside his Istanbul restaurant at 5 am, I stayed up all night
to be on time. We jumped in his pickup truck and drove for an hour to his farm in the country. The sun
was just coming up. He wanted to show me the perfect moment to pick zucchini flowers for stuffing—
the moment when they open to the sun. He’d brought a pot of his own rice stuffing and we filled the
flowers, steamed them and ate them that morning. Two years later I saw a documentary about Middle
Eastern cooking hosted by the London chef Yotam Ottolenghi, in which he enjoyed the same
experience.
You might not be able to pick your flowers at sunrise, but you can come close to the experience if
you choose male zucchini flowers (the ones with no zucchini attached), which taste better because
they have not had to expend any energy producing fruit. This recipe is not Musa’s stuffing—it’s a
simpler version they use on the Aegean coast.

SERVES 4

5 spring onions (scallions)

5 flat-leaf (Italian) parsley stalks
5 dill stalks
5 mint stalks
220 g (7 oz/1 cup) short-grain rice
100 ml (3½ fl oz) olive oil
1 teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon white pepper
½ teaspoon sugar
1 tomato
½ onion
16 zucchini flowers (preferably male)
½ lemon

Wash the spring onions, then remove the roots and tough outer leaves. Finely chop. Pick the leaves
from the parsley, dill and mint and finely chop. Set aside the stalks. Wash the rice under cold running
water, drain and place in a bowl. Add half the olive oil, spring onion, salt, pepper, sugar and herb
leaves, and mix together with the rice. Grate the tomato into the mixture.

Remove any stalk from each zucchini flower, gently fold back the petals and stuff with a tablespoon
of the stuffing. Fold the largest petal over to cover the mixture, then fold over the remaining petals.
Put a 20 cm (8 in) plate face down in the bottom of a large saucepan (about 25 cm/10 in wide).
Scatter the parsley, dill and mint stalks over the plate. Place the half onion in the middle of the plate.
Surround it with the zucchini flowers, stem side facing up, flowers down. Add the remaining olive oil
and 50 ml (12/3 fl oz) of warm water. Bring to the boil, then cover and simmer for 20 minutes. Check
after 15 minutes and add another 50 ml (12/3 fl oz) of water if the pan seems to be drying out. Turn off
the heat and squeeze the lemon half over the flowers. Rest, covered, for 15 minutes.

Serve warm.
TURŞU KAVURMA
FRIED GREEN BEAN PICKLES

If you find this dish in a meyhane, you’ll know the chef is from the Black Sea. Pickling is an ancient
tradition all over Anatolia, a way of preparing vegetables at the end of summer to feed the family
over the harsh winter months, but the Black Sea is the only area where they pickle vegetables and then
pan-fry them. In addition to green beans (usually the flat kind) they fry pickled cabbage and silverbeet
roots. But green beans are the best.

SERVES 4

1 kg (2 lb 4 oz) green beans

2 red chillies
4 garlic cloves
160 g (52/3 oz/½ cup) rock salt
50 ml (12/3 fl oz) white vinegar
4 chickpeas
1 onion
60 ml (2 fl oz/¼ cup) vegetable oil
1 tablespoon capsicum (pepper) paste

Wash the beans and cut off the ends. Bring 500 ml (17 fl oz/2 cups) of water to the boil in a saucepan,
add the beans and simmer for 4 minutes. Strain the beans and then plunge into iced water for 2
minutes. Strain the refreshed beans and then arrange them, upright, in a 2 litre (70 fl oz/8 cup)
preserving jar.

Cut a slice along each chilli (but leave the seeds and the stalks) and push between the beans. Peel two
of the garlic cloves and place them, whole, in the jar. Dissolve the rock salt in 500 ml (17 fl oz/2
cups) of water. Add the vinegar to the brine, then pour the mixture into the jar. Put the chickpeas on
top of the beans. Seal tightly and store for 1 week at room temperature.

Remove the chickpeas from the jar, scoop off any froth on top of the water and then store for 1 more
week (or a few days longer if the weather is cold).

A day before you want to serve the fried pickles, take out about 250 g (9 oz/2 cups) of the beans, and
rest them in water overnight.

Pat the soaked beans dry and cut into 5 cm (2 in) lengths. Finely slice the onion and crush the
remaining garlic. Heat the vegetable oil in a frying pan over medium heat. Add the onion and fry for 3
minutes until soft. Add the garlic and capsicum paste, and fry for 2 more minutes, stirring regularly.
Add the beans, stir through the onions, and simmer, covered, for 5 minutes. Serve the turşu kavurma
warm on a platter for people to help themselves.

NOTE
You can keep the remaining turşu kavurma in a jar for up to 3 months at room temperature, and enjoy
them as a side dish whenever you feel like pickles.
 THE BROTHERS OF ORFOZ

An evening walk along the waterfront in the west-coast town of Bodrum is likely to be at first a
charming experience and then a depressing one. Beneath the fifteenth-century Castle of Saint Peter,
you stroll along a pebbly beach lined with candle-lit tables put out by the local eateries. The gentle
waves are lapping just short of the table legs.
It’s idyllic until the waiters start beckoning and shouting: ‘Check out our menu. We got schnitzel,
we got pizza, we got Greek salad, we got waffles, we got kebabs.’
Well, an optimist would say at least 20 per cent of their repertoire is Turkish. Bodrum, once the
site of one of the seven wonders of the ancient world (the Mausoleum of Halicarnassus), is now a
tourist haven that could be anywhere in the Mediterranean. But to get back to Anatolia, you need only
round the corner just past the beach, behind the museum of Turkey’s favourite singer, Pasha of
Bodrum, Zeki Muren, and look for a sign that says ‘Orfoz’. There you’ll find what might be the best
seafood meze bar in the country.
Orfoz is run by the Bozçağa brothers—Çağri is the cook and Çağlar is the host (and also a cook).
Their parents were bakers, but they’d both gone off and studied chemical engineering at university
before they realised their real passion was experimenting with food. So they opened Orfoz in 2003.
When I remark that the bistros along the waterfront do not seem very Turkish, Çağlar says: ‘Well,
you could say that in Orfoz we are not doing Turkish cuisine either—we are just doing our cuisine.
We cook local seafood in the best way we can think of.’
There’s no written menu. In the great tradition of meyhanes, Çağlar just keeps bringing dishes and
asking what we’d like. But afterwards he’s happy to write down, in a mixture of Turkish and English,
what he gave us. Here’s what he wrote down after our meal:

Kecirpeynir—Goat cheese with own local cold pressed olive oil

Sardalya sasimi—fish, sashimi, sardine
Smoked eel
Sea snails with wine sauce patlangoz
Fish soup from grouper fish fresh leaves of celery
Mixed salad
Fresh clams and local oysters
Oysters with parmesan cheese
Mussels in casserole wine parsley garlic olive oil
Rice with seafoods cinnamon
Eggplant in oven (garlic, pepper, olive oil)
Grilled octopus
Baby calamary with onion and garlic
Shrimps in olive oil
Mother’s cookie and cream caramel
Seasonal fruits

Çağlar insists that Orfoz is just a meze bar with a large wine list. Anywhere else in the world, it
would be called a great restaurant.

Çağlar (left) and Çağrı Bozçağa preparing kidonya, one of their unique shellfish mezes.
Local scampi served in Orfoz in Bodrum on the Aegean coast.
KADAYIF KARİDES
CRUNCHY PRAWNS

Many Turks would have trouble recognising this dish as part of their cuisine. Kadayıf pastry is mostly
used for desserts (in a sugar and cheese confection called künefe) and jumbo prawns are not a
common ingredient across the country— being pretty much confined to the area around Mersin on the
Mediterranean coast. But I still claim this for my culture because the recipe was a gift from my Aunty
Meral, who suggested the idea of wrapping prawns in pastry when I first opened my restaurant in
Sydney in 2007. It went down a treat with Australians, who love to throw a ‘shrimp’ on the barbie.
Kadayıf pastry is not easy to make at home, so we suggest you buy it ready-made. In Turkey it’s
manufactured in an elaborate process whereby thin streams of batter are drizzled onto a spinning hot
plate, so they dry instantly and form bunches. Its full name is tel Kadayıf, which translates as ‘string
dough’. It is similar to Italian vermicelli, so if you can’t find Kadayıf, you could buy vermicelli or
fresh angel hair pasta instead. You’d soften the pasta in boiling water for a minute, drain it, add the
ghee and orange, and bunch it together in ribbons about 1 cm (½ in) wide, ready to wrap around the
prawns.

SERVES 4

MUHAMMARA SAUCE
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 red bullhorn peppers (or 1 red capsicum/ pepper)
2 garlic cloves, lightly roasted
50 g (1¾ oz) walnut kernels
1 teaspoon isot pepper (or chilli flakes)
1 teaspoon ground cumin
pinch of salt
1 tablespoon capsicum (pepper) paste
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1 tablespoon pomegranate molasses
20 pomegranate seeds

8 fresh king prawns

1 tablespoon ghee
juice of/2 orange
1 teaspoon orange zest
100 g (3½ oz) Kadayıf pastry (or vermicelli or fresh angel hair pasta)
2 teaspoons sumac, for decoration
First make the muhammara sauce. Rub half the olive oil on the bullhorn peppers and roast over an
open flame on your cook top, using tongs to rotate the skin and evenly char. (If you prefer a milder
garlic taste to raw garlic, you can repeat with the garlic cloves.) Transfer the peppers to a bowl,
cover the bowl with plastic wrap, and leave to sweat for 15 minutes. Peel the skin from the peppers
and remove the stalk and seeds. Roughly chop.

Put the chopped peppers, garlic, walnuts, isot, cumin, salt capsicum paste, lemon juice, pomegranate
molasses and the remaining oil in a blender and pulse for 15 seconds to make a coarse paste. Stir in
half the pomegranate seeds.

Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F/Gas 4).

Remove the heads from the prawns. The best way to do this is to straighten the body with one hand
and twist the head 90 degrees with the other hand, gently pulling the head off so that the black thread
along the spine comes away. Peel off the skin but leave the tail on.

Put the ghee in a frying pan over low heat and warm it slightly (so you can still put a finger in it). Add
the orange juice and zest. Place the Kadayıf in a mixing bowl and gently loosen the pastry, slowly
adding the ghee mixture and smearing it through with your fingers so it’s evenly spread. When the
dough is softened, pull it apart into ribbons about 1 cm (½ in) wide.

Wrap a Kadayıf ribbon tightly around each prawn, starting at the tail and pressing the strands of
dough into the prawn flesh. Keep the wrapping in a neat single layer to ensure even cooking. Place the
prawns in a baking tray and cook for about 5 minutes, or until the pastry is golden brown. If your oven
cooks unevenly, turn the tray round once during cooking.

Spread a heaped tablespoon of the sauce on four plates. Sit two prawns on top of the sauce, tails up.
Sprinkle over a little sumac and a few more pomegranate seeds and serve.
MİDYE TAVA
BOSPHORUS-STYLE MUSSELS WITH
TARAMA

If you wanted a glass of beer and a plate of fried food to soak up the alcohol you’d go to a birane
rather than a meyhane. The dish you’re most likely to find there is deep-fried mussels, where beer
appears in the batter as well as in a glass.
The tradition is to serve the mussels with a tarator (dipping sauce) made with stale bread, walnuts
and garlic. Our refined version includes the roe of grey mullet, which makes it a tarama (what the
Greeks call a tarama salata).
In Turkey, tarama is always light beige, because that’s the colour of the roe. I was surprised to find
in Australia that tarama salata is pink—and then I learned that it is often artificially coloured. I do not
recommend that you buy commercial tarama salata to serve with this dish. If you can’t find the grey
mullet roe, make a simple tarator by replacing the roe with 100 g (3½ oz) of walnuts.

SERVES 4

TARAMA SAUCE
2 thick slices white bread
100 g (3½ oz) mullet roe
1 garlic clove, roughly chopped
juice of 2 lemons
250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) olive oil
250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) vegetable oil

MUSSELS
16 blue mussels, scrubbed
60 g (2¼ oz/½ cup) chickpea flour (besan)
100 ml (3½ fl oz) lager beer
1 egg, separated
75 g (22/3 oz/½ cup) plain (all-purpose) flour
1 teaspoon salt flakes
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
vegetable oil, for shallow-frying

First make the tarama sauce. Remove the crusts from the bread and discard. Roughly chop the bread.
Put the bread pieces in a mixing bowl and add about 125 ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) of water to just cover.
Leave to soak for 1 minute, then remove the bread and squeeze out the water. Transfer to a food
processor, add the roe, garlic and half the lemon juice, and pulse to make a paste. Mix the two oils
together and gradually drizzle them into the mixture as it’s processing. After you’ve added about 100
ml (3½ fl oz) of the oils, loosen the mixture with 2 tablespoons of ice-cold water. Keep adding oil
and iced water in similar amounts to completely emulsify, and finish by adding the remaining lemon
juice. Set aside.

Sniff each mussel and if it has a strong smell, discard it. Place the mussels in a bowl and cover with
boiling water. When they start to open (after about 5 minutes), scoop them out of the water. Using a
knife with a point but a blunt edge, force open any shells that are not open enough and then pull all the
mussels out of their shells. Snip off the beards and place the mussels on paper towel to drain.

Using eight 20 cm (8 in) long bamboo skewers, put two mussels, lengthways, on each skewer. Sift the
chickpea flour into a wide bowl, pour in the beer and egg yolk and mix well. Whisk the egg white
until soft peaks form and fold it into the flour mixture.

Sift the plain flour in a separate bowl and mix in the salt and pepper.

Pour the vegetable into a frying pan, about 2 cm (¾ in) deep and heat over medium heat. Add a drop
of water to the oil. If it sizzles the oil is ready. Toss the mussel skewers through the flour, shake off
any excess flour, then dip in the batter. Fry four skewers at a time in the hot oil, using tongs to turn
after 1 minute, then cook for 1 minute more until golden brown. Place the cooked skewers on paper
towel to absorb the excess oil.

Spread 2 tablespoons of tarama sauce onto one side of four plates. Place two skewers (four mussels)
next to the sauce and serve.
SÜBYE KOKOREÇ
SAUTÉED SQUID WITH GREEN CHILLIES

Kokoreç is my favourite street food, made with lamb intestines, but you may be relieved to hear there
are no lambs or intestines in this dish. I’ve used the word in the Turkish name because the squid has a
similar texture to the intestines, and the spicing is the same. We use green chillies as a colour contrast
to the red bullhorn peppers. I prefer squid to calamari in a dish like this because of its softer texture.
Calamari is better stuffed, as you’ll.

SERVES 4

3 garlic cloves
2 green chillies
2 red bullhorn peppers (or 1 red capsicum/ pepper)
3 spring onions (scallions)
4 oregano stalks
1 tomato
500 g (1 lb 2 oz) squid, cleaned
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 tablespoon capsicum (pepper) paste
1 teaspoon sea salt
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 teaspoon ground cumin
1 tablespoon dried thyme
pita bread or baby cos lettuce, to serve

Finely slice the garlic. Slice the chillies and the peppers, and remove the seeds and stalks. Wash the
spring onions, then remove the roots and tough outer leaves. Finely chop. Pick the leaves from the
oregano and finely chop. Finely chop the tomato.

Finely chop the squid, including the head and tentacles.

Heat the olive oil in a wok over high heat. Add the garlic, spring onion, chilli and pepper. Fry for 3
minutes. Add the squid, capsicum paste, salt, pepper, cumin and thyme. Fry for 5 minutes, stirring
constantly. Add the oregano and tomato, stir and then remove from the heat.

Serve hot in open pita bread or in baby cos lettuce, on a large platter for people to help themselves.
KÖMÜRDE AHTAPOT
MEDITERRANEAN GRILLED OCTOPUS

Octopus is one of the most common ingredients on any Aegean seaside meze table. At 3 pm in the
coastal towns you’ll see kitchen workers emerge from the restaurants and throw handfuls of octopus
against the rocks beside the sea, to tenderise them ahead of the 6 pm rush.
My mum used to automate the process by putting them in an old top-loading washing machine with
some rocks and churning them for an hour (without washing powder!). Luckily in fish markets now
you can buy them already tenderised.
I love cooking octopus whole with its tentacles on. My good friend İvgen, from Evgenia meyhane
in Bodrum, gave me a version of this recipe which has the octopus boiling with mulberry-tree
branches before it’s char-grilled. She says it makes the octopus melt in your mouth. For convenience,
ecology and flavour, I’ve substituted oregano. No mulberry trees were harmed in the making of this
dish. I can’t say the same for the octopus.

SERVES 4

1 kg (2 lb 4 oz) octopus, cleaned

250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) red wine
1 teaspoon dried oregano
1 garlic clove
185 ml (6 fl oz/¾ cup) olive oil
1 tablespoon dark soy sauce
4 spring onions (scallions)
juice of 1 lemon
3 flat-leaf (Italian) parsley stalks, leaves only, finely chopped
1 small bunch of fresh cranberries (optional)

Put the octopus in a bowl with the red wine and oregano, and leave to marinate for 2 hours.

If you’re using a charcoal grill, light it 1 hour before you’re ready to cook. Burn the charcoal for at
least 45 minutes and when the flames have died down, and the coals are glowing with a covering of
white ash, the barbecue is ready. (If you’re using a gas barbecue, turn it on to medium–high about 5
minutes before you’re ready to cook.) If you are using the oven, preheat to 200°C (400°F/Gas 6).

Remove the octopus from the marinade, place it on a board and stretch it out into a tube shape. Tightly
wrap the octopus tube in three layers of foil. Discard the marinade.

Place the foil-wrapped octopus on the grill and cook for 2 hours, turning every 30 minutes (or cook in
the oven for 1½ hours).

Crush the garlic and mix together in a bowl with 125 ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) of the olive oil and the soy.

Remove the octopus from the heat, unwrap from the foil and brush with the oil and soy mixture. Brush
the spring onions with the same mixture. If you’re using a charcoal barbecue, put the octopus and
spring onions over the coals for 2 minutes on each side. Or sear the octopus and spring onions in a
frying pan over high heat for 2 minutes each side until the octopus skin darkens.

Cut the octopus and divide it among four plates. Or place the octopus, whole, on a serving plate for
people to help themselves as part of a meze platter. Decorate with the spring onions and drizzle with
the lemon juice and the remaining oil. Top with parsley and serve. If it’s the season for fresh
cranberries, you can decorate the plate with a few of them.
The signs in the Istanbul fish market say ‘Calamari fish’ (top left) and ‘Real grey mackerel kilo 10.Lira’. Mullet is often used for pickling,
drying, or stuffing as dolma.
PIRASA SARMA
LEEKS STUFFED WITH CHICKEN AND
CHESTNUTS

Chestnuts are a favourite Turkish street food in winter, sold from wood-fired braziers by hawkers
who probably sell ice cream in the summer.
Bursa, a town near Istanbul, is famous for its chestnuts (and its Iskender kebap. It is in the foothills
of Mount Uludağ, which has forests full of chestnut trees.
In this meze, I’ve paired the chestnuts with leeks, another winter ingredient. It involves a fair bit of
folding, as you’re required to turn a tube into a triangle. Don’t get hung up on a perfect fold. Anything
vaguely resembling a three-sided parcel will do, as long as you eat it quickly.

SERVES 4

9 chestnuts
3 large leeks
220 g (7¾ oz/1 cup) short-grain rice
1 French shallot (eschallot)
50 ml (12/3 fl oz) olive oil
3 garlic cloves, crushed
300 g (10½ oz) minced (ground) chicken
1 tomato
1 tablespoon tomato paste
1 tablespoon capsicum (pepper) paste
2 teaspoons freshly ground black pepper
1 teaspoon allspice
1 teaspoon cumin
2 teaspoons salt
50 g (1¾ oz) craisins (dried cranberries)
5 flat-leaf (Italian) parsley stalks
5 dill stalks

CAPSI CUM SAUCE

1 tablespoon butter
1 tablespoon capsicum (pepper) paste
1 tablespoon pomegranate molasses
1 teaspoon salt
You can use frozen or tinned chestnuts, as long as they are skinned. If using fresh chestnuts, cut a cross
in the flat base, place in a saucepan of boiling water and boil for 10 minutes. Remove from the pan
and leave to cool, then peel the skin off. Roughly chop the chestnuts.

Remove the roots and green tops from the leeks, then rinse to remove any dirt. Slice down one side of
each leek and peel off the outer two layers. Wash these thoroughly, flatten them out and place them
across the bottom of a saucepan.

Peel off another four layers of each leek and place in a separate saucepan. Reserve the remaining
white centres. Add 750 ml (26 fl oz/3 cups) of salted water to the second pan, bring to boil and then
simmer for 5 minutes until the leek sheets are translucent and soft. Transfer to a bowl of iced water
for 2 minutes to refresh. These twelve pieces are the leek skins you are going to stuff.

Wash the rice under cold running water. Finely chop the cores of the leeks and finely chop the French
shallot. Finely crush the garlic. Heat the oil in a frying pan over medium heat. Add the chestnut pieces
and the shallots. Fry for 1 minute, then add the chopped leeks, garlic and the minced chicken and fry
for 2 minutes more. Add the rice, then grate in the tomato. Fry for 2 minutes, then add the tomato
paste, capsicum paste, spices and cranberries, and stir to combine. Add 125 ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) of
boiling water and simmer for 5 minutes, covered. Turn off the heat. Stir in the chopped parsley and
dill, close the lid, and leave to rest for 15 minutes.

Pick up one sheet of leek skin and put a heaped tablespoon of mixture onto one side. Fold the edges
over to make a tight triangular parcel. Repeat to stuff the remaining leek skins.

Put the parcels into the first leek-skin covered pan, folded sides down, on top of the spread skins.
Pack them in tightly. Add 250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) of warm water and put a small bread and butter plate
on top to hold the parcels down. Put the lid on and simmer for 30 minutes over low heat.

Meanwhile, make the sauce. Melt the butter in a frying pan over low heat. Add the capsicum paste,
pomegranate molasses and salt, and stir to combine. Simmer for 5 minutes.

Remove the parcels from the pan. Place three parcels on each plate. Drizzle the capsicum sauce over
the top and serve.
ÖRDEK GÖZLEME
DUCK AND SOUR CHERRY GÖZLEME

The stuffed pancakes known as gözleme are hard to find in Istanbul—even though they are well
known outside Turkey. They are associated with the Yörük people who live in mountainous regions.
Yörük means ‘walker’ or ‘nomad’, but the Yörüks are not gypsies. They walked into Anatolia around
800 years ago and set up agricultural communities. Nowadays, Yörük women with scarves round
their heads arrive in small towns with their tents made of horsehair and fry gözleme stuffed with
spinach and cheese, potatoes or minced lamb.
I decided to make the concept upmarket by including duck, which nobody would do in Turkey.
Strictly speaking, this dish is not a meze (they don’t serve gözleme in meyhanes), but in my restaurant
I serve it as part of my meze selection.

SERVES 6

4 onions
2 carrots
9 garlic cloves
1 kg (2 lb 4 oz) duck legs
4 dried bay leaves
1 tablespoon salt
1 tablespoon black peppercorns
½ bunch flat-leaf (Italian) parsley
½ bunch mint
200 g (7 oz) haloumi
125 ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) olive oil
80 g (2¾ oz) blanched almonds
2 tablespoons capsicum (pepper) paste
200 g (7 oz/1 cup) sour cherries, pitted
juice of ½ lemon
1 sheet yufka, 60 cm (24 in) wide (or 12 sheets of filo about 30 x 40 cm/12 x 16 in)
1 egg
4 tablespoons butter

Cut two of the onions into quarters, quarter the carrots, squash five of the garlic cloves, and place in a
large saucepan. Add the duck legs, bay leaves, salt and peppercorns, cover with water and bring to
the boil over medium heat. Reduce the heat and simmer for 1½ hours until the legs are fully cooked.

Meanwhile, chop the remaining onions and crush the remaining garlic. Pick the leaves from the
parsley and mint, and finely chop. Coarsely grate the haloumi.

Remove the duck legs from the cooking liquid. Leave to cool slightly and then pull the meat off the
bones. Shred the duck meat, and discard the bones and cooking liquid.

Heat the olive oil in a frying pan over medium heat. Add the almonds and toast for 2 minutes, shaking
the pan constantly to evenly brown. Add the chopped onions and cook for 5 minutes until translucent.
Add the garlic, capsicum paste and the duck meat. Cook for a further 3 minutes. Remove the pan from
the heat and leave to cool.

Halve the sour cherries. Stir them into the duck mixture and then add the parsley, lemon juice, mint
and haloumi. Stir to combine.

Cut the yufka into six wedges. (Or if you’re using filo, overlap two sheets to make a square, painting a
little melted butter where they overlap to help them stick together.)

Divide the duck mixture into six portions and put one portion in the middle of each wedge of yufka (or
each square of filo). Whisk the egg.

Fold the three points of the yufka wedges over the filling to make a triangular parcel, or fold the four
corners of the filo over the filling to make a square parcel. Paint some egg onto the last layer to stick
the parcels together.

Heat 1 tablespoon of the butter in a frying pan over high heat. Add one gözleme and fry for 3 minutes
on the multi-layered side of the parcel, then flip over and cook the other side for 1 minute. Place on
paper towel and repeat with the remaining gözleme and butter. Serve hot on a platter for people to
help themselves.
İÇLİ KÖFTE
TARSUS LAMB AND BEEF DUMPLINGS

İçli köfte literally means ‘a meatball with something inside’. The word içli is also poetic language for
‘deeply felt’, and I’ve seen this translated on Turkish tourist menus as ‘sentimental meatballs’.
Tarsus is a historic city in south-central Turkey, in the middle of the wheat and cotton belt. It was
where Cleopatra met Mark Antony. Biblical scholars know it as the home of Saul who became Saint
Paul. No doubt he ate these dumplings, which are known as kibbeh on the Arab peninsula.
Tarsus has many citizens of Arab descent, who moved to the area in the nineteenth century and
introduced this dish, using the wheat of the area. Their version is different from the standard form
because it is boiled instead of fried, so it’s healthier.

SERVES 6

LAMB FI LLI NG
4 onions
80 ml (2½ fl oz/1/3 cup) vegetable oil
4 cloves garlic
500 g (1 lb 2 oz) lamb mince
2 tablespoons capsicum (pepper) paste
2 teaspoons salt
2 teaspoons freshly ground black pepper
1 tablespoon chilli flakes
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon allspice
150 g (5½ oz) walnuts

BULGUR SHELLS
500 g (1 lb 2 oz) fine bulgur
200 g (7 oz) lean ground (minced) beef
1 tablespoon cornflour (cornstarch)
1 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons capsicum (pepper) paste
50 g (1¾ oz) butter
1 egg
80 ml (2½ fl oz/1/3 cup) vegetable oil

YO ĞURT AND TAHI NI TO PPI NG

200 g (7 oz) plain yoğurt
1 tablespoon tahini
pinch of sumac

First make the filling. Finely chop the onions. Crush the garlic. Heat the vegetable oil in a frying pan
over medium heat. Add the onion and cook for 5 minutes until translucent then add the garlic and fry
for 2 minutes more. Add the mince and fry for 5 minutes, stirring frequently. Add the capsicum paste,
salt, pepper, chilli flakes, cinnamon and allspice, and fry for a further 3 minutes. Remove the pan
from the heat and leave to cool. Put the walnuts in a blender and coarsely chop. Transfer the filling
mixture into a bowl, add the walnuts and mix together, then refrigerate for 2 hours.

Now make the wrapping. Put the bulgur in a heatproof bowl and cover with 750 ml (26 fl oz/3 cups)
of boiling water. Leave to soak for 30 minutes, then drain.

Mix the mince, cornflour, salt, capsicum paste and butter into the bulgur. Break the egg into the
mixture and knead for 10 minutes, to make a smooth paste.

Mix 125 ml (A fl oz/½ cup) of water with the vegetable oil. Wet your palm with the oily water, and
place a ping-pong-ball-sized lump of the beef mixture in your palm. Press it into a pattie the size of
your palm. Partly close your fist to turn the pattie into a cup, and put a heaped tablespoon of the lamb
mixture in the middle. Fold the wrapping around the mixture to make a ball. Transfer the ball onto a
tray. Repeat to make twelve balls and then refrigerate for 2 hours.

Bring about 3 litres (105 fl oz/12 cups) of water to the boil in a saucepan over high heat. Carefully
add the dumplings, six at a time, and cook for 5 minutes until the skin is firm and crusty. Remove each
batch of dumplings from the pan with a slotted spoon and place on paper towel.

Mix the yoğurt and tahini together in a small bowl.

Place the icli köfte on a serving plate. Spoon a tablespoon of the yoğurt and tahini topping over each
dumpling, decorate with a pinch of sumac, and serve.
KURU DOLMA
STUFFED DRIED EGGPLANT

You see the dried shells of baby eggplants hanging in markets all over eastern Turkey, and you can
safely assume they came from a village called Oğuzeli, near Gaziantep, which specialises in emptying
and drying eggplants, zucchini and capsicums at the end of summer, ready to be stuffed during winter.
Of course the stuffing in this recipe can be used with fresh baby eggplants. Just slice off the top,
hollow out the core (leaving thickish walls) and fill it with the stuffing. You can use the scooped out
flesh to make the eggplant salad.

SERVES 4

DO LMA
1 green capsicum (pepper)
4 red capsicums (peppers)
10 mint leaves, finely chopped
10 flat-leaf (Italian) parsley leaves
1 garlic clove
175 g (6 oz/1 cup) fine bulgur
150 g (5½ oz) ground (minced) lamb
100 g (3½ oz/½ cup) chickpeas, boiled
1 tablespoon pomegranate molasses
1 teaspoon cumin
1 tablespoon capsicum (pepper) paste
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon white pepper
50 ml (12/3 fl oz) olive oil
1 tomato
1 pack dried eggplants (aubergines), about 20 pieces (or 10 fresh eggplant/aubergines)
3 red capsicums, extra
1 onion

TO MATO AND CAPSI CUM CO O KI NG LI Q UI D

1 tablespoon tomato paste
1 tablespoon capsicum (pepper) paste
2 tablespoons olive oil
juice of ½ lemon

YO ĞURT SAUCE
125 g (4½ oz/½ cup) plain yoğurt
2 tablespoons tahini
2 teaspoons sumac

Remove the stalks and seeds from the green capsicum and 1 red capsicum and finely chop. Finely
chop the mint and parsley leaves. Crush the garlic to a paste.

Put the bulgur in a bowl, cover with 125 ml (4 fl oz/½ cups) of water and leave to soak for 20
minutes. Stir in the mince, chickpeas, pomegranate molasses, cumin, capsicum paste, parsley,
chopped capsicum, salt, pepper, oil and garlic. Halve the tomato and grate it into the mixture. Discard
the skin. Mix the mince mixture together well and then set aside.

Put the dried eggplants in a bowl, cover with warm water and leave to hydrate for 6 minutes. Remove
from the bowl and pat dry with paper towel. Stuff each of them with 1 to 2 tablespoons of the stuffing,
until it is three-quarters full.

Cut the remaining 3 red capsicum in half and remove the stalks and seeds. Cut the halves into pieces
to fit inside the top of the eggplants. Push the capsicum lids on top of the stuffing, shiny side up. These
will stop the stuffing from falling out when the eggplant swells during cooking. Peel the onion but
leave whole.

Using a deep 25 cm (10 in) wide pot, place a 20 cm (8 in) wide dinner plate upside down at the
bottom of the pan. Sit the eggplants, capsicum-lids upwards, around the inside of the pot, with the
onion in the centre to create a tight fit.

To make the cooking liquid, mix the tomato and capsicum pastes, and olive oil in 500 ml (17 fl oz/2
cups) of water. Pour the liquid over the eggplants and add the lemon juice. Bring to the boil over high
heat, then reduce to a simmer and cook, covered, for 45 minutes.

Meanwhile, mix the yoğurt tahini and sumac together in a small bowl.

Spoon 2 tablespoons of the cooking liquid onto four plates. Add five kuru dolma to each plate,
distribute the sauce on top and serve.
PAÇANGA
PASTIRMA BÖREKS

I used to joke that the word paçanga (pronounced ‘pachanga’) sounds like a Spanish dance, and when
we were researching this book, I got two shocks. First, it is the name of a type of music popular in
Cuba since the late 1950s; and second, there are scholars who claim the dish was brought to Anatolia
by Jews escaping the Spanish Inquisition in the sixteenth century. I hope that’s true, because then this
dish would represent a blend of three communities that contributed greatly to Turkish cuisine—the
Armenians, with their pastirma-making skills; the Bulgarians, with their dairy farming; and the
Spanish Jews, with their sophisticated technique (and the name).

MAKES 8

1 sheet yufka (or 4 sheets of filo)

65 g (21/3 oz/½ cup) shredded aged kaşar (or aged mozzarella)
1 tomato
2 green chillies, about 10 cm (4 in) long
8 pieces beef pastirma (or another cold cut of meat, including corned beef)
3 eggs
1 teaspoon salt
250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) vegetable oil
60 g (2¼ oz/1 cup) breadcrumbs

Cut the yufka into eight wedges. Grate the cheese. Halve the tomato and thinly slice. Remove the
stalks from the chillies but leave the seeds. Finely slice.

Divide the pastirma or cold meat into strips about 3 cm (1¼ in) wide and 10 cm (4 in) long. Place a
strip across each segment of yufka, about 5 cm (2 in) from the bottom. On top of the strip, out 4 slices
of tomato, 2 tablespoons of cheese, and 1 teaspoon of chilli pieces. Whisk the eggs and the salt
together in a bowl. Fold the yufka base over the strip of filling, then fold in the sides (about 3 cm/1¼
in flap). Tightly fold up the parcel, but before you finish the rolling, brush the top triangle of pastry
with a little of the egg mixture to make the roll stick. Set aside the eight parcels.

Heat the vegetable oil in a deep frying pan over medium heat. Add a drop of water to the oil. If it
sizzles the oil is ready. Dunk the böreks into the egg mixture, two at a time, then roll in the
breadcrumbs. Pan-fry the rolls for 2 minutes on each side until golden. Place on paper towel to
absorb the excess oil and then repeat with the remaining börek. Serve on a platter for people to help
themselves.
YAPRAK CİĞER
THRACE-COOKED VEAL LIVER

Thrace is a region that overlaps Greece, Bulgaria and Turkey. In the Turkish part, the town of Edirne
(named after the Roman emperor Hadrian) is known for two things: olive oil wrestling and the livers
of the cattle that grow in the neighbourhood. The liver is sliced very long and thin so that it looks like
leaves (yaprak) and is always pan-fried. One thing I learned from an Edirne liver master was to rest
the liver in milk to drain the excess blood and soften the taste. I’ve had customers who have never
enjoyed liver turn into converts when they try this.

SERVES 4

LI VER
1 veal liver (about 200 g/7 oz)
250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) milk
75 g (22/3 oz/½ cup) plain (all-purpose) flour
50 g (1¾ oz) unsalted butter
1 teaspoon salt
3 dried whole red chillies
1 teaspoon hot paprika
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 teaspoon isot (or chilli flakes)
1 teaspoon thyme
1 teaspoon ground cumin

SUMAC SALAD
½ red onion
1 tablespoon sumac
3 flat-leaf (Italian) parsley stalks, chopped

Peel the thin skin off the liver. With a very sharp Knife, slice the liver into about eight leaves, about 5
mm (¼ in) thick. Place the livers in a bowl, cover with the milk and leave to rest for 1 hour. Pat the
liver strips dry with paper towel.

Sift the flour into a bowl. Roll the liver in the flour to coat well. Shake off any excess flour.

Heat the butter in a frying pan over medium heat until it begins to sizzle. Add the liver and cook for 2
minutes on each side until the corners are crisp. Sprinkle on the salt and chillies and sauté quickly,
then remove the pan from the heat.
Mix the paprika, black pepper, isot, thyme and cumin together in a large bowl. Toss the cooked slices
of liver into the mixed spices.

Thinly slice the red onion, place in a bowl and add the sumac and chopped parsley. Knead the onion
mixture for 1 minute to mix the juice of the onion with the parsley. Place the liver slices on a large
plate, add a dollop of onion salad on top, and serve.
KOÇ YUMURTASI
RAM’S EGGS

When I put testicles on the menu many people thought I was trying to create a sensation, but I was
actually making a point about sustainability. When I was growing up, Turkey was going through
economically tough times, and it was important not to waste anything. The butchers would reserve
offal for the families that had young children, as a source of protein. I grew up eating liver, kidneys,
brains and testicles, and anyone looking at my height today would say that they must have been a great
source of nutrition. Nowadays, when the food elite talks about sustainable eating, I like to ask: ‘How
did we go from fillet steak to fried crickets without using the rest of the animal first?’

SERVES 4

4 ram testicles
1 slice day-old white sandwich bread
50 ml (12/3 fl oz) milk
80 g (2¾ oz/½ cup) blanched almonds
1 garlic clove, peeled
juice of ½ lemon
1 tablespoon white vinegar
2 teaspoons sea salt
1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
2 tablespoons butter
1 teaspoon ground cumin
1 teaspoon isot (or chilli flakes)
2 teaspoons sumac, to decorate

It’s likely you will have bought the testicles frozen. Let them thaw for 15 minutes. Chop off the top
and bottom. Remove the translucent skin and the white membrane, then cut the soft meat in half
lengthways. Set aside.

Put the bread in bowl, cover with the milk and leave to soak for 5 minutes. Discard the crusts and
squeeze the bread to remove excess liquid.

Put the almonds, garlic, lemon juice, vinegar, salt and the bread in a food processor and purée,
slowly adding the oil. If it’s too thick, add 2 teaspoons of water.

Melt the butter in a frying pan over low heat. Add the half testicles, cut side down, and sauté for 2
minutes. Turn, sprinkle on the cumin, isot and remaining salt, and fry for 1 minute more. Remove from
the pan and rest on paper towel.

Spread 1 tablespoon of the almond and garlic sauce on one side of each plate, with pieces of testicle
on the other side. Sprinkle with the sumac and serve.
A busker on Istiklal Street in Beyoğlu, centre of Istanbul’s bohemian culture and nightlife.
KOKTEYLLER
THREE COCKTAILS

Let me tell you a secret: I’ve mixed more drinks in Turkey than I’ve cooked hot dinners. I was trained
as a bartender before I became a chef and, like most of my generation of Turkish hospitality students,
I was inspired by the movie Cocktail (starring Tom Cruise and Bryan Brown). I found mixing drinks
with ‘flair’ was a great way to get tips and to pick up chicks. Then I got serious and added cooking to
my repertoire. When I opened my restaurant in the Sydney suburb of Balmain, one of my first
customers was Bryan Brown, who lives round the corner.
These three flashy mixtures give a nod to traditional Turkish ingredients—raki, pomegranate and
figs—and two of them have Turkish puns in their names (the Nar in Narito means pomegranate, and
the Inci in Incini means fig). But they were all created within a mile of Bryan Brown.

MAKES 3
INDIVIDUAL COCKTAILS

MI DNI GHT EXPRESS

1 heaped teaspoon Turkish coffee
15 ml (½ fl oz) Kahlua
30 ml (1 fl oz) brandy
10 ml (¼ fl oz) barrel-aged raki
1 piece of pashmak (Persian fairy floss)

Boil the Turkish coffee with 70 ml (2¼ fl oz) of water in a pot over medium heat. Strain three times
through a tea strainer lined with muslin cloth to yield 15 ml (½ fl oz) of triple-strained Turkish coffee.

Half fill a cocktail shaker with ice. Add the kahlua, brandy, raki and coffee. Shake vigorously for 1
minute. Strain into a long glass. Decorate with pashmak and serve.

NARI TO
1 lime or small green satsuma mandarin
5 ml (1/8 fl oz) pomegranate molasses
6 mint leaves
2 tablespoons pomegranate seeds
30 ml (1 fl oz) light rum
15 ml (½ fl oz) pomegranate liqueur
60 ml (2 fl oz/¼ cup) pomegranate juice
soda water, to top up
Quarter the lime or satsuma. Place in a cocktail shaker with the pomegranate molasses, mint and
pomegranate seeds. Mash the mixture with what bartenders call a muddler. Add the rum, pomegranate
liqueur and pomegranate juice. Shake vigorously for 1 minute. Serve in a tall cocktail glass, topped
up with soda water.

I NCI NI
½ fresh fig in season or 1 teaspoon fig jam
30 ml (1 fl oz) Hendricks gin
15 ml (½ fl oz) Cointreau
10 ml (¼ fl oz) fresh lemon juice

GARNI SH
1 candied fig (from fig jam)
5 pieces lemon zest

Muddle the fresh half fig in a shaker or put in the fig jam. Add the gin, Cointreau and lemon juice.
Half fill the shaker with ice. Shake vigorously for a minute. Double-strain into a martini glass with
the candied fig and lemon zest, and serve.
DINNER
For most Turks, dinner is the most important meal of the day, particularly during the
thirty nights of Ramadan (spelt ‘Ramazan’ in Turkish). That’s the month when adult
muslims are expected to refrain from eating, drinking, smoking or having sex from
dawn to sunset.

When the drums and cannons signal that the sun has set, the faithful sit down to a feast called iftar,
which begins with easily digested foods such as dates and olives, then moves on to lavish lamb and
eggplant stews, and concludes with cinnamon-flavoured rice puddings and baklava.
Paradoxically, although Ramadan is the month for fasting, Turks tend to put on weight then, because
they have a gourmet party every night—either at home or in lokantas and restorans that set up trestle
tables in the street to provide instant gratification to the desperate fasters.
The other 335 nights of the year, Turks have the leisure to contemplate the way their dining scene is
changing, and the rise of what is being labelled ‘the new Anatolian cuisine’.
The classic European image of a ‘restaurant’, serving starter, main course and dessert from a
written menu, with matching wines, is not part of the Turkish tradition. Until the twenty-first century,
our approach to meals outside the home mostly involved going to eateries that specialised in one type
of cooking (just kebaps, say, or just köfte, or just grilled fish, or just pide), and sharing dishes
delivered to the middle of the table in no particular order, apart from the broad principle of ‘cold
first, then hot’.
There was no tradition of hero-worshipping chefs. Eateries were chosen for the friendliness of
there. Chefs saw their job as perfecting the standard recipes of their predecessors, not creating their
own works of art.
If people wanted to show off, they would look for restaurants purporting to offer Italian, French,
Japanese or whatever was that year’s international fad. They saw no reason to spend big money on
anything described as Turkish.
Then a bunch of radicals came along and applied to Anatolian food a concept known in English-
speaking societies as ‘fine dining’ or in French-speaking societies as nouvelle cuisine.
Mehmet Gürs was the first of the fine dining pioneers, and became internationally known. With a
Turkish father and a Finnish mother, and eight years’ kitchen training in the United States, he was
bound to come up with something unusual when he opened his first restaurant, Downtown, in
1995(which had evolved by 2006 into the very posh Mikla on top of the Marmara Pera Hotel).
Here’s how Mehmet summarises his philosophy:

The Anatolian kitchen is not restricted to the Turkish or the Ottoman kitchen. All products of different
ethnic origins and religions of Anatolia, the birthplace of cultures during a very long span of time
before and after the Ottoman Empire, constitute the kitchen of this region. Wine born in this region is
an indispensable part of the New Anatolian kitchen. Diversity of ingredients and revitalisation of
endangered and almost extinct rich resources is as important as the methods used … Respect the
elders and listen to them, yet do not be crushed by them and do not be afraid to turn age-old ideas
upside down.

Other pioneers include Şemsa Denizsel, who moved from advertising to cooking and opened her
Kantin in 2000; US-trained Didem Şenol, whose restaurant Lokanta Maya sets the bar a lot higher
than all preceding lokantas; Maksut Aşkar, who started his career as a bartender in one of Mehmet’s
restaurants and now runs a bistro called neolokal where he reinvents traditional recipes with his
unique touch; and Civan Er, who studied international relations in London before opening Yeni,
which means ‘new’. I’ve detailed how to find these places at the end of this book.
Thanks to chefs like them, it’s possible for visitors to Istanbul to enjoy sophisticated Turkish
dinners that use contemporary methods but respect the produce and have regional authenticity. That’s
an approach I share. But in addition, I’ve had to develop my style in a land thousands of miles from
Turkey. I’ve found those adaptations exciting, and I hope the fun I’ve had comes across in this
chapter.
Mehmet Gürs prepares for dinner at Mikla, one of Istanbul’s most innovative restaurants.
BADEM ÇORBASI
COLD ALMOND AND GRAPE SOUP

The almond, now grown along the Aegean and Mediterranean coasts, is another delicacy that was
cultivated first in Anatolia (and one of only two nuts to be mentioned in the holiest Christian, Jewish,
and Muslim texts—the other being the pistachio).
I first had the cold version of this sixteenth-century Ottoman dish in Şemsa Denizsel’s famous
Kantin restaurant in the posh Istanbul suburb of Nişantaşi. She was inspired by Spanish cuisine in
deciding to include grapes. I like the addition of unripened green almonds (picked in late spring
before the outer skin becomes tough and inedible) because they give a sour balance to this mellow
soup.

SERVES 4

50 ml (12/3 fl oz) almond milk

1 slice thick sandwich bread
2 garlic cloves
160 g (52/3 oz) blanched almonds
1 teaspoon sea salt
125 m (4 fl oz/½ cup) olive oil
60 ml (2 fl oz/¼ cup) white wine or sherry vinegar

TO PPI NG
3 garlic cloves
2 teaspoons lemon juice
pinch of sugar
80 ml (2½ fl oz/1/3 cup) olive oil
2 green almonds (optional)
180 g (61/3 oz/1 cup) green seedless grapes

Put the almond milk in a saucepan with 50 ml (12/3 fl oz) of water. Bring to the boil and then turn off
the heat. Cut the crusts from the bread and discard. Soak the bread in the boiled almond milk for 2
minutes. Squeeze the excess milk out of the bread and set the milk aside to cool.

Dry-fry the garlic (unpeeled) in a frying pan over medium heat for 4 minutes, shaking the pan
constantly to evenly brown. Remove from the heat and leave to cool slightly. Peel away the skin and
any burnt spots.
Place the blanched almonds, soaked bread, toasted garlic and salt in a food processor, and blend to
make a fine paste. Slowly mix in the oil, then the almond-milk water, and then 200 ml (7 fl oz) of cold
water. Pour the soup into a large bowl and stir in the vinegar. Chill in the fridge for 30 minutes.

Next, make the garlic chips. Finely slice the garlic lengthways into about eighteen thin pieces. Drizzle
with lemon juice and sprinkle with sugar.

Heat the olive oil in a frying pan over high heat. Add a drop of water to the oil. If it sizzles, the oil is
ready. Add the garlic to the pan and fry for 3 minutes until it’s golden brown. Scoop the chips out
with a slotted spoon and place on a paper towel to drain the excess oil.

Quarter the green almonds. Cut the grapes in half. Divide the badem çorbasi soup into four bowls.
Decorate with the halved grapes, almond pieces and garlic chips. Serve chilled.
KIRLANGIÇ ÇORBASI
SCORPIONFISH SOUP

When I was growing up, this delicacy made with the ugliest fish I’d ever seen was a speciality of my
father. He is a devoted sailor and amateur fisherman, and we spent our summers in the seaside village
of Bayramoğlu, an hour from Istanbul. He’d go out on the water all day in his small boat, and come
back with a catch that always included scorpionfish. They are bony and hard to clean, so there’s no
point trying to turn them into fillets. Best to cook them before you remove the flesh.
Like many Turkish soups, this is enriched at the end with a terbiye—a word that translates as
‘teaching good manners’. The basic ingredients of a terbiye are egg and lemon, sometimes with yoğurt
or flour added. Old-school chefs would call this ‘binding’ the soup, but we prefer to say we’re
polishing it to perfection.

SERVES 4

1 scorpionfish, about 1.5 kg (3 lb 5 oz) (or any rockfish)

1 garlic clove
1 onion, quartered
1 potato
1 carrot
¼ celeriac
1 celery stalk
½ bunch dill
½ bunch flat-leaf (Italian) parsley
125 ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) dry white wine
1 egg yolk
100 ml (3½ fl oz) olive oil
juice of 1 lemon
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

Clean the fish, removing the guts and gills. Place on a board and chop into three pieces.

Put 1.5 litres (52 fl oz/6 cups) of salted water in a saucepan. Add the fish, whole peeled garlic clove
and onion, and bring to the boil over high heat. Continue to boil for 20 minutes, uncovered. Turn off
the heat, remove the fish from the pan and rest for 20 minutes. Remove the flesh from the bones and
set the flesh aside. Return the bones and head to the pan, bring back to the boil and then boil over high
heat for 15 minutes.
Peel the potato, carrot and celeriac and roughly chop. Remove the leaves from the celery and set
aside. Chop the celery stalk.

Strain the hot fish liquid into another pot and discard the bones, garlic and onion. Add the vegetables
and bring back to the boil, then reduce the heat and simmer for 20 minutes.

Pick and chop the celery, dill and parsley, add to the original pan with the fish and mix together. Add
the wine and boil vigorously for 2 minutes to let the alcohol evaporate. Add 250 ml (9 fl oz/ 1 cup) of
the soup and bring to the boil over high heat. Boil for 5 minutes.

Put 250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) of the soup in a bowl with the egg yolk and whisk to combine. Return the
soup to the pan and simmer for 5 minutes, stirring frequently.

Mix the olive oil, lemon juice, salt and pepper in a bowl. Divide the fish into four bowls. Pour a
ladle of the soup over each lump of fish. Drizzle a little lemony oil over each bowl and serve.
KELLE PAÇA
SHEEP’S HEAD SOUP

This is a dish to help you sober up at 4 am and in Istanbul is likely to be found in an offal specialist
that is closed during daylight hours. These places, in the more colourful suburbs, catch the customers
who stagger out of a meyhane in a confused condition after midnight and look after them until the
breakfast cafés start opening around 6 am.
I first encountered kelle paça when I was seventeen at an eatery called Apik in the abattoir district
Dolapdere. It’s filled with Romany musicians, prostitutes, and characters you would not want to meet
in a dark alley. In my merry condition at the time, I found the scene intriguing, and was happy to go
along with the Turkish conviction that the gelatine and protein in this dish helps you sober up.
Clearly, this recipe depends on you being able to source a whole sheep’s head. If you can’t, leave
out the head and make the soup with lamb knuckles and brains.

SERVES 4

1 sheep’s head, skin off, top of skull removed

BRAI N
1 teaspoon white vinegar
2 teaspoons salt
1 egg
1 tablespoon plain (all-purpose) flour
pinch of freshly ground black pepper
125 ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) vegetable oil, for frying

SO UP
1 onion
2 lamb knuckles
1 tablespoon salt
3 tablespoons plain (all-purpose) flour
2 tablespoons lemon juice
1 egg

GARLI C SAUCE
2 cloves garlic
juice of 1 lemon
70 ml (2¼ fl oz) red wine vinegar
Remove the brain from the head and wash under running water. Remove the outer membrane. Put the
brain in a saucepan and cover with water. Add the vinegar and half the salt, and bring to the boil over
high heat. Reduce the heat to medium and boil for 5 minutes. Strain off the water and put the brain in a
bowl. Cover with cold water and then transfer to the fridge to cool.

To make the soup, peel and halve the onion. Put the head, minus brain, and knuckles in a saucepan,
add the onion halves and add enough water to cover. Add the salt. Boil for 1½ hours over medium
heat, partly covered with the lid. Skim any scum off the surface.

Remove the sheep’s head from the pan and remove the tongue. Return the head to the pan and set
aside the tongue. Continue to cook for another 20 minutes. Remove the head and Knuckles from the
pan and leave to cool on paper towel. Strip all the meat off the head. Take the meat from the knuckles
and remove the fat. Set aside in a bowl.

Peel the outer layer from the tongue and remove any connective tissue from the base. Thinly slice the
tongue.

Strain the stock into another saucepan to remove the onion and any floating scum. Put the stock and all
the meat back in the original pan and place over low heat. When the soup is warm (not boiling),
scoop out 250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) of the quid and mix in a bowl with the flour, lemon juice and egg.
Whisk together and then add to the soup. increase the heat to medium and bring to the boil. Reduce the
heat to a simmer.

Remove the brain from the fridge, strain off the water, and slice into four pieces. Mix the egg, flour,
remaining salt and pepper, and 1 tablespoon of water in a bowl, and then coat the pieces of brain in
the mixture.

Heat the vegetable olive oil in a frying pan over medium heat. Add a drop of water to the oil. If it
sizzles the oil is ready. Place the brain pieces in the pan and fry for 2 minutes on each side until
golden. Using a slotted spoon, scoop four heaped spoons of meat out of the soup and place each in a
bowl. Put one piece of brain on each mound of meat. Ladle the soup around each mound.

To make the sauce, crush the garlic and mix together with lemon juice and red wine vinegar. Drizzle a
little of the sauce over each bowl and serve.
KARPUZ SALATASI
WATERMELON AND FETA SALAD

European writers in the seventeenth century associated stuffed watermelons (under the name ‘Turkish
pumpkins’) with the luxurious life of the Ottoman emperors, although the watermelon had originated
in southern Africa and seems to have arrived in Turkey with Arab traders. Nowadays, the biggest
watermelons in the world are grown on the banks of the Tigris River, in a region called Diyarbakir.
The ‘First International Traditional Watermelon Festival’ was held there in 2012. In 2013, they
changed the name of the event to the ‘Diyarbakir Culture and Watermelon Festival’. I met a grower
named Adil Aydan, who proudly displayed a watermelon weighing 49.5 kilos (110 lb). Asked who
would need a watermelon that size, he replied: ‘In my area, we have big families.’

SERVES 4

¼ watermelon, about 1 kg (2 lb 4 oz)

400 g (14 oz) feta (mild and creamy)
1 piece mastic crystal (less than 1 g/1/25 oz) (or 1 teaspoon mastic liqueur or Sambuca)
2 tablespoons balsamic vinegar
1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
juice of ½ lemon
20 purslane (or baby rocket/arugula) leaves
20 mint leaves

Skin and seed the half watermelon and cut it into 2 cm (¾ in) cubes. Keep the seeping juices in a
bowl to add to the dressing. Cut the feta into 2 cm (¾ in) cubes. Put the mastic in a bowl and crush
with the watermelon juice. Add the vinegar, olive oil and lemon juice and mix well.

Toss the watermelon, feta, purslane and mint together in a salad bowl and drizzle over the dressing.
Serve with grilled fish or sardine ‘birds’.
EFENDY SALATA
FIG AND HAZELNUT SALAD

This has been the house salad ever since I opened my Sydney restaurant in 2007. It was one of my
team’s first creations, and I must confess it has one non-Turkish ingredient—mustard, with the seeds
left in. If it’s winter and figs are out of season but you’re desperate to serve this, you could soak dried
figs in warm water for 15 minutes. It won’t be quite as luscious as the fresh version, but it will still
be delicious.

SERVES 4

135 g (4¾ oz/1 cup) hazelnuts

6 fresh figs
150 g (5½ oz) wild (or baby) rocket (arugula)
65 g (21/3 oz/½ cup) crumbly goat’s feta

MUSTARD DRESSI NG
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 tablespoon seed mustard
1 tablespoon grape molasses
1 tablespoon red wine vinegar
2 teaspoons lemon juice

Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F/Gas 4).

Put the hazelnuts in a baking tray and roast for 5 minutes. Remove from the oven and leave to cool.
Rub the skins off. Crush the hazelnuts or roughly grind in a food processor.

Mix all the dressing ingredients in a bowl.

Remove the stalks from the figs and slice each fig into six pieces, lengthways. Toss the rocket and
nuts in a salad bowl with the dressing. Crumble the feta and sprinkle over the salad. Top the salad
with the fig slices and serve.
KANGURMALI TARAK
LIME-MARINATED SCALLOPS WITH
KANGAROO PASTIRMA

This dish commemorates the pivotal historical event shared by Australia and Turkey, and combines
ingredients from these two great cultures. Gallipoli, in northwest Turkey is a popular scuba-diving
area, and a major source of scallops. It is best known to Australians as the site of an attempt in 1915
to secure territory in Turkey, which had joined the First World War on Germany’s side.
Australia’s major public holiday each year is 25 April, which was when the Australian and New
Zealand troops (called ANZACs) took part in the ill-fated Allied assault on the Turkish peninsula.
They were repelled by the Turks under General Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, who went on to create the
Turkish republic out of the ruins of the Ottoman Empire.
When I came to live in Sydney, I was curious to see how kangaroo meat would respond to the
drying and preserving process we call pastirma. It turns out that kangaroo works even better than
beef, because it’s almost fat-free.

SERVES 4

500 g (1 lb 2 oz) kangaroo fillets

1 kg (2 lb 4 oz) rock salt
500 g (1 lb 2 oz) caster (superfine) sugar
15 garlic cloves
1½ teaspoons salt
3 tablespoons ground fenugreek
3 tablespoons ground cumin
1 teaspoon ground fennel
2 tablespoons sweet paprika
1 tablespoon hot paprika
8 tarragon leaves
4 mint leaves
juice of 1 lime
1 teaspoon white pepper
1 teaspoon grape molasses
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 teaspoon raki
12 sea scallops (or 6 large scallops)

Place the kangaroo fillets on a board and, using a sharp knife, remove any sinews. Using a cake rack
(or steamer tray or a large colander), cover the rack with muslin (cheesecloth) or a tea towel (dish
towel). Place the rack in a baking tray or large pan. You will use this for the drying process.

Mix the rock salt and caster sugar in a bowl. Spread half the rock salt mixture onto the muslin-
covered tray, about 1 cm (½ in) thick. Put the kangaroo fillets in the middle of the rack and thoroughly
cover with the rest of the rock salt mixture. Fold the muslin cloth over the top of the salt. Place a flat-
bottomed tray over the fillets with a 3 kg (6 lb 12 oz) weight on top (using anything from a case of
beer to wine bottles) to flatten out the kangaroo as it dries. Place the baking tray in a cool spot for 2
days, checking occasionally that the accumulated water does not reach the meat.

Unwrap the meat and wash off the salt. Place the meat in a bowl, cover with water and leave to rest
for 24 hours.

Remove the meat from the water and pat dry with paper towel. Put the kangaroo on a rack with a drip
tray underneath and refrigerate for 24 hours. Turn the fillets over and return to the fridge for one more
day.

Next, make the paste. Mix the garlic, 1 teaspoon of the salt, fenugreek, cumin, fennel and paprika in a
blender. If the mixture seems dry, drizzle about ½ teaspoon of water into the mix.

Remove the kangaroo from the fridge and coat with the paste, making sure every part is completely
covered. Put the kangaroo on the cake rack with the tray underneath, but without the muslin cloth, and
return to the fridge for at least another 5 days.

When you are ready to serve, slice through the fillet, diagonally, as thinly as possible (about 1-2
mm/1/32-1/16)—use a slicer if you have one. Finely chop the tarragon and mint leaves. Put the lime juice
in a small bowl and mix in the mint, tarragon, white pepper, grape molasses, olive oil, raki and the
remaining sea salt. Slice the scallops into rounds about 1 cm (½ in) thick, and rest them in the
marinade for 2 hours.

Divide the scallop slices among four plates, top each with a slice of kangaroo and serve.
KALAMAR DOLMA
STUFFED BABY CALAMARI

As you’ve gathered by now, we Turks will stuff anything. We love baby calamari because, when
cleaned, they form little pouches—just waiting to be filled. To make life more challenging, I decided
to fill the pouches with an elaborate stuffing, using other seafood that would either eat or be eaten by
calamari.
You may be surprised to see soy sauce among the ingredients here, and yes, it’s not typically
Turkish. I first encountered this mixture of cream and soy in the meyhane of my friend Ivgen, in
Bodrum, and mistook it for a form of tahini. It turned out Ivgen had successfully brought together the
two ends of the spice route.

SERVES 4

1 kg (2 lb 4 oz) small calamari

(about 6-8 cm/2½-3¼ in each), cleaned
1 tablespoon white vinegar
100 g (3½ oz) prawns, peeled
100 g (3½ oz) firm white flesh fish (such as ling, blue eye trevalla, mahi mahi)
1 garlic clove
60 ml (2 fl oz/¼ cup) olive oil
100 g (3½ oz) rice
½ teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon sugar
1 tablespoon turmeric
50 g (1¾ oz) butter
50 g (1¾ oz) grated kaşar (or mozzarella)
10 tarragon leaves, chopped
10 mint leaves, chopped

CREAM SAUCE
50 g (1¾ oz) butter
3 garlic cloves
1 tablespoon soy sauce
150 ml (5 fl oz) pouring (whipping) cream

We recommend you buy the calamari cleaned, but if you prefer to use whole calamari, remove the
tentacles, the cartilage in the middle and the skin, and thoroughly wash the bodies (you can use the
tentacles, chopped, as part of the stuffing).
Put 1 litre (35 fl oz/4 cups) of water and the vinegar in a saucepan over high heat and bring to the
boil. Add the calamari tubes, reduce the heat to medium and cook for 25 minutes. Scoop the tubes out
of the water and place on a board to cool. Reserve the cooking liquid.

Peel and clean the prawns, then finely chop. Check there are no bones in the fish fillets, then finely
chop.

Finely slice the garlic. Heat the olive oil in a frying pan over medium heat. Add the garlic and cook
for 1 minute. Wash the rice under cold running water, then add to the pan. Stir for 1 minute to coat the
rice with the oil. Add the chopped fish, prawns and the salt and sugar. Stir for 1 minute to combine.

Put 250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) of the reserved cooking liquid in a small bowl and stir in the turmeric. Add
the turmeric liquid to the rice mixture and cook, covered, for 5 minutes. Remove from the heat and
leave to rest, with the lid on, until it cools to room temperature.

Finely chop one of the calamari tubes (and the legs, if you’ve kept them) and add to the rice. Stir in
the butter, cheese, and the chopped tarragon and mint leaves.

Use a teaspoon to stuff the rice into the remaining calamari tubes (about 2–3 teaspoons per tube).
Tightly pack the calamari tubes into a saucepan, with the wide open ends facing upwards. If the
calamari seem too loosely packed and are at risk of falling over, put a large (washed) potato in the
middle and pack the calamari around it. Pour 250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) of the cooking liquid into the pan,
so that the liquid comes about two-thirds of the way up the tubes. The tops should be at least 2 cm (¾
in) clear of the liquid. Cover with the lid and simmer for 20 minutes over low heat.

Meanwhile, make the sauce. Melt the butter in a saucepan over low heat. Halve 2 garlic cloves. Add
to the pan, increase the heat to medium and cook for 3 minutes. Add the soy sauce and reduce the heat
to a simmer. Add the cream and simmer, uncovered, for 5 minutes, stirring regularly until the mixture
starts to bubble. Remove from the heat.

Put 2 tablespoons of the sauce onto each plate. Lift the calamari tubes out of the pan, divide between
the plates, sitting them on top of the sauce, and serve.
KARİDES GÜVEÇ
PRAWN AND HALOUMI CASSEROLE

The word güveç (pronounced ‘goo-wetch’) means a clay pot in which traditional casseroles are
made. The usual version of karides güveç, served in restaurants and meyhanes in Turkish coastal
cities, uses small prawns or shrimps, but because I live in Australia, I have the luxury of easy access
to prawns of significant size. Using bigger prawns also saves shelling time.
The mushrooms keep the casserole moist when it’s cooking, and help prevent the prawns from
drying out. You need only bake the güveç in the oven for long enough to let the haloumi melt, without
overcooking the prawns.

SERVES 4

12 cherry tomatoes (multi-coloured, if possible)

1 long green chilli
2 green bullhorn peppers (or 1 green capsicum/pepper)
3 onions
3 garlic cloves
12 prawns
80 ml (2½ fl oz/1/3 cup) vegetable oil, for frying
400 g (14 oz) small mushrooms (such as Swiss brown or button)
200 g (7 oz) haloumi
50 g (1¾ oz) butter
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

Hlave the cherry tomatoes. Slit along the chilli and the bullhorn peppers and remove the stalks and
seeds. Finely chop. Finely slice the onions. Finely chop the garlic.

Remove the heads from the prawns. The best way to do this is to straighten the body with one hand
and with the other hand twist the head 90 degrees, gently pulling the head off so that the black thread
along the spine comes away. Peel off the skin but leave the tail on.

Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F/Gas 4).

Heat half of the vegetable oil in a frying pan over medium heat. Add a drop of water to the oil. If it
sizzles the oil is ready. Add the prawns and sear for 30 seconds on each side. Remove from the pan
and set aside on paper towel. Add the remaining oil to the pan, immediately add the onion and cook
for 3 minutes. Add the garlic and sauté for 1 minute. Add the chilli and pepper and fry for 3 minutes.
Halve the mushrooms. Toss them into the pan, add the salt and pepper and simmer for 3 minutes.
Remove from the heat and stir in the halved cherry tomatoes.

Put three prawns in each of four ovenproof bowls. Divide the mushroom mixture between each bowl.
Cut the haloumi into four slices. Place one slice in each bowl. Put a dollop of butter on each slice of
haloumi. Bake for 7 minutes until the haloumi is melted and slightly burnt around the corners. Serve
hot.
Outside and inside one of the massive mosques built in Istanbul with the wealth of the Ottoman Empire.
ASMADA ZARGANA
CHAR-GRILLED GARFISH IN VINE LEAVES

The traditional recipe involves stuffing and wrapping hamsi (similar to a European anchovy), the
most prized fish of the Black Sea region, but they are impossible to find outside of the Black Sea. You
could make this dish with sardines, or small red mullet, but I prefer garfish because it’s milder in
taste and can absorb some of the saltiness of the vine leaves. Because they’re cooked on the barbecue
or grill, the vine leaves will char a little. That just adds flavour.

SERVES 4

15 fresh or preserved vine leaves

10 flat-leaf (Italian) parsley leaves
10 mint leaves
2 garlic cloves
2 tablespoons pine nuts
juice of ½ lemon
12 garfish (about 1 kg/2 lb 4 oz), butterflied, heads and tails on
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 lemons, cut into 8 wedges each, to serve

If you’re using a charcoal grill, light it 1 hour before you’re ready to cook. Burn the charcoal for at
least 45 minutes, and when the flames have died down and the coals are glowing with a covering of
white ash, the barbecue is ready. If you’re using a gas barbecue, turn it on to medium heat about 5
minutes before you’re ready to cook. Or use a frying pan.

If the vine leaves are fresh, place in a bowl, cover with boiling salted water and soak for 10 minutes.
If they are in brine, wash thoroughly to remove most of the salt.

Crush the parsley leaves, mint leaves, garlic, pine nuts and lemon juice with a mortar and pestle.
Open out each fish and place a tablespoon of the stuffing inside, then close the two halves of the fish.

Spread the vine leaves out flat on a board, shiny side down. Roll each garfish in a vine leaf. If the
vine leavs are small, add half of another vine leaf. Drizzle the vine leaves with the olive oil and cook
on the grill, close to the heat, for 2 minutes on each side until the vine leaves are charred. If you don’t
have a barbecue, heat the olive oil in a heavy-based trypan over high heat. Add a drop of water to the
oil. If it sizzles the oil is ready. Place the wrapped fish in the pan and cook for 4 minutes on each
side.
Serve the asmada zargana with the lemon wedges. You should eat the vine leaves.
HAMSİ KUŞU
SARDINE BIRDS

This is very much a hands-on recipe, requiring you to squeeze three egg-coated fish fillets into the
shape of a bird (or what must have looked like a bird to the Black Sea chef who named this dish
centuries ago). There’s a song about this dish, by local folk singer Volkan Konak, which goes: ‘I wish
I was a hamsi bird, so I could fly up into the branches, and the mothers-in-law wouldn’t eat me.’
The strong-flavoured fish called hamsi (similar to a European anchovy) is the staple protein of the
Black Sea region. In the season (autumn and winter) you find them everywhere in Istanbul, and you
can buy them in the fish markets for as little as 2 lira a kilo.
Because they’re so plentiful, hamsi appear in hundreds of Turkish recipes—in simple dishes like
pan-fried hamsi with cornflour, some more complicated ones (like this recipe), and some totally
weird, like the cornbread in our breakfast chapter or ‘hamsi jam’ (which everyone mentions but
nobody admits to having eaten). The best substitute for hamsi outside Turkey is sardines.

SERVES 4

1 tablespoon roasted hazelnuts

30 wild rocket (arugula) leaves
2 onions
290 ml (10 fl oz) olive oil
2 tablespoons rice
2 teaspoons salt
½ teaspoon sugar
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
zest of 1 lemon
18 sardines, butterflied, tails on
4 tablespoons maize flour
2 eggs

watermelon salad to serve (optional)

Finely chop the roasted hazelnuts. Finely chop the wild rocket. Finely slice the onions.

Heat 2 tablespoons of the olive oil in a saucepan over medium heat. Add the onions and cook for 5
minutes until soft and translucent. Wash the rice under cold running water, then add to the onion. Stir
for 1 minute. Add 250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) of hot water and the salt. Bring to the boil and then simmer,
covered, for 15 minutes. Stir in the hazelnuts, sugar, pepper and lemon zest. Remove from the heat
and leave to rest, covered, for 15 minutes.
Slice six of the sardines into two fillets each, so you have twelve lids to go on the ‘birds’. Toss all
the sardines (halves and whole), in the maize flour.

Now stuff the birds. Holding a butterflied sardine in your hand, place a little less than 1 tablespoon of
filling between the halves, and push them gently together. Repeat with the other eleven butterflied
sardines. Put a half-sardine lid on each stuffed sardine, to make a triangle shape. Squeeze the pieces
together.

Whisk the eggs in a bowl. Heat the remaining olive oil in a frying pan over high heat. Add a drop of
water to the oil. If it sizzles the oil is ready. Dip the birds into the egg and carefully place in the hot
oil. Fry for 2 minutes on each side until golden. Place on paper towel to absorb the excess oil.

Serve three hamsi kuşu per person, with watermelon salad if you like.
DİL ŞİŞ
SKEWERED SOLE WITH BRAISED FENNEL

Partly out of laziness, partly out of convenience, Turkish restaurants outside Turkey have made
swordfish on skewers a clichéd dish, but they’re not doing their country any favours. Charcoal works
best with an oily fish that doesn’t dry out as easily as swordfish, so inevitably most swordfish
skewers turn out dry and overcooked.
Putting something on a skewer doesn’t make it Turkish. What does is the right application of
techniques and flavourings to a fresh ingredient. Sole, like most fish fillets, is much more suitable for
pan-frying, and rolling the fillets before skewering means you can achieve a crispy outside and a
juicy inside.

SERVES 4

16 sole fillets (or other flat fish)

125 ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) olive oil
8 bay leaves
4 spring onions
1 red onion
1 lemon
12 bay leaves
1 small fennel bulb
zest of 1 orange
2 teaspoons salt
1 teaspoon sugar
1 teaspoon plain (all-purpose) flour
juice of 2 oranges
2 tablespoons butter
1 teaspoon white pepper

Ask your fishmonger to slice four fillets each from four soles. Lay the fillets on a board. Slice the
spring onions into 4 cm (1½ in) tubes. Heat 1 tablespoon of the olive oil in a frying pan over medium
heat. Add the spring onions and cook for 2 minutes, shaking the pan constantly. Remove from the heat.

Put a spring onion across the bottom of each fillet and roll the fillet around it. Now make the skewers.
Cut the red onion in half, crossways. Reserve one half to use with the fennel. Cut the remaining half
into eight pieces. Cut the lemon in half, then slice that half into three rounds about 1 cm (½ in) wide,
then slice each round into quarters. Reserve the remaining half of the lemon for the sauce.
Each skewer will contain four rolls of fish, three small pieces of lemon, three bay leaves, and two
pieces of onion that will form brackets at either end of the skewer. Take one piece of onion and push
onto the skewer. Add one roll of fish, then one bay leaf, one piece of lemon, then fish again, bay leaf
again, lemon, fish, bay leaf, lemon, fish, and finally the other onion bracket. Make three more skewers
the same way.

Remove the outer layer from the fennel and slice the remaining bulb into four rounds, lengthways. If
the fennel came with the green fronds attached, Keep them for decoration. Finely slice the remaining
half onion and any remaining pieces not used for the skewers.

Heat 2 tablespoons of the olive oil in a frying pan over medium heat. Add the onion and fry for 1
minute. Add the fennel pieces and fry for 1 minute, then stir in the zest, salt and sugar. Mix the flour
into the orange juice. Reduce the heat to a simmer. Add the orange juice mixture and enough water to
cover the fennel. Close the lid and simmer for 15 minutes. Check the fennel; if it is not soft, simmer
for another 10 minutes.

In a separate, large 30 cm (12 in) frying pan, heat all but 2 tablespoons of the remaining olive oil with
the butter over medium heat. Add a drop of water to the oil. If it sizzles the oil is ready. Add the
skewers and cook for 4 minutes on each side until golden brown.

Place a quarter of the fennel mixture on each plate. Place a skewer on top. Juice the remaining half
lemon, and combine the juice with the remaining olive oil and the white pepper. Drizzle a little over
each skewer. Decorate with fennel tips (if you have them) and serve.
USKUMRU DOLMASI
‘FORGET-ME-NOT’ MACKEREL WITH
BARBERRIES

In this dish you are required to reach down the throat of a fish and pull out its insides, including the
bones, in order to make it empty enough to satisfy the Turkish compulsion to stuff everything they see.
Uskumru dolmasi is one of the oldest surviving Ottoman seafood recipes, mentioned in seventeenth
century palace documents, and nicknamed unutma beni (don’t forget me) because meyhanes in past
centuries would send plates of stuffed mackerel to the homes of their regular customers on the last
night of the fasting month of Ramadan, to remind them of what they’d been missing. It was the earliest
form of advertising by letter box drop, but we doubt if anybody rejected it as junk mail.

SERVES 4

4 blue mackerel, whole

BARBERRY STUFFI NG
50 g (1¾ oz) dried barberries (or currants)
1 large onion (about 250 g/9 oz), chopped
200 ml (7 fl oz) olive oil
100 g (3½ oz) pine nuts
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon allspice
3 teaspoons salt
20 flat-leaf (Italian) parsley leaves, finely chopped, plus extra to garnish

MACKEREL CO ATI NG
150 g (5½ oz/1 cup) plain (all-purpose) flour
3 eggs
190 g (6¾ oz/1 cup) fine polenta
300 ml (10½ fl oz) olive oil

PO MEGRANATE DRESSI NG ( O PTI O NAL)

1 tablespoon pomegranate molasses
1 tablespoon olive oil
20 pomegranate seeds
10 parsley leaves, finely chopped
Clean the blue mackerel by removing the gills and the organs without a knife. You need to push your
fingers into the throat of the fish and hook them under the gills. Pull gently so the gills and the attached
organs come out. Use scissors to cut off the fins, being careful not to tear the skin. Wash thoroughly.

Gently massage the fish on each side for 5 minutes to soften the flesh until you can feel the spine.
Gently break the tail, turning it 90 degrees, up then down, without puncturing the skin. Push the points
of a pair of scissors through the gill hole and use them to sever the head from the spine. You can now
remove the spine from inside the fish. Cover the fish with a dry cloth so you can hold it with one
hand. With the other hand, reach through the gill hole and, with your thumb and forefinger, gently pull
out the spinal bones. Scrape off any meat that’s attached to the spine and put in a bowl. Using a
cocktail spoon, remove all the flesh from inside the fish and add to the bowl.

Put the barberries in a bowl, cover with water and leave to soak for 15 minutes. Finely chop the
onion. Meanwhile, heat the oil in a large frying pan over medium heat. Add a drop of water to the oil.
If it sizzles the oil is ready. Sauté the pine nuts for 2 minutes, then add the onions and fry for 3
minutes. Add the fish meat, spices, salt, parsley and barberries and fry for another 2 minutes, stirring
constantly. Remove from the heat and leave to cool for 5 minutes.

Stuff a quarter of the mixture into each fish, using a long-handled cocktail spoon. Pack the stuffing in
tightly, and use your fingers to mould it into a fish shape.

Now make the coating. Sift the flour into a bowl. Lightly whisk the eggs in a separate bowl. Put the
polenta in a third bowl. Heat the oil in a frying pan over medium heat. Add a drop of water to the oil.
If it sizzles the oil is ready. Coat each fish with flour. Dip in the egg. Thoroughly coat with polenta.
Carefully place the stuffed fish in the pan, two at a time, and cook for 8 minutes each, giving them a
quarter turn every 2 minutes until the skin is golden brown and crisp. Drain on paper towel.

If using, mix the pomegranate molasses, olive oil, pomegranate seeds and parsley together in a small
jug (pitcher).

Serve the uskumru dolmasi hot, splashed with a little olive oil and parsley and, if you like, the
pomegranate dressing.
BAMYALI BARBUNYA
PAN-FRIED RED MULLET WITH OKRA

This late-summer dish is a combination of two much-loved ingredients in Turkey. There’s the pretty
pink sweet-tasting fish, which is called barbunya by the Turks and Greeks, triglia by the Italians, and
red mullet or goatfish by the unpoetic English. And there’s the green bullet called bamya by the Turks
and Arabs, ladies fingers’ by Malaysians, okra by the English and gumbo by the people of Louisiana.
Okra are edible seed pods that originated in Africa. They had become a fad food by the fifteenth
century in the Ottoman Empire, when the sultan in Istanbul organised palace war games between
teams named ‘the cabbages’ and ‘the okras’. Okra is very good for you, but it’s not popular because
when cooked it puts out a slime that some people don’t like. Here’s the solution to the slime: use very
small pods. If you can’t find small okra, choose medium-sized ones (no longer than 10 cm/4 in or
they’ll have a woody texture) and soak them for 30 minutes in 1 litre (35 fl oz/4 cups) of water with
100 ml (3½ fl oz) of vinegar and 2 tablespoons of salt. Rinse them well, peel off the skin, and remove
the woody stalk.

SERVES 4

2 French shallots (eschalots)

2 garlic cloves
1 red capsicum (pepper)
1 carrot
1 green tomato or 2 tablespoons unripened grapes
300 g (10½ oz) okra
80 ml (2½ fl oz/1/3 cup) olive oil
125 ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) verjus
juice of ½ lemon
½ teaspoon sugar
1 teaspoon white pepper
2 teaspoons salt
16 small red mullets
75 g (22/3 oz/½ cup) plain (all-purpose) flour
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) vegetable oil
1 lemon

Finely slice the French shallots and garlic. Remove the stalk and seeds from the red capsicum and
roughly chop. Roughly chop the carrot. Quater the green tomato. Cut the stalks off the okra.
Heat the olive oil in a saucepan over medium heat. Add the shallots and carrot and fry for 3 minutes.
Add the garlic and fry for 2 more minutes. Add the okra, tomato and capsicum, and fry for 1 minute.
Add the verjus, lemon juice, sugar, white pepper and half the salt, and bring to the boil. Add 250 ml
(9 fl oz/1 cup) of warm water, reduce the heat and simmer, covered, for 10 minutes.

Clean and scale the red mullet. Sift the flour into a bowl and mix in the remaining salt and the black
pepper. Coat the red mullets in the flour. Shake the fish to remove the excess flour.

Heat the vegetable oil in a frying pan over medium heat. Add a drop of water to the oil. If it sizzles
the oil is ready. Carefully add the mullet, four at a time, and fry for 2 minutes on each side until the
skin is golden brown and crisp. Transfer to paper towel to remove the excess oil.

Cut the top and bottom off the lemon and slice into 8 rounds. Place the lemon in the frying pan and
cook for 1 minute on each side each side until it starts to caramelise.

Spread the okra mixture on one half of each plate, and place four red mullet on the other half.
Decorate with the lemon rounds and serve.
The moped rider must have gone swimming at Bodrum beach.
Fishing from Istanbul’s Galata Bridge, with beer houses serving local seafood on the lower deck.
MERCAN BUĞULAMA
WHOLE SNAPPER IN CELERIAC MILK

One day when I was a kid, my father came home very late saying my stepmother was in hospital with
food poisoning, because ‘she ate yoğurt and fish together’. That started my fascination with combining
seafood and dairy.
It’s a common myth in Turkey that milk and fish don’t mix, but if it were true, there’d be nobody
left alive in the west coast town of İzmir (formerly known as Smyrna and very close to Troy). All
along the promenade there, restaurants compete to offer the best version of sütlü balık (literally ‘fish
in milk’). Normally it’s done with fillets, but I always prefer to use whole fish if I can. I’ve included
celeriac here, because it adds a great flavour to the milk.

SERVES 4

1 celeriac
500 ml (17 fl oz/2 cups) milk
1 white onion
4 celery stalks
2 tarragon stalks
4 caperberries
1 snapper (about 1 kg/2 lb 4 oz), cleaned
2 tablespoons thickened (whipping) cream
250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) dry white wine
juice of 1 lemon
½ bunch chives
3 silverbeet (Swiss chard) leaves

Peel the celeriac and cut it into rounds about 1 cm (½ in) thick. Place the rounds in a bowl, add the
milk and leave to rest overnight in the fridge. Remove the celeriac from the bowl and pat fry with
paper towel. Reserve the milk.

Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F/Gas 4).

Slice the onion. Pick the celery leaves and tarragon leaves. Chop the stalks off the caperberries and
slice in half.

Clean and scale the fish, if necessary. Place the fish on a board and slice through the belly to open a
pocket for the stuffing. Stuff with celery and tarragon leaves, onion and caperberries.
Place the celeriac rounds on the bottom of a baking tray. Place the snapper on top. Mix the soaking
milk with the cream and white wine, and pour over the fish. Add the lemon juice and chives on top of
the fish. Cover with silverbeet leaves, then cover the baking tray tightly with foil. Bake for 40
minutes.

Serve the mercan buğulama on a serving platter, pouring any remaining juice over the fish, for people
to help themselves.
 THE OTTOMAN EXPERIMENT

Batur Durmay happily admits that his restaurant, Asitane, is an indulgence. ‘We didn’t open this place
to make a lot of money’, he says. ‘I just have to be sure I get it right.’ Getting it right means ensuring
the dishes on his menu are what you could have eaten had you been invited to a banquet with the
sultan at the Topkapi Palace around 1700.
Asitane was set up by Batur’s family in 1991 so they’d have an interesting place to take clients in
their primary business, which was making steel moulds for heavy industry. Batur, the most obsessive
foodie in a family of gourmets, was tasked with unearthing recipes that displayed the opulence and
diversity of one of the greatest empires in history.
He soon encountered a problem. Before the year 1844 (when the first cookbook in the Turkish
language was published), the Ottoman kitchen workers did not write down recipes. But they were
meticulous record keepers, giving names to every dish served at banquets and noting the ingredients
purchased for the pantry. Batur found a particularly helpful document from 1539 listing the 100 dishes
served at a circumcision ceremony for the sons of Süleyman the Magnificent.
He hired scholars to dig further into the palace records and chefs to theorise on how the ingredients
must have been combined and served, and ultimately came up with more than 300 dishes that he is
confident would be recognisable to a time traveller from the seventeenth century.
Modern Turks have an ambiguous relationship with the Ottoman Empire. They are proud that for
500 years, their ancestors were the fairly humane rulers of a collection of countries now called
Albania, Bulgaria, Egypt, Greece, Hungary, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Macedonia, Romania,
Saudi Arabia, Syria and Tunisia. They are annoyed that after 200 years of decline, the Ottoman
caliphs had become so decadent by the early twentieth century that they dragged Turkey into The First
World War on the wrong side, and ended up losing what was left of this great empire.
Whether they admire or disapprove, they are fascinated by the lavish lifestyle the Ottomans created
for themselves, especially since the success in 2011 of a TV melodrama called Muhteşem Yüzyil
(Magnificent Century), about the life of Sultan Süleyman the Magnificent. Batur was a food consultant
for the series.
The Istanbul eating scene is now enjoying an Ottoman revival. Batur estimates there are 200
restaurants that claim to serve the food of the emperors. Many of them think that all they have to do is
cook meats with dried fruits, or serve spiced rice in several colours, or give fancy names to standard
kebaps.
Some places have sent spies to Asitane, to steal Batur’s recipes. But Batur is fighting back.
Occasionally he includes a dish on his menu that contains typically Ottoman ingredients but has no
background in any scholarship. He invents a name that sounds as if it might have been used in the
sixteenth century, and then waits to see how long it takes for that name to appear on the menus of his
competitors. Then he has a little word to them about laziness and plagiarism.
Fortunately, he now has plenty of customers who recognise the work his researchers and cooks
have put into ensuring authenticity. Asitane has become so popular that he finds himself seriously at
risk of financial success.

Batur Durmay recreates dishes served to the seventeenth-century sultans at Asitane restaurant, in Istanbul’s historic Fatih district.
FİRİKLİ BILDIRCIN
SUPER FREEKEH QUAILS

My family used to keep quails in cages on the balcony of our apartment in Istanbul because my father
believed eating their eggs would help my stepsister’s asthma.
Quails are thought to have originated in China, but they were cultivated for food by the Egyptian
pharaohs and became popular in Anatolia during the Seljuk period (in the eleventh and twelfth
centuries). We don’t know how the Seljuks cooked them, because they weren’t big on written
records, but a few hundred years later, this recipe was created by the Ottomans, which explains the
carob glaze. Before the arrival of chocolate from the Americas in the seventeenth century, carob was
the sultans’ favourite sweetener. Nowadays, grape and pomegranate molasses have become more
fashionable than carob molasses, but I think the thick caramel flavour contrasts beautifully with the
smoky freekeh (which I’ve used as stuffing instead of the Ottomans’ rice).

SERVES 4

FREEKEH STUFFI NG
50 g (1¾ oz) green lentils
1 onion
2 tablespoons olive oil
250 g (9 oz) freekeh
1 teaspoon chilli flakes
1 tablespoon capsicum (pepper) paste
500 ml (17 fl oz/2 cups) chicken stock
1 tablespoon butter
pinch of salt
pinch of pepper

CO ATI NG
80 ml (2½ fl oz/1/3 cup) vegetable oil
4 tablespoons carob molasses
1 teaspoon hot paprika
5 sage leaves

8 quails
4 tablespoons butter

Soak the lentils overnight or simmer for 30 minutes, and then drain.
Finely chop the onion. Heat the olive oil in a frying pan over medium heat. Add the onion and fry for
5 minutes until soft. Add the freekeh and the lentils and fry for a further 3 minutes, stirring regularly.
Add the chilli flakes, capsicum paste, stock and butter. Stir thoroughly and bring to the boil, then add
the salt and pepper. Cover and simmer for 15 minutes. Remove from the heat and leave to rest,
covered, for 15 minutes.

Wash the quails. Sizzle 1 tablespoon of the butter in a frying pan over medium heat. Add the quails,
two at a time, and cook for 2 minutes on each side until the skin crisps up. Add a new tablespoon of
butter for each two quails. Leave to rest on paper towel.

Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F/Gas 4).

Using a tablespoon, stuff each quail with the freekeh and lentil mixture.

Now make the coating. Mix the vegetable oil, carob molasses and paprika together in a bowl. Finely
chop the sage leaves, add to the carob mixture and combine. Brush the quails thoroughly in the
coating, retaining a little of the molasses mixture to serve.

Pour 250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) of water into a baking tray. Sit the quails in the water. Bake for 25
minutes until golden brown. After 10 minutes of baking, spoon some of the liquid from the tray over
the quails to keep them moist.

Serve two quails per person, with a tablespoon of the molasses mixture drizzled over each plate.
KAVUN DOLMASI
STUFFED MELON WITH CHICKEN AND
CASHEWS

Melon has been one of the staples of Anatolian cuisine since Roman times, and was probably first
cultivated near what is now eastern Turkey. The Ottoman palace chefs apparently liked the theatre of
being able to lift the lid and expose the filling. They adopted the Persian fascination for mixing meat
and fruit, and mostly used lamb mince in the stuffing, but I think that’s too heavy for the delicate fruit,
so I changed it to chicken.
I like to use Galia melon (developed in Israel in the 1970s) because it’s almost perfectly round, but
if you can’t find it, go for rockmelon, and choose the smallest one you can find.

SERVES 4

50 g (1¾ oz) craisins (dried cranberries)

2 onions
10 parsley stalks
10 mint stalks
50 ml (12/3 fl oz) vegetable oil
75 g (22/3 oz) almonds
75 g (22/3 oz) cashews
300 g (10½ oz) chicken mince
1½ teaspoons salt
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
½ teaspoon allspice
½ teaspoon cinnamon
1 Galia melon, rockmelon or honeydew (about 1 kg/2 lb 4 oz)
2 tablespoons butter
50 ml (12/3 fl oz) olive oil

Put the cranberries in a bowl, cover with warm water and leave to soak for 15 minutes. Finely chop
the onions. Pick and chop the mint and parsley leaves.

Heat the vegetable oil in a frying pan over medium heat, add the onions and cook for 4 minutes. Add
the almonds and cashews, and fry for 1 minute. Add the chicken mince and fry for 5 minutes, stirring
regularly until the chicken is evenly golden brown. Add 1 teaspoon of the salt and the spices. Drain
the cranberries, add to the pan and stir. Remove the pan from the heat.
Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F/Gas 4).

Slice the cap off the melon, about 2 cm (¾ in) below the top. Scoop out and discard all the seeds.
Mix the butter with a pinch of salt and rub inside the cavity. Push in the stuffing mixture. Place the cap
back on, secured with two toothpicks. Rub the olive oil all over the outside of the melon and bake for
35 minutes.

Remove the cap and serve the whole melon at the table. Scoop out four servings, or slice into
quarters.
PERDELİ PİLAV
VEILED RICE

This is a kind of chicken and rice pie, which originated in Siirt, a city in southeastern Turkey. In the
classical version they simply mixed the chicken into the spiced rice and wrapped pastry around it, but
I find that quite dry.
It makes a spectacular presentation if you upend the pie and unveil layers of different ingredients
inside—caramelised onions on top, which keep the other layers moist, then a layer of shredded
chicken, and under that the spiced rice.

SERVES 4

FI LLI NG
125 ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) olive oil
10 brown onions
5 saffron threads
440 g (15½ oz/2 cups) medium-grain rice
1½ tablespoons butter
100 g (3½ oz) flaked almonds
1 tablespoon cinnamon
2 teaspoons allspice
2 teaspoons freshly ground black pepper

CHI CKEN STO CK

2 onions
2 carrots
1 small chicken (less than 1.8 kg/4 lb)
1 tablespoon salt

PASTRY
450 g (1 lb/3 cups) plain (all-purpose) flour, plus extra for dusting
250 g (9 oz) butter
3 eggs
½ teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons vegetable oil, for greasing
5 blanched almonds, halved

First, get the onion confit started for the filling. Heat the olive oil in a saucepan over low heat. Finely
slice the onions, add to the pan and fry, covered, for 10 minutes. Move the lid so it’s partly open and
simmer 1½ hours, stirring occasionally. The confit onions should reduce to half the size of the
uncooked onions.

Next, make the chicken stock. Halve the onions and carrots, and place in a large saucepan with the
chicken. Cover with salted water and boil, partly covered, for 30 minutes over medium–low heat.
Turn off the heat and transfer the chicken to a board. Leave to cool slightly. When the chicken is cool
enough to handle, strip off the skin and all the meat. Shred the meat into thin strands and set aside. Put
375 ml (13 fl oz/1½ cups) of the warm chicken stock in a bowl, add the saffron and set aside to soak.
Put the chicken skin and bones back in the pan and return to the heat. Simmer, without the lid, so the
stock reduces.

Now, make the ‘veil’. Sift the flour into a mixing bowl. Make a well in the middle. Melt the butter in
a frying pan over medium heat (or microwave for 30 seconds). Whisk the eggs in a bowl. Whisk the
butter into the egg, then whisk in the baking powder and salt. Fold the egg mixture into the flour and
knead for 5 minutes. Sprinkle some flour on your work surface and roll the dough into a ball. Return
the dough to the bowl, cover with a damp cloth and rest in a warm place for at least 30 minutes.

Now cook the rice. Rinse the rice under cold running water. Melt the butter in a medium saucepan
over medium heat. Stir in the flaked almonds, and fry for 2 minutes. Add the rice and toss it in the
butter for 1 minute, to coat. Remove the saffron threads from the bowl of stock and discard. Mix the
cinnamon, allspice and pepper into the saffron liquid. Add the liquid to the rice and stir. Add 500 ml
(17 fl oz/2 cups) of the simmering chicken stock. Bring the rice to a boil.

Reduce the heat and simmer, covered, for 15 minutes. Remove from the heat and leave to rest,
covered, for 15 minutes.

Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F/Gas 4).

Place the dough on a floured work surface. Roll into a round sheet about 60 cm (24 in) wide. Paint
half the vegetable oil inside a 25 cm (10 in) cake tin to grease well. Place the half almonds around the
bottom of the cake tin in any pattern you like. Line the tin with the pastry sheet so the sides of the sheet
come up and overlap the rim of the tin. There should be about 12 cm (4½ in) of pastry hanging over
the edge (this will be folded over the rice).

Remove the onion confit from the heat. Scoop out the onions with a slotted spoon and spread them
over the pastry in the tin. Add a layer of chicken meat over the onion, then spoon in the rice so it fills
to about 1 cm (½ in) below the rim. Fold the pastry over the rice. If it doesn’t completely cover the
rice, squeeze the pastry out with your fingers so it stretches across. Brush on the remaining vegetable
oil. Cook the ‘pie’ in the oven for 20 minutes until golden. Lift the cake tin out of the oven and turn the
pie out onto a baking tray. Put the baking tray in the oven and cook for another 10 minutes.

Serve the whole pie at the table, slicing it into eight wedges (two per diner).
ÖRDEK SARMA
DUCK AND SILVERBEET PARCELS

When I came to Sydney I found duck was a popular meat with Australians, and I started serving this
dish in winter. It is a modern variation of a Black Sea dish, where silverbeet is usually wrapped
around lamb mince and rice. There they’d never use duck, which is a meat cooked at home by the
wives of hunters, or freekeh, which is from the southeast. My justification for the change is that spit-
roasted duck was served in Istanbul at the circumcision ceremony for the son of Sultan Mehmet II, in
1457. That’s the rule: when challenged, quote the Ottomans.

SERVES 4

4 duck legs
1.5 litres (52 fl oz/6 cups) chicken stock
190 g (6¾ oz/1 cup) freekeh
2 tablespoons dried barberries (or cranberries)
1 red capsicum (pepper)
1 onion
1 garlic clove
2 tablespoons butter
2 tablespoons olive oil
4 tablespoons flaked almonds
125 ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) dry sherry
½ teaspoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon pimento
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
2 teaspoons capsicum (pepper) paste
2 teaspoons tomato paste
10 silverbeet (Swiss chard) leaves

SAUCE
2 garlic cloves
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 tablespoon smoked paprika
250 g (9 oz/1 cup) plain yoğurt

Put the duck legs and chicken stock in a large saucepan. Bring to the boil over medium heat, then
reduce the heat and simmer, covered, for 1 hour.
Remove the legs from the pan and place on a board to cool slightly. When the legs are cool enough to
handle, remove the meat. Put the skin, sinews and bones back in the pan and simmer, with the lid off,
for another 5 minutes. Remove from the heat.

Put the freekeh in a bowl and cover with 375 ml (13 fl oz/1½ cups) of warm strained stock. Leave to
rest for 30 minutes. Put the barberries in a bowl. Cover with warm water and leave to soak for 15
minutes. Halve the capsicum, remove the stalk and seeds, and finely chop. Finely chop the onion and
the garlic.

Melt the butter in a frying pan over medium heat. Add the olive oil. Add the flaked almonds and onion
and cook for 2 minutes. Add the garlic and fry for 1 minute. Add the duck pieces and fry for 2
minutes. Add the sherry, cinnamon, pimento, salt and pepper. Increase the heat to high for 3 minutes to
cook out the alcohol.

Put the capsicum and tomato pastes in a bowl, add 125 ml (A fl oz/½ cup) of the warm chicken stock
and stir to combine. Add the mixture to the duck and stir. Add the strained freekeh and capsicum to
the duck mixture, and stir. Bring to the boil, then turn off the heat. Strain the barberries and stir into
the duck and freekeh stuffing. Leave to cool, covered, for 10 minutes.

Wash the silverbeet leaves under cold running water. Put the silverbeet in a bowl and cover with
boiling water. Leave for 2 minutes, then plunge in iced water for 1 minute to refresh. Remove the
stalks. If the leaves are large, cut them in half (so you can make two parcels). You should have at
least ten leaf pieces. Put the two largest leaves aside (to line the bottom of the cooking pot). Place 3
tablespoons of the freekeh and duck mixture across each leaf, about 4 cm (1½ in) from the bottom.
Fold in the edges around the stuffing and tightly roll the leaf up. Repeat to make eight parcels.

Cover the bottom of a saucepan with the two reserved leaves. Place the eight parcels on the leaves.
Pour in the chicken stock to almost cover the parcels. Weigh the parcels down with a plate. Bring to
the boil, then reduce the heat and simmer, covered for 20 minutes.

Meanwhile, make the sauce. Crush the garlic. Heat the olive oil in a frying pan over medium heat.
Add the crushed garlic and paprika. Fry for 3 minutes, stirring constantly. Remove from the heat and
leave to cool. Transfer to a bowl and mix in the yoğurt.

Place a quarter of the yoğurt sauce on each plate. Scoop out the parcels with a slotted spoon then add
two to each plate and serve.
KABURGA DOLMASI
ROASTED LAMB RIBCAGE

This is a hearty dish, designed to entertain an extended family or lots of friends. It’s a speciality of the
beautiful southeastern city of Mardin, which was carved out of a sandstone mountain 6000 years ago.
I first tried this dolma at Cerciş Murat Konaği, Mardin’s most famous restaurant (now with a
branch in Istanbul), which also serves wine made from white cherry pits in clay jugs. Mardin’s
cooking has influences from the Kurds, the Assyrians and the Armenians.
Try to use spring lamb, which has sweeter flesh than a grown-up sheep. And you’ll need good
stitching skills, because tightly stitching the skin is important to keep the flavours inside the ribcage.

SERVES 8

2 kg (4 lb 8 oz) uncleaned lamb ribcage (skin on)

STUFFI NG
1 lamb liver (about 120 g/4¼ oz)
4 onions
80 ml (2½ fl oz/1/3 cup) olive oil
70 g (2½ oz/½ cup) pistachio kernels
440 g (15½ oz/2½ cups) coarse bulgur
1 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon freshly ground black pepper
2 tablespoons capsicum (pepper) paste
3 tablespoons craisins (dried cranberries)
2 teaspoons allspice
2 teaspoons cinnamon
15 basil leaves

CO ATI NG
20 oregano leaves
1 tablespoon plain yoğurt
1 teaspoon dried chilli flakes
1 tablespoon butter
½ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 tablespoon capsicum (pepper) paste

First make the stuffing. Remove and discard the skin from the lamb liver, and roughly chop into small
pieces. Finely slice the onions. Heat the olive oil in a frying pan over medium heat Add the onions
and cook for 3 minutes. Add the lamb liver and cook for 1 minute, stirring constantly, then add the
pistachios and bulgur and fry for 1 minute, stirring to coat. Add the salt and pepper and 250 ml (9 fl
oz/1 cup) of warm water, and stir.

Dilute the capsicum paste in 250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) of water, and add to the pan. Add the cranberries,
allspice and cinnamon. Cover and simmer over low heat for 10 minutes. Remove from the heat.
Finely chop the basil and stir into the mixture. Leave the mixture to rest for 10 minutes, covered.

On the wider side of the ribcage, lift the skin away from the ribs to create a pocket for the stuffing.
Push the stuffing into the cavity so the skin forms a dome. Stitch up the skin at the top. Ideally, you
should use what chefs call a ‘trussing needle’, but any large needle and strong thread will do. This
will stop the stuffing falling out during the boiling process.

Sit the stuffed ribcage in a large saucepan, ribs facing upwards, and pour in enough water to almost
cover. Bring to the boil and then simmer, covered, for 2 hours. Add more water after 1 hour, if
necessary.

Preheat the oven to 200°C (400°F/Gas 6). Transfer the ribcage to a board and leave to cool.

Finely chop the oregano leaves. Place in a bowl and mix with the yoğurt, chilli flakes, butter, salt,
pepper and capsicum paste. Spread the yoğurt paste over the ribcage. Place the ribcage in a baking
tray, skin side up, and roast for 20 minutes until it’s brown and crisp.

Serve the kaburga dolmasi on the tray at the table. Remove the stitches and discard the cotton. Carve
down the middle and open to reveal the stuffing. Spoon out the stuffing and add a chunk of meat for
each person.
ELBASAN TAVA
GOAT AND DATES IN BAKED YOĞURT

Along with cubed and deep-fried spiced liver, this goat stew is one of two famous Albanian dishes
that influenced the cuisine of Anatolia. It is named after the city of Elbasan, which means ‘crushing
fist’, presumably because Mehmet II built a huge fortress there to keep the Albanians under control in
the fifteenth century.
Strangely, you’d have a hard time finding either this dish or the fried liver in modern Albania,
where waiters are inclined to say ‘They do that in Turkey—we don’t do it any more’. It’s their loss. If
you can’t find goat, use lamb.

SERVES 4

835 g (1 lb 13 oz) plain yoğurt

3 French shallots (eschalots)
3 garlic cloves
500 g (1 lb 2 oz) goat (shoulder meat)
1 tablespoon butter
1 tablespoon black peppercorns
1 teaspoon salt
10 basil leaves
1 bay leaf
12 dates, pitted
500 ml (17 fl oz/2 cups) beef stock
3 egg yolks
450 g (1 lb/3 cups) plain (all-purpose) flour
1 tablespoon sweet paprika
mixed cress salad, to serve (optional)

Place the yoğurt on a sheet of muslin (cheesecloth) and tie up the corners. Hang the muslin over a pot
overnight to allow the yoğurt to thicken.

Quarter the French shallots. Finely chop the garlic. Remove any fat from the goat shoulder and cut the
meat into 3 cm (1¼ in) cubes. Melt the butter in a frying pan over high heat. Add the meat and fry for
2 minutes, turning to evenly brown. Add the shallots and fry for 2 minutes. Add the garlic,
peppercorns, salt, basil and bay leaf and fry for 2 minutes. Add 250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) of water. Bring
to the boil, then reduce the heat and simmer, covered, for 45 minutes. It should reduce and thicken.
Pour the goat stew into a casserole dish. Sprinkle the dates over the stew.
Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F/Gas 4).

Gently warm the stock in a saucepan to about 35°C (95°F). Put the egg yolks in a bowl. Sift in the
flour and whisk. Add the flour mixture to the yoğurt. Stir in the beef stock. Warm the yoğurt mixture
over low heat, constantly whisking, but remove it from heat as soon as you see bubbles forming (you
do not want it to boil). Pour the mixture over the meat and add the paprika. Place the casserole dish in
the oven and bake for 40 minutes.

Serve in the casserole dish at the table with a mixed cress salad, for people to help themselves.

Bodrum’s marina and the Castle of Saint Peter, a former Crusader fortress, at night.
DANA PİRZOLA
ROAST VEAL CUTLETS AND
CAULIFLOWER PURÉE

Cauliflower, which was known as ‘rose cabbage’ in Ottoman times, is much loved in Turkey—
pickled, sautéed or boiled for salads. But in the past, it was never puréed, and certainly never served
with parmesan. And you’d hardly ever encounter veal cutlets in Turkey—cattle are mostly used for
dairy farming, and the meat minced when the milk runs out.
So we’d have to call this an example of ‘the new Istanbul cooking’.

SERVES 4

250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) olive oil

4 thick veal cutlets
1 celeriac (or 3 potatoes)
2 carrots
1 onion
1 garlic bulb
4 French shallots (eschalots)
250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) dry red wine
2 tablespoons fennel seeds
4 thyme stalks
1 tablespoon salt
1 tablespoon freshly ground black pepper

CAULI FLO WER PURÉE

1 cauliflower
2 tablespoons butter
2 tablespoons plain (all-purpose) flour
125 ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) pouring (whipping) cream
1 teaspoon white pepper
1 teaspoon nutmeg
50 g (1¾ oz/½ cup) grated parmesan

DATE MO LASSES GLAZE

4 tablespoons butter
4 tablespoons date molasses (or grape molasses)
1 teaspoon ground cumin
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
½ teaspoon salt

Preheat the oven to 200°C (400°F/Gas 6).

Heat a splash of the olive oil in a frying pan over high heat. Add the cutlets and sear for 1 minute on
each side. Remove from the heat and set aside.

Skin the celeriac and roughly chop. Roughly chop the carrots. Quarter the onion. Quarter the garlic
bulb, leaving the skins on. Roughly chop the French shallots.

Pour the wine and remaining olive oil into a deep baking pan, then add the cutlets, in a single layer.
Spread the chopped vegetables, fennel seeds and thyme stalks over the cutlets. Sprinkle on the salt
and pepper and pour in enough water to cover the vegetables. Tightly cover the pan with foil and
bake for 3½ hours.

Meanwhile, chop the cauliflower into florets, discarding the stalk. Put the cauliflower in a saucepan,
cover with water and boil for 30 minutes over medium heat. Scoop out the cauliflower pieces with a
slotted spoon and transfer to a food processor. Pulse to a thick liquid.

Melt the butter in a saucepan over medium heat and stir in the flour. Continue to stir for 3 minutes to
remove any lumps. Pour in the cream. Stir for 2 more minutes to make a smooth sauce. Add the
cauliflower, white pepper and nutmeg. Whisk for 5 minutes over low heat. Add the grated parmesan
and whisk for another 5 minutes to make a smooth purée. Divide the purée among four plates.

Remove the baking tray from the oven. To make the glaze, melt the butter in a frying pan over low
heat. Scoop out 125 ml (A fl oz/½ cup) of the liquid from the baking tray and add it to the butter. Stir
in the molasses, add the cumin, pepper and salt. Lift out the veal cutlets, one at a time, and glaze them
in the molasses mixture, about 1 minute on each side.

Place one cutlet on top of the cauliflower purée and serve with the vegetables.
EFENDY BEĞENDY
BRAISED BEEF CHEEKS AND EGGPLANT
PURÉE

There are as many folk stories about the origin of Turkish dishes as there are combinations of lamb
and eggplant. The story I like about this dish is that it was served to the French empress Eugenie when
she passed through Istanbul on her way to the opening ceremony of the Suez Canal in 1869. Eugenie’s
personal chef got together with the sultan’s chef and added béchamel sauce to the original palace
recipe. It then was named Hünkar Beğendi (‘the sultan liked it’)—probably because all possible
combinations of the words for lamb and eggplant had been used up.
I solved the lamb-repetition problem by using beef cheeks (rare in Turkish cuisine) and I’ve
lightened the mash by not using flour. There are no sultans in Turkey any more, so I’ve changed the
Turkish title to ‘the gentleman liked it’, making this dish more democratic—if not gender-neutral.

SERVES 4

4 beef cheeks (about 180 g/61/3 oz each)

1 onion
1 green bullhorn pepper (or ½ green capsicum/ pepper)
1 garlic clove
3 tomatoes
100 ml (3½ fl oz) olive oil
50 g (1¾ oz) cumin seeds
200 g (7 oz) tomato paste
1 litre (35 fl oz/4 cups) beef stock
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) dry red wine
200 g (7 oz) green olives, pitted

EGGPLANT PURÉE
4 globe eggplants (aubergines)
juice of 2 lemons
120 g (4¼ oz) butter
300 ml (10½ fl oz) pouring (whipping) cream
1 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
200 g (7 oz) grated kaşar (or provolone)
½ teaspoon white pepper
1 teaspoon salt

Place the beef cheeks on a board and trim off any sinew or fat. Finely slice the onion. Remove the
stalk and seeds from the bullhorn pepper and roughly chop. Roughly chop the garlic and tomatoes.

Heat the olive oil in a large flame-proof casserole dish over medium heat. Add the onion and cumin
seeds and brown for 4 minutes. Add the chopped pepper and garlic, and fry for 2 minutes. Add the
fresh tomato and tomato paste and stir to combine. Add the beef stock, salt, pepper and red wine. Add
the beef cheeks, reduce the heat to low and simmer, covered, for 5 hours.

While the beef cheeks are stewing, pierce the eggplants with a fork and char the skins by placing the
eggplants directly onto the flame of your cook top. Using tongs, move the eggplant around to evenly
blacken and then remove from the flame.

Once the eggplants are cool enough to handle, scoop out the flesh into a large bowl. Discard the skin.
Add 1 litre (35 fl oz/4 cups) of water and the lemon juice. Leave to soak for 2 minutes, then remove
the eggplant, pat dry with paper towel and place in a colander to drain for about 10 minutes. Finely
chop.

Melt 100 g (3½ oz) of the butter in a frying pan over low heat. Add the eggplant pieces and whisk
together to make a mash. Add the cream, freshly grated nutmeg and grated kaşar. Add the white
pepper and salt. Simmer 5 minutes, stirring regularly. Divide the eggplant purée among four plates.

Add the olives to the casserole dish and continue to stew for 5 minutes. Remove from the heat. Put
250 ml (4 fl oz/1 cup) of the beef-cheek cooking liquid in a saucepan with the remaining butter and
boil over medium heat for 5 minutes to reduce.

Place one beef cheek on each plate. Drizzle a little of the reduced sauce over each cheek, and serve.
KUZU KAPAMA
LAMB SHOULDER PIE

The fashionable modern cooking style called sousvide, which involves cooking in a sealed bag,
echoes an old Ottoman technique. We’ve been using pastry to seal the flavour in meat and vegetables
for centuries—as evidenced by the title of this dish, which literally translates as ‘enclosed lamb’.
In this case, the lamb is sealed and cooked for so long the meat falls off the bone. I’ve been
inspired by the Australian meat pie, and made an edible dough.

SERVES 4

1 lamb shoulder (about 1.5 kg/3 lb 5 oz), bone in, shank removed
1 egg
1 tablespoon plain yoğurt

SPI CE RUB
2 garlic cloves
1 tablespoon sea salt
1 tablespoon sweet paprika
½ tablespoon ground cinnamon
½ tablespoon freshly ground black pepper
½ tablespoon lemon pepper
1 teaspoon ground aniseed
125 ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) olive oil

PO MEGRANATE GLAZE
125 ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) olive oil
1 tablespoon pomegranate molasses

PI E FI LLI NG
2 carrots
1 onion
2 garlic cloves
1 celeriac, peeled
5 small potatoes
2 cardamom pods
1 cinnamon stick
2 bay leaves
1 star anise
125 ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) olive oil
250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) dry red wine
1 litre (35 fl oz/4 cups) beef stock

PASTRY
½ teaspoon dry yeast
1 teaspoon sugar
300 g (10½ oz/2 cups) plain (all-purpose) flour, plus extra for dusting
2 sprigs thyme, leaves picked and finely chopped
1 clove garlic, crushed
1 teaspoon salt
zest of 1 lemon
50 g (1¾ oz) butter

Trim any large pieces of fat from the outside of the lamb shoulder. To make the rub, crush the garlic,
and mix in a bowl with the salt, spices and olive oil. Rub the mixture over the lamb, including in the
cavities. Rest the lamb for 20 minutes.

Now make the glaze. Heat the olive oil and the pomegranate molasses in a wide frying pan for 2
minutes over high heat. Place the lamb in the glaze and fry for 2 minutes on each side, caramelising
the glaze onto the meat.

Preheat the oven to 140°C (275°F/Gas 1).

To make the filling, roughly chop all the vegetables and place in a large pot with the cardamom pods,
cinnamon stick, bay leaves and star anise. Pour in the olive oil, red wine and beef stock to cover the
lamb. Cover with the lid and bake for 4½ hours until the meat is very tender. Remove the lamb from
the oven and cool to room temperature.

Meanwhile, make the pastry. Mix the yeast and the sugar in 375 ml (13 fl oz/1½ cups) of lukewarm
water and set aside for 5 minutes. It should start to form bubbles. Sift the flour into a mixing bowl,
make a well in the middle and pour in the yeast mixture. Knead the dough for 5 minutes or until the
dough is as soft as an earlobe. Mix the thyme, crushed garlic, salt, lemon zest and butter together, and
then add to the dough. Knead for a further 5 minutes. Sprinkle some flour on your work surface and
roll the dough into a ball. Return the dough to the bowl, cover with a damp cloth and leave to rest for
at least 1 hour. The dough should double in size.

Transfer the lamb and vegetables to a casserole dish. Increase the oven heat to 200°C (400°F/ Gas 6).

Roll the dough into a sheet big enough to cover the casserole dish, with an overhang of about 4 cm
(1½ in) on all sides. Separate the egg and heat the egg white. Paint the egg white around the rim and
outside edge of the dish. Drape the pastry sheet over the dish, and use the egg white to stick the
overhang to the sides. Mix the yoğurt with ½ tablespoon of water. Paint that yoğurt mixture over the
dough. Put the pie in the oven and bake for 15 minutes, or until the pastry is golden brown.

Slice the pie crust into four segments and put one on each plate, then scoop out a generous portion of
meat and vegetables to put on top of the pastry, and serve.
KUYRUK MANTI
STICKY OXTAIL DUMPLINGS WITH
YOĞURT BROTH

The most influential modern Middle-Eastern chef of our times is Greg Malouf. originally from
Melbourne and now based in Dubai. I am lucky to have him as a friend and mentor, and this is my
adaptation of his adaptation of the classic dumpling called manti for the traditional version). I love
the complexity of flavours and yet the simplicity of using gyoza wrappers, available in Asian
supermarkets, which saves hours of rolling pastry and folding it into tiny parcels. It’s a typical
example of Greg’s talent for blending traditional flavours with modern techniques and presentation.

SERVES 4

2 oxtail discs (about 120 g/4¼ oz each)

100 ml (3½ fl oz) olive oil
2 celery stalks
2 carrots
1 fennel bulb
2 onions
2 garlic cloves
2 teaspoons salt
2 teaspoons freshly ground black pepper
125 ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) dry sherry
1 tablespoon capsicum (pepper) paste
2 litres (70 fl oz/8 cups chicken stock
20 parsley leaves
10 coriander (cilantro) leaves
1 teaspoon ground fenugreek
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
½ teaspoon allspice
1 teaspoon ground cumin
1 teaspoon fennel seeds
1 packet gyoza pastry (about twenty 10 cm/ 4 in sheets), chilled
1 egg white
1 tablespoon cornflour (cornstarch)
1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar

SAUCE
½ garlic clove
250 g (9 oz/1 cup) plain yoğurt
pinch of salt
100 g (3½ oz) butter
1 tablespoon sweet paprika
1 tablespoon hot paprika
1 tablespoon dried mint

Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F/Gas 4).

Put the oxtail pieces in a baking tray with the olive oil. Roughly chop the celery, carrots, fennel, onion
and garlic and add them to the pan. Add half the salt and half the pepper. Cover with foil and bake for
2 hours.

Remove the tray from the oven and leave the oxtail to cool. Separate the meat from the bones. Shred
the meat. Finely chop the vegetables and mix with the meat.

Heat the oxtail mixture and sherry in a large frying pan over high heat for 5 minutes to cook out the
alcohol. Dilute the capsicum paste in 125 ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) of the chicken stock. Add the mixture to
the pan. Mix the parsley, coriander, fenugreek, cinnamon, allspice, cumin and fennel seeds with the
remaining pepper and salt in a bowl. Stir into the oxtail mixture. Reduce the heat and simmer for 3
minutes. Remove from the heat and leave to rest for 15 minutes.

Take the gyoza sheets out of the fridge 15 minutes before you want to use them. Mix the egg white,
cornflour and 250 ml (4 fl oz/1 cup) of water in a bowl. Take one gyoza sheet off the pile and lay it
on a board, shiny side up. Place 2 teaspoons of the oxtail mixture in the centre of the sheet. Dip your
finger in the cornflour liquid, and swipe it around the edge of the gyoza. Bring the edges together and
pinch them four times so the sides stick together, to make a roughly square parcel. Place on a tray and
repeat to make twenty parcels. Refrigerate the manti parcels, wrapped in plastic wrap, for at least 30
minutes.

When you’re ready to serve, put the remaining chicken stock in a saucepan and bring to the boil over
high heat. Add the apple cider vinegar, then add the manti. Cook for 5 minutes until the skin is
translucent.

For the sauce, finely crush the garlic and mix with the yoğurt and salt. Loosen the yoğurt with 2
tablespoons of the chicken stock.

Scoop the manti out of the pan and divide into four bowls. Liberally splash the garlic yoğurt over the
top.

Melt the butter in a frying pan over medium heat. Add the two paprikas and sizzle for 3 minutes.
Drizzle the paprika butter over each bowl, and decorate with dried mint. Serve.
KEŞKÜL
PALACE PUDDING

This gluten-free summer favourite is one of the oldest Ottoman recipes, derived from a dish called
Keşkül-ü Fukara (‘begging bowl’), which was generously served to the populace by the sultans to
celebrate war victories, religious holidays and other significant occasions.
The word keşkül means a bowl made out of a coconut half shell, which the dervish monks would
wear around their necks in the hope people might throw in donations (which would have been
difficult if they were whirling dervishes). Nowadays, the poor don’t need to go to the palace—they
can find versions of keşkül in pudding shops across Istanbul.
There are several traditional variations—some using only almonds, some using coconut flakes. I
like crushed pistachios to give a bright green colour and a crunchy texture.

SERVES 4

40 g (1½ oz) blanched almonds

40 g (1½ oz) pistachio kernels
250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) milk
250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) pouring (whipping) cream
100 g (3½ oz) sugar
25 g (1 oz) cornflour (cornstarch)
pashmak (Persian fairy floss) and pomegranate seeds, to decorate (optional)

Put the almonds in a food processor and pulse finely. Pulse the pistachios separately.

Put the milk and cream in a saucepan and mix. Heat over medium heat, then add the sugar. Cook for 2
minutes, then whisk in the almond meal. Continue to whisk for 2 minutes, then scoop out 125 ml (4 fl
oz/½ cup) of the mixture into a bowl. Whisk the cornflour into the bowl, and then slowly add to the
cooking mixture, whisking constantly.

Continue to whisk, and bring to the boil. Add the pistachios, reduce the heat and simmer for 3
minutes, whisking. When the mixture starts to thicken, remove from the heat and leave to cool to room
temperature.

Divide the keşkül mixture into four bowls or cups. Refrigerate for 3 hours to set. Remove from the
fridge, decorate with pashmak and pomegranate seeds, if you like, and serve.
KITIR KABAK
CRUNCHY PUMPKIN WITH TAHINI

Long before molecular gastronomy was all the rage, Turkish chefs were using chemistry to create
sweets and jams. By soaking hard-shelled fruits and vegetables in quicklime, they’d soften the
interior and crystallise the exterior. The most common cases for treatment were watermelon rinds and
unripened figs, eggplants, walnuts and olives.
You can’t use quicklime in food preparation these days, but you can get a similar effect with
pickling lime or burnt lime (calcium hydroxide). You must still be careful to wash off all traces of the
chemical before you start the cooking.
This dish is a speciality of Antakya in the southeast, where they use tahini as an accompaniment,
under the influence of their Syrian neighbours.

SERVES 6

150 g (5½ oz/1 cup) calcium hydroxide (burnt lime)

½ blue pumpkin (winter squash)
1 kg (2 lb 4 oz) caster (superfine) sugar
2 cardamom pods
2 cloves
2 cinnamon sticks
135 g (4¾ oz/½ cup) tahini
115 g (4 oz/1 cup) chopped walnuts
125 ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) thick (double) cream
1 tablespoon ground cinnamon

Put the calcium hydroxide in a bucket with 10 litres (2 gal) of water. Leave to settle overnight.

Skim any skin off the surface of the bucket of water and discard. Scoop 3 litres 105 fl oz/ 12 cups) of
water from the top, without disturbing the sediment at the bottom, and transfer to a large bowl.
Discard the rest of the liquid. Peel the half pumpkin and cut into about thirty square pieces, roughly 4
cm (1½ in) across and 1 cm (½ in) thick. Put the pumpkin in the bowl and soak for 24 hours.

Thoroughly wash the pumpkin under cold running water for 5 minutes. Put any pumpkin offcuts in the
bottom of a wide saucepan, then spread the pumpkin squares on top. Add the sugar. Close the lid and
leave to rest for another 24 hours.

Crack the cardamom pods. Add all the spices to the pumpkin and sugar mixture. Put the pan over
medium heat and cook for 5 minutes with the lid off. Cover with the lid, reduce the heat and simmer
for 20 minutes. Remove the lid and boil for 5 more minutes on high heat. Remove from the heat and
leave to cool. Discard the cloves, cardamom pods and cinnamon sticks.

To serve, stack five squares of pumpkin on each plate, in a pattern that pleases your eye. Drizzle
tahini over the top. Mix the cream and cinnamon together in a bowl. Add 1 tablespoon of the cream
mixture on top of each pumpkin pattern, sprinkle with walnuts and serve.
AYVA TATLISI
POACHED QUINCES WITH SOUR CHERRIES
AND CLOTTED CREAM

You could have eaten this dish 2000 years ago in Anatolia. The world’s first cherry growing and the
world’s first quince growing happened there. Writings from 72 BC discuss how the military leader
Lucullus brought a cultivated cherry to Rome from a part of the empire called Pontus in northeastern
Anatolia. The Romans at the time were happy to combine it with their quinces stewed in honey.
The Ottoman chefs made a habit of stewing fruits with sugar syrup and combining them with
kaymak. The secret here is to cook very slowly and include the skins and the cores of the quinces
while simmering, to enhance the pink colouring the Ottomans loved.

SERVES 4

100 g (3½ oz/½ cup) frozen sour cherries

4 quinces
juice of 1 lemon
1 cinnamon stick
5 cloves
660 g (1 lb 7 oz/3 cups) sugar
16 walnut kernels
125 g (4½ oz/½ cup) kaymak (or thick/double cream)

Take the cherries out of the freezer about 1 hour before you want to serve the dish.

Peel the skin off the quinces and reserve the skin. Halve the peeled quinces, lengthways, and remove
the hard cores. Reserve the cores.

Put the lemon juice and 1 litres (35 fl oz/4 cups) of water in a bowl. This will stop the quinces from
going brown.

Lay the quince skins, shiny side down, in the bottom of a wide saucepan. Place the cinnamon stick,
cloves and cores on top. Put the quinces, cut side up, on top of the spices. Put 3 tablespoons of the
sugar on each quince half. Pour 500 ml (17 fl oz/2 cups) of water into the pan around the quinces,
being careful not to cover the quinces or wash the sugar off. Put the lid on the pan and simmer for 1
hour until the quinces are pink and soft.

Mix 110 g (3¾ oz/½ cup) of the sugar with about 25 sour cherries. Take the lid off the pot and place
three cherries in each half quince. Cover again and simmer for 30 minutes. Remove from the heat and
leave to cool for 30 minutes—with the lid off if the quinces are soft, lid on if the quinces are still
slightly firm.

Place the quinces on a serving platter. Put two walnuts on top of each quince.

Add a dollop of kaymak or thick cream on top of each quince. Drizzle about 1 tablespoon of the
cooking liquid over the quinces and serve.
KÜNEFE
BUFFALO MOZZARELLA AND PISTACHIO
PASTRY

There is constant debate about the ownership of this dish between the neighbouring cities Antakya,
Adana and Mersin. I prefer to eat the Antakya version (bigger and cheesier), but I will not take sides
in the origin argument, because all three cities have many citizens of Syrian ancestry and there are
versions of this dish all over the Arab world. So the Turkish ownership debate maybe academic.
There are cheeses made in those towns specifically to go inside künefe. The challenge in making
the dish outside Turkey is to find the right cheese—fresh, low in salt and able to ooze when heated. I
like to use buffalo mozzarella.

SERVES 4

SYRUP
440 g (15½ oz/2 cups) sugar
1 tablespoon lemon juice

PASTRY
300 g (10½ oz) fresh buffalo mozzarella (or unsalted mozzarella)
500 g (1 lb 2 oz) kadayıf pastry
200 g (7 oz/1 cup) ghee
125 ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) grape molasses
70 g (2½ oz/½ cup) finely ground pistachios

First make the syrup, so it has time to cool. Put the sugar and 500 ml (9 fl oz/2 cups) of cold water in
a saucepan and bring to the boil over medium heat. Reduce the heat and simmer for 8 minutes. Add
the lemon juice and simmer for 1 more minute. Remove from the heat and leave to cool to room
temperature.

Roughly chop the mozzarella. Roughly cut the kadayıf pastry into chunks. Put the pastry in a bowl with
half the ghee and mix with your hands until completely combined. Divide the buttered pastry into two
balls.

Brush the grape molasses and a little ghee onto the base of a frying pan (or divide into smaller frying
pans to make individual künefe). Spread half the pastry over the pan, pressing it down with the
(clean) base of another pan. Spread the mozzarella evenly over the pastry, and spread the other half of
the pastry over the mozzarella. Press down again on the second layer of pastry.
Place the pan over medium heat. After about 6 minutes, as the bottom is turning golden brown, turn the
künefe out onto a plate, and then put it back into the pan with the uncooked side down. Cook the
second side for a further 4 minutes. Turn off the heat and slice the künefe into four segments. Pour the
cold syrup over the segments.

Divide the künefe between each plate, sprinkle with pistachios and serve.

Across Turkey, restaurants with 500 seats are not uncommon. This one is Bayazhan in Gaziantep.
İNCİR & KAYISI DOLMASI
WALNUT-STUFFED FIGS AND ALMOND-
STUFFED APRICOTS

More than half the world’s dried figs and dried apricots come from Turkey, so of course we have to
stuff them. Turkey is the fourth-biggest producer of walnuts in the world, and the number-eight almond
producer. So of course they’d be the best nuts for the stuffing.

SERVES 4

500 ml (9 fl oz/2 cups) milk

1 cinnamon stick
4 cloves
8 dried figs
60 g (2¼ oz/½ cup) walnuts
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
2 tablespoons grape molasses
2 tablespoons sugar
8 dried apricots
1 tablespoon almond meal
1 teaspoon icing (confectioners’) sugar
2 tablespoons pouring (whipping) cream
2 tablespoons pistachio kernels

Heat the milk, cinnamon stick and cloves in a saucepan over medium heat and bring to the boil.
Remove from the heat. Remove the stalks from the figs. Rest the figs in the warm milk for 30 minutes.

Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F/Gas 4).

Roughly chop the walnuts. Remove the figs from the milk with a slotted spoon and place on a board.
Open the figs with a teaspoon and stuff 1 teaspoon of chopped walnuts inside. Mix the oil and
molasses together in a bowl and then brush over the figs. Place the figs on a baking tray and cook for
10 minutes until soft. Remove from the oven and leave to cool.

Meanwhile, put the sugar and 250 ml (9 fl oz/ 1 cup) of water in a saucepan and bring to the boil.
Add the apricots, reduce the heat and simmer, covered, for 15 minutes. Remove from the heat and
leave to cool. Remove the apricots from the syrup and leave to drain on paper towel.
Mix the almond meal, icing sugar and cream together in a bowl. Make a pocket in each apricot with a
teaspoon and stuff 1 heaped teaspoon of the cream and almond mixture inside. Use the teaspoon to
smooth the exposed stuffing. Finely chop the pistachios and roll the cream side of each apricot in the
pistachio pieces.

Serve two figs and two apricots per person.

DONDURMALI HELVA
SEMOLINA HELVA WITH RASPBERRY
ICED YOĞURT

This is not a deconstruction of a traditional dish, but a sensible reconstruction of a bastardised one.
Some fashionable restaurants in Istanbul are now serving ice cream (either vanilla or sahlep) covered
with a dome of warm semolina helva. Some of them even name it ‘Sultan’s helva’ to add vintage
credibility. I don’t get it. For me, a good semolina helva should be warm and crumbly, so you can’t
make a dome out of it. And a good ice cream should be firm and cold, not half melted.
I’ve made the assumption that most home cooks don’t have an ice cream machine, so I’ve explained
here how to make what the Italians call a semifreddo, using raspberries and yoğurt.

SERVES 4

I CED YO ĞURT
6 eggs
220 g (7¾ oz/1 cup) sugar
500 ml (9 fl oz/2 cups) whipping cream
2 tablespoons plain yoğurt
1 punnet (200 g/7 oz) raspberries

HELVA
200 g (7 oz) butter
2 tablespoons pine nuts
285 g (10 oz/1½ cups) fine semolina
250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) milk
220 g (7¾ oz/1 cup) sugar

First make the iced yoğurt. Separate the eggs. You are going to use all six yolks and three of the
whites. Blend the egg yolks and the sugar together in a bowl. Put the cream in a kitchen mixer and
blend until thick. Fold the egg yolk mixture into the cream. Whisk three egg whites until peaks form.
Gently fold into the yolk mixture. Fold in the yoğurt. Finally, fold in the raspberries, reserving a few
to serve.

Line four cups (half-filled if you want dome shapes), a rectangular tray (if you want to slice the iced
yoğurt to serve), or any container you prefer, with plastic wrap, making sure the wrap overhangs the
sides. Using a wooden spoon, push the mixture into the moulds and then place in the freezer overnight.
About 30 minutes before you want to serve this dessert, make the helva. Melt the butter in a frying pan
over medium heat. Add the pine nuts and cook for 3 minutes, tossing constantly to evenly brown. Add
the semolina and brown for 10 minutes, stirring constantly.

In a separate pan, mix the milk, sugar and 250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) of water, and bring to the boil over
low heat. Immediately pour the boiling mixture over the semolina and continue to stir for about 10
minutes, until all the liquid is absorbed.

To serve, put one iced yoğurt dome (or a thick slice) on each plate and surround it with warm helva.
Decorate with fresh raspberries and serve quickly, so the iced yoğurt does not melt.
GÜLLAÇ
RAMADAN RICE-PAPER BAKLAVA

Güllaç is thought to be the original form of baklava, which was turned into a more elaborate dish by
the chefs in the palaces of the Ottoman sultans. For eleven months of the year in Turkey it is almost
impossible to find sheets of güllaç—a fine dried pastry made of cornflour (cornstarch). That’s
because it’s an ingredient associated with the banquet served after sunset during the fasting month of
Ramadan.
I used to serve güllaç in my restaurant for one month of the year. Then Owen, a Chinese chef who
had worked with me since I opened my restaurant, showed me a round of rice paper that was readily
available in all Asian supermarkets. It’s smaller than the traditional güllaç sheets, but combined with
milk, rosewater and nuts, it makes a desert which, to me, tastes even better than the cornflour version
and is probably healthier. It’s also appropriate that a Chinese person was responsible for my
improved recipe. The first recorded mention of güllaç in the world was in a fourteenth century
Chinese text called Yinshan Zhenyao, written by a doctor of Turkish origin in the court of the Yuan
dynasty.

SERVES 4

75 g (22/3 oz/½ cup) hazelnuts

75 g (22/3 oz/½ cup) pistachios
500 ml (9 fl oz/2 cups) milk
110 g (3¾ oz/½ cup) sugar
½ teaspoon rosewater
½ pack (12 sheets) rice papers, about 20 cm (8 in) wide
25 pomegranate seeds

Using a grinder or a food processor, coarsely crush the hazelnuts. Finely crush the pistachios.

Put the milk and sugar in a saucepan over low heat and gently heat for 5 minutes to combine, being
careful not to let the mixture boil. Remove from the heat and stir in the rosewater.

Put 2 tablespoons of the milk mixture in a deep round serving dish, then layer the rice papers, one at a
time, shiny side up. Spread 2 tablespoons of warm milk mixture over each sheet as you go.

After the first three layers, sprinkle on half the hazelnuts. After three more layers, sprinkle on half the
pistachios. After three more layers, sprinkle on the other half of the hazelnuts and, three layers after
that, sprinkle on the remaining pistachios. Sprinkle the pomegranate seeds over the pistachios. Put the
lid on the dish, then refrigerate for 1 hour.

Slice the milky baklava into quarters and then serve chilled.
KAHVELİ SUPANGLE
ZUPPA TURCA WITH CHOCOLATE
CUSTARD

The Italians use the term zuppa inglese (English soup) for a dessert made with custard and sponge
finger biscuits (known to the English as trifle). The French use the term crème anglaise for what the
English call custard. In Turkey, the dish called supangle (pronounced ‘soup anglais’) is made with
slices of sponge and chocolate custard. Therefore I feel entitled to torture the language further by
calling my mixture of chocolate custard and coffee-soaked biscuits zuppa turca.

SERVES 4

ZUPPA TURCA
2 teaspoons Turkish coffee
50 g (1¾ oz) sugar
30 ml (1 fl oz) mastic liqueur (or white Sambuca)
30 ml (1 fl oz) Kahlua
12 sponge finger biscuits (also called ladyfingers or, in Turkey, cat’s tongues)

CHO CO LATE CUSTARD

500 ml (9 fl oz/2 cups) milk
110 g (3¾ oz/½ cup) sugar
2 egg yolks
3 tablespoons cornflour (cornstarch)
1 tablespoon plain (all-purpose) flour
3 tablespoons dark cocoa
150 g (5½ oz) dark chocolate (70 per cent cocoa)

DECO RATI O N
1 tablespoon ground pistachios
½ tablespoon shaved coconut
12 roasted coffee beans

First make a Turkish coffee in a cezve or small saucepan with 70 ml (2¼ fl oz) of water, the Turkish
coffee and 1 teaspoon of the sugar. Place a piece of muslin (cheesecloth) in a tea strainer. Strain the
coffee through the muslin four times, to remove all the grains.

Now make a sugar syrup. Stir the remaining sugar and 80 ml (2½ fl oz/1/3 cup) of water together in a
saucepan over medium heat. Bring to the boil, then reduce the heat and simmer, uncovered, for 5
minutes. Remove from the heat and leave to cool to room temperature.

Combine the coffee with the mastic liqueur, Kahlua and sugar syrup. Spread the sponge fingers in a
single layer in a baking dish. Pour over the coffee mixture and then rest in the fridge for 30 minutes.

To make the topping, warm the milk in a saucepan over low heat. Add the sugar to 125 ml (4 fl oz/ ½
cup) of the warm milk mixture in a bowl and whisk in the egg yolks and two flours, until smooth. Pour
the egg yolk mixture into the pan, stirring constantly. Add the cocoa. Simmer for 5 minutes, stirring
constantly. Shave the chocolate into the mixture and stir. As soon as the chocolate has melted in, turn
off the heat.

Place a layer of soaked sponge fingers in the bottom of four pudding bowls (glass, ideally). Pour the
chocolate mixture over the top.

Chill the bowls in the fridge for 1 hour. Decorate with shaved coconut, roasted coffee beans and
pistachios, and serve.
The pebbly shoreline and a big high tide at the end of the day in Bodrum.
HİNDİ GÖĞSÜ
TURKEY PUDDING

This is a kind of answer to the question, ‘Do they cook with turkey in Turkey?’ The normal answer is
‘not often’, and then only on New Year’s Eve in westernised families. There is, however, a
traditional Ottoman desert called tavuk göğsü, apparently with ancient Roman origins, that uses
shredded chicken breast. I decided to see if turkey breast would work as well.
But first let’s talk about the bird. It originated in South America, and the first Europeans who saw it
thought it was a form of guineafowl—a game bird they imagined came from Turkey. So they brought it
to England under the name ‘turkey fowl’. The French thought it came from India, so they called it
dinde (which translates as from India’). When the bird first arrived in Turkey, it was known as
Egyptian fowl’, but the Turks later followed the French and ‘corrected’ the name to hindi, which
means ‘Indian’. In India, the bird is called peru, which is the closest to its real origin.
Anyway, the bird under any name works better than chicken in this dish, because of its bland taste,
and we can safely call this a turkey pudding as well as a Turkey pudding.

SERVES 6

1 turkey breast (the fresher the better)

1 litre (35 fl oz/4 cups) milk
1 vanilla pod
220 g (7¾ oz/1 cup) sugar
2 tablespoons cornflour (cornstarch)
2 tablespoons rice flour
1 teaspoon butter
2 pieces mastic crystal
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

Wash the breast under cold running water for 2 minutes. Pat dry with paper towel, then wrap in
plastic wrap and freeze overnight.

Put the frozen turkey breast in a saucepan, cover with water and boil for 50 minutes over medium heat
until fully cooked. Transfer the turkey to a bowl of iced water for 1½ hours. Change the iced water
every half hour, rinsing the breast each time. Put the turkey in the freezer for 1 hour to chill. Remove
and set aside for 1 hour.

Shred the rested turkey meat into hair-thin pieces, discarding any thicker, tougher shreds. (It’s no
problem if you have to discard half the breast.)
Put the milk in a large saucepan. Slit the vanilla pod and add to the milk. Add the sugar. Warm for 5
minutes over medium heat. Scoop 250 ml (9 fl oz/1 cup) of the milk into a bowl, add the cornflour
and rice flour and whisk to combine. Pour the flour mixture into the pan, constantly whisking. Add the
butter and mastic, and whisk for 2 minutes, or until the mixture thickens. Remove the pan from the
heat. Remove the vanilla pod and discard. Add the turkey shreds. Whisk for 5 minutes. Pour the
mixture into a 20 x 30 cm (8 x 12 in) baking tray and rest in the fridge for 3 hours to set.

Remove the tray from the fridge. You should now have a soft rectangular mat. Slice along the mat,
once, and across the mat twice, to make six slabs. Transfer the slabs onto six plates. Use a spatula to
fold each slab in half. Decorate with cinnamon powder and serve cold.
 SOMER SUGGESTS…

This is not a definitive list of the ‘best’ visiting experiences in Istanbul, but a rough guide to the
places I like to visit when I return to my home town. Bear in mind that Istanbul is divided by the
Bosphorus Strait, between ‘the European side’ and ‘the Asian side’. I grew up on the Asian side (in
the waterside suburb of Kadıköy). Most tourists stay on the European side, which is their loss.

FOR BREAKFAST

Van Kahvaltı Evi is the restaurant that started the big breakfast phenomenon in Istanbul. Arrive early
and arrive hungry! I’m yet to see anyone yet who can clear the entire meal, but it’s the best
introduction to the eastern Turkish way of starting the day.
Address: Defterdar Yokuşu No. 52/A, Cihangir, Beyoğlu
Phone: 0212 293 6437

Çakmak Kahvaltı Salonu is one of the oldest breakfast houses in the Beşiktaş area, still pumping with
locals and a few tourists who discovered this gem. It specialises in clotted cream with honey, local
cheeses, eggs with spicy sausage and kavurma (a kind of meat stew) and it stays open for brunch and
lunch.
Address: Akmaz Çeşme Sokak No. 20, Beşiktaş
Phone: 0212 227 25 65

Kale Café opened in 1982 and started the trend of breakfast on the Bosphorus—classics such as
mememen or eggs with sucuk. Views are to die for.
Address: Yahya Kemal Cad. No. 2 Rumelihisarı
Phone: 0212 265 6563
Website: www.kalecafe.com

FOR LUNCH

Çiya means not one but three restaurants under the command of Musa Dağdeviren, whose research
and skill put regional Anatolian food on the map long before any other chef in Turkey cared for it. The
three Çiyas alone are enough reason to visit the bustling markets of Kadıköy, but I suggest you sample
the many food wonders there, if you have any room left after Musa’s menu.
Address: Caferağa Mh., Güneşli Bahçe Sk No. 43, Kadıköy
Phone: 0216 330 3190
Website: www.ciya.com.tr

Kantin has a beautiful room, style and service, but it’s the uncompromising honesty of Şemsa
Denizsel’s food, based on season and freshness, that impress me most in this local bistro in the posh
suburb of Nişantaşi.
Address: Akkavak Sokaği No. 30, Nişantaşı
Phone: 0212 219 3114
Website: www.kantin.biz

Hacı Abdullah is a traditional Ottoman/home-style eatery, run for 120 years by the same family. Their
olive oil-braised vegetable dishes (zeytinyağlılar) are particularly good.
Address: Ağa Camii Atıf Yılmaz Cad. No. 9/A Beyoğlu
Phone: 0212 293 8561.
Website: www.haciabdullah.com.tr

Sultanahmet köftecisi Selim Usta is a cheap and delicious lunch pit-stop for köfte (meatballs), in the
middle of the tourist hub called Sultanahmet, the oldest part of the city.
Address: No. 12 Divanyolu, Sultanahmet. Phone: 0212 520 0566
Website: www.sultanahmetkoftesi.com

FOR KEBAPS

Çiya Kebap is one of Musa Dağdeviren’s three restaurants in Kadıköy, offering char-grilled treats
that change with the season and are authentic to their region of origin.
Address: Caferağa Mh., Güneşli Bahçe Sk No. 43, Kadıköy
Phone: 0216 330 3190
Website: www.ciya.com.tr

Antiocha is a small but very popular char-griller in the grungy and trendy area of Asmalımescit, with
no reservations, specialising in the kebaps of southeastern Turkey.
Address: Asmalı Mescit Mah. Minare Sokak No. 21 Beyoğlu.
Phone: 0212 292 1100
Website: www.antiochiaconcept.com
Zübeyir caters for people who love to sit around the grill and receive whatever the chef passes over
the counter.
Address: Şht. Muhtar Mh, Beyoğlu
Phone: 0212 293 3951

FOR SEAFOOD

Poseidon offers top views of the Bosphorus, creatively grilling delicious local fish such as lufer,
kalkan and levrek. Like anything in the affluent suburb of Bebek, it’s expensive. You can also dine at
the Bebek Balıkçısı next door, if Poseidon is booked out.
Address: Cevdet Paşa Cad. No. 58 D:1 Küçük Bebek
Phone: 212 287 9531
Website: www.poseidonbebek.com

Karaköy Balıkçısı—Grifin has a beautiful vista of the old city and the Bosphorus, and has served
high-quality fish and mezes for ninety years.
Address: Tersane Cad. Kardeşim Sk No. 30
Phone: 212 243 4080
Website: www.tarihikarakoybalikcisi.com

Bebek Balıkçısı is at Cevdet Paşa Cad. No. 26 Bebek

Phone: 212 263 3447
Website: www.bebekbalikci.net

İsmet Baba, on the Asian side of the Bosphorus, has a less spectacular view but great atmosphere:
wooden walls, fish nets, pictures of generations of owners and local customers who look older than
the restaurant (founded in 1951).
Address: Carsi Cad. iskelesi Yanı 1A, Üsküdar, Kuzguncuk
Phone: 0216 341 3375
Website: www.ismetbaba.com.tr

PUDDINGS AND PASTRIES

Özkonak is one of the few pudding shops that still use real chicken breast in their tavukgöğsü pudding.
The chicken-free version, called kazandibi (bottom of the pan), is ideal for the less adventurous.
Address: Akarsu Caddesi 46B, Cihangir
Phone: 0212 249 1307

Markiz, in the tradition of the Orient-Express era, is one of the longest surviving Parisian style
patisseries in Istanbul.
Address: İstiklal Cad. No. 360-362, Beyoğlu
Phone: 0212 245 8394

Güllüoğlu Baklava Shop in Karaköy is justly famous as one of the most authentic baklava houses
outside Gaziantep.
Address: Katlı Otopark Altı, Karaköy
Phone: 0212 293 0910
Website: www.gulluoglu.biz

MEZE TIME

Imroz is the most interesting meyhane in a district where many meyhanes have second-rate food and
gypsy musicians blowing trumpets in your ear.
Address: Nevizade Sk. No. 24 Balıkpazarı/ Beyoğlu
Phone: 0212 2499073
Website: www.krependekiimroz.com

Sofyalı 9 is my local when I visit Istanbul, because the food is consistent and it’s away from the
bustle of the main Beyoğlu district.
Address: Asmalımescit Cad. Sofyalı Sk. No. 9 Beyoğlu
Phone: 0212 252 3810
Website: www.sofyali.com.tr/en/

Koço is a typical Greek meyhane, with the surprise of a small church inside the building. It was a
drinking place for my grandad and my dad. I had many rakı-filled nights there and probably my son
will follow the family tradition when he is of age.
Address: Moda Cad. No. 171 Kadıköy
Phone: 0216 336 0795
Website: http://kocorestaurant.net

Despina was a rare breed of female meyhane owner, who opened her place in 1946. Madame
Despina is dead now, but her place kicks on with live traditional Turkish music every night.
Address: Açıkyol Sk. No. 9, Kurtuluş
Phone: 0212 247 3357

Duble mezebar is on the terrace of the Palazzo Donizetti Hotel in the historic Pera district, famous for
modern mezes (well translated on the English menu), cool crowd and wonderful views.
Address: Palazzo Donizetti Hotel, Asmalımescit Caddesi No. 55, Kat 7, Beyoğlu
Phone: 0212 2440188

WINE TASTING

Sensus Şarap & Peynir is a wine, cheese and olive oil shop in a basement under the Anemon Hotel
near the Galata Tower. They claim to have 300 Turkish wines available for tasting, along with
interesting snacks to line the stomach.
Address: Bereketzade Mah. Büyükhendek Cad. No. 5, Galata
Phone: 0212 245 5657

FOR DINNER

Mikla is the best known 'New Anatolian’ fine diner in the city, created by Mehmet Gürs on top of the
Marmara Pera Hotel. Go just before sunset and have panoramic pre-dinner drinks on the rooftop.
Address: The Marmara Pera Hotel, Meşrutiyet Cad.Tepebaş Beyoğlu
Phone: 0212 293 5656
Website: www.miklarestaurant.com

Yeni Lokanta translates as ‘new bistro’, but its chef, Civan Er, ran the famous Changa restaurant
before switching to a more relaxed style.
Address: İstiklal Caddesi Kumbaracı Yokuşu No. 66, Beyoğlu
Phone: 0212 292 25 50
Website: www.lokantayeni.com

Asitane is the best and most authentic of the Ottoman revival restaurants, located next door to Kariye
museum.
Address: Derviş Ali Mh., Kariye Cami Sk No:6, 34240 Edirnekapı.
Phone: 0212 534 8414
Website: www.asitanerestaurant.com
neolokal is the creation of Maksut Aşkar, who is brave enough to display his team in an open kitchen,
creating light adventurous dishes with a focus on regionality and sustainability.
Address: SALT Galata Bankalar Cad. No. 11, Karaköy
Phone: 0212 249 8930
Website: www.neolokal.com

STREET FOOD

The eating never stops in Istanbul. There are street sellers with queues around the block at 4 o’clock
in the morning. But the best of late dining is in places called işkembeci—offal eateries that sell
everything from tripe soup to whole roasted sheep’s head.
There are iskembeci in every neighbourhood, generally open from dusk till dawn. The best is Apik
in the suburb called Dolapdere. This is not a tourist destination, so you should go there in a cab, have
your soup, and get out of there in a cab.
My favourite street-hawker dish is kokoreç, a kind of sausage made with sheep intestines spiced
with chilli flakes, oregano and cumin..
Other stalls sell midye dolma—fresh mussels in their shells, stuffed with aromatic rice.
And then of course there’s simit, sourdough pretzels dipped in molasses and sesame, which cure
the munchies at any time of the day.
And these are the top three foodie things to do that don’t involve eating.
The Spice Market is overwhelmingly touristy with hagglers and pushy storekeepers, but an oasis
can be found at Area 51—Bilge Kadıoğlu’s Ucuzcular shop. Bilge is the only female shop owner and
speaks perfect English. She does not have higher prices for tourists and the quality of her spices is
exceptional.
The Topkapı Palace kitchens keep closing for renovations, but they are supposed to be opened in
2015.
Kadıköy Market is not your average shopping mall. It’s crammed with specialist shops selling nuts,
pickles, offal, oils and pastries.

WHERE TO STAY

Expensive: If you’re rich and have an interest in twentieth-century history, try the Pera Palace in
Beyoğlu, where the travellers on the Orient Express, including Agatha Christie, stayed in the 1920s.
www.jumeirah.com/en/hotels-resorts/istanbul/pera-palace-hotel-jumeirah.

Also at a high price, you might prefer a former prison, the Four Seasons in Sultanahmet
(www.fourseasons.com/istanbul), or a former Ottoman palace, Ciragan Palas, on the Bosphorus
Website: www.kempinski.com/en/istanbul/ ciragan-palace/welcome

Medium price (and stylish design): There are four House Hotels, in Bosphorus, Galatasaray,
Nisantasi and Karakoy.
Website: www.thehousehotel.com

IN GAZIANTEP

Metanet, near the central market, is a lokanta where you can eat fiery lamb soup (beyran) for
breakfast, and where they also do an excellent lahmacun (thin-crust pizza) closer to lunchtime.
Address: Kozluca Mahallesi, Kozluca Cad. No: 11
Phone: 0342 231 4666

Yörem, under a suburban apartment block a short cab ride from the old town centre, is where Hatice
Kalan serves a variety of home-style dishes, including the legendary storyteller soup (yuvalama).
Address: İncilipınar Mah. 3. Cad. 15. Sk. Ali Bey Apt. No.2/C
Phone: 0 342 230 5000.

Zekeriya Usta is where Mehmet Ozsimitci makes crisp katmer pancakes stuffed with pistachios and
clotted cream. He closes at midday. It’s in an arcade in the new part of Gaziantep, so you’ll need to
get a cab and show these details.
Address: Katmerci Zekeriya Usta. Çukur Mahallesi, Körükçü Sk, B. Hilmi Geçidi 16/C-D, Gaziantep
Phone: 0342 230 0971

Ali Haydar makes liver kebaps for breakfast. He opens at 6 am, closing before 8 am just on the
outskirts of the castle.
Address: Yaprak Mh. Dere Kenarı Sk, Tabakane Mevkii

İmam Çağdaş does great kebaps and perfect baklava near Gaziantep’s central market.
Address: Uzun Çarşı 49, Sahinbey
Phone: 0342 231 2678

IN BODRUM
Orfoz, just off the main beach, is where the Bozçağa brothers play endless variations on local seafood
in convenient meze portions.
Address: Kumbahçe Mah. Cumhuriyet Cad. No.177B
Phone: 0252 316 4285
Website: http://www.orfoz.net

No longer grinding flour for pide, these eighteenth century windmills are scattered over the hills behind Bodrum, on the Aegean coast.
Istanbul’s Hagia Sophia and surrounding mosques at dusk.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I want to offer my thanks to ...

David Dale, for taking a chance on me and on Turkish cuisine. And to Susan Williams and Millie
Dale, for allowing me to borrow David for weeks at a time.
Janni Kyritsis, the Greek chef who introduced the Turkish chef to the Italophile author.
My wonderful wife Ash and children Deniz and Derin, for being the reason I do this.
My mother Ülkü, who taught me to fly and my father Güngör who taught me to land. My two sisters,
Begüm and Çiğdem, living so far away yet so close to my heart.
Ace photographer Bree Hutchins for endangering her life and her digestive system countless times
to get the best possible shots.
The team at Murdoch Books: editing whiz Emma Hutchinson; designers Hugh Ford and Sarah
Odgers; stylist Michelle Noerianto; Publisher Diana Hill. And, of course, Sue Hines who had the
vision to get this show on the road.
The loyal team at Efendy: my brother-in-crime Fatih Külle and our head chef Bektaş Özcan; go-to
guy Utku Görmez; my kitchen assistants during the shoot Burak Yildirim and Owen Wang and all past
and current staff contributing to the success of Efendy.
Musa and Zeynep Dağdeviren, who run three Çiya restaurants in Istanbul and produce the magazine
Yemek Ve Kültür (Food and Culture). Their website is http://ciya.com.tr/index_en.php.
Greg Malouf, mentor and friend, who paved the way for my generation of chefs to professionalise
Middle Eastern, Turkish and Greek cuisines in Australia.
For sharing their scholarship with us: Filiz Hösükoğlu (in Gaziantep); Aylin Öney Tan (Istanbul);
Nilhan Aras (Istanbul); Tuba Şatana of istanbulfood.com.
For inspiring us with their specialties: Akife Malkoç (Istanbul); Melek Boz (Bodrum); İvgen Özön
(Bodrum); Bercuk Anne (Sydney); Meral Ballı (Istanbul); Fouad Kassab (Sydney); Ayşe Sencer
(Istanbul); Arman Uz (Kiama); Ömer Mutlugun (Malatya).
For opening their kitchens to us: Batur Durmay of Asitane; Ezgi Güven of Ayna of Cunda Island,
Ayvalik; Mehmet Gürs of Mikla, Istanbul; Şemsa Denizsel of Kantin; Maksut Aşkar of neolokal;
Civan Er of Yeni; Pando Şestakof of Pando’s, Istanbul; Ali Haydar, the liver master of Gaziantep;
Mehmet Özsimitci, the katmer master of Gaziantep; Mustafa Hasırcı, the beyran master of Metanet;
Hatice Kalan of Yörem; Çağlar and Çağrı Bozçağa of Orfoz; the ladies of Sacide, Bodrum; the Bingöl
family of Miam, Bodrum; Kanat Kıral of Bodrum Lokum.
For showing us their work: Mehmet Tembel (in Oğuzeli); Aydin Kilitoğlu of Asri Bakery,
Gaziantep; Telat, Burhan and Telat Jr Çağdaş of Imam Çağdaş, Gaziantep; Enis Güner of Sevilen
wines.
For their hospitality: Timur Schindel of Anatolian Houses, Gaziantep; Lucio Galletto of Lucio's;
Armando Percuoco of Buon Ricordo and Nour Atalla of Darling Diner.
These books informed and entertained us:
 500 Years of Ottoman Cuisine, by Marianna Yerasimos (Boyut)
The Sultan's Istanbul on Five Kurush A Day, by Charles Fitzroy (Thames & Hudson)
World Food Turkey, Dani Valent (Lonely Planet)
Western Anatolia Wine Culture, by A. Nedim Atilla(Bilgi)
Osmanli Mutfağı, by Tuğrul Şavkay (Şekerbank)
Kaz dağları'ndan bir lezzet öyküsü, by Erhan Şeker (AMK)
Osmanlı Mutfak Sözlügü, by Priscilla Mary Işin (Kitap)
Tatlı-pasta Öğretimi, by Ekrem Muhittin Yeğen (Inkilap)

And above all, to the many peoples of many ethnicities, faiths and philosophies who enriched the
food culture of Anatolia.
INDEX

A
Afyan
almonds
almond-stuffed apricots
in Anatolia
cookies
and grape soup
truffles
Anatolia, history of
apple and cinnamon tea
apricots
almond-stuffed
kebap
and walnut dolmas
Armenian chickpea domes
artichokes with broad beans
Asitane
Asri Bakery
aşure (Noah’s Ark pudding)
Atatürk, Mustafa Kemal
Aubergines see eggplants
ayran
minted yoğurt shake

B
baharat (spicing)
baking (firin)
baklava
Black Sea rolled
filo pastry for
hazelnut and milk
pistachio
rice-paper
barberries
basil lemonade
bazlama
beans (pulses)
in Anatolia
artichokes with broad beans
baked with spice-cured beef
broad bean pâté
fava purée
Noah’s Ark pudding (aşure)
soaking
white bean and tahini salad
beef and veal dishes
beef cheeks with eggplant purée
and bread stew
beef goulash
cured meat see pastirma
dumplings see mantı
eggplant stuffed with beef
lamb and beefball soup
meatballs see köfte
pastry with see böreks
veal cutlets with cauliflower purée
veal kebap
veal liver
bici bici
biscuits see cookies
Black Sea cornbread with leeks and whitebait
Black Sea fondue
Black Sea rolled baklava
Bodrum eating places
böreks
beef and chilli
cigars with feta and parsley
feta and kale
half moon with beef and chilli
Kurdish-style with hazelnuts
lamb and peas
pastırma
rolled with spinach and feta
yufka pastry for
boza ‘beer’ with toasted chickpeas
breads
bazlama
Black Sea cornbread with leeks and whitebait
bread and beef stew
ekmek
pide see pide breads
poğaça
simit
breakfast, regional variations in
bream, vodka and mustard-cured
brioche, Balkan-style, stuffed with potato and chilli
buffalo mozzarella
bulgur
in Anatolia
mint and cucumber salad
pilav
shells

C
calamari
calcium hydroxide (pickling lime)
capsicum (bullhorn peppers)
capsicum salça
capsicum sauce
carob molasses
carrot and beetroot juice
carrot and coconut balls
carrot and saffron dip
cashew and chicken stuffing
casserole, prawn and haloumi
cauliflower purée
caviar
celeriac milk
celeriac with quince and orange
Cerciş Murat Konaği
cheeses see also feta
in Anatolia
buffalo mozzarella
four cheeses with pide bread
 goat’s cheese and zucchini salad
haloumi and prawn casserole
cherries
cherry stuffed vine leaves
mahlep
with poached quinces
chestnuts, leeks stuffed with chicken and
chicken dishes
chicken and yoğurt soup
chicken kebap with prune orzo
Circassian chicken
leeks stuffed with chicken and chestnuts
melon stuffed with chicken and cashews
rice, veiled
yoğurt soup with chicken
chickpeas
in Anatolia
Armenian domes
and dumpling stew
humus
Noah’s Ark pudding (aşure)
chill and capsicum butter
chill and capsicum salsa
chilles in Anatolia
chocolate custard
chocolate dates
Circassian chicken
clay pot cooking
clotted cream
cocktails
cookies see also desserts
almond
fork biscuits
Kavala
Ottoman donuts
semolina domes
cooking equipment
cooking glossary
cooking techniques
cornbread, Black Sea, with leeks and whitebait
courgettes see zucchini
cream, clotted
cream and soy sauce
Cretan eggs with wild weeds
currants
custard, chocolate

D
dates
chocolate
date molasses glaze
desserts see also cookies
almond truffles
baklava see baklava
buffalo mozzarella and pistachio pastry
burnt milk and mastic pudding
carrot and coconut balls
chickpea domes
chocolate dates
figs, sleeping
Noah’s Ark pudding (aşure)
palace pudding
pancakes see pancakes
pumpkin with tahini
quinces poached with sour cherries
rice pudding, saffron layered
semolina helva with raspberry iced yoğurt
strawberry and rose snow cone
zuppa turca with chocolate custard
dip, saffron and carrot
dolma (stuffed)
almond-stuffed apricots
apricot and walnut
eggplant stuffed dried
garfish in vine leaves
lamb ribcage roasted
sour cherry-stuffed
spice mix
stuffing technique
 walnut-stuffed figs
dondurma
döner kebap
donuts, Ottoman
drinks
apple and cinnamon tea
basil lemonade
boza ‘beer’ with toasted chickpeas
çay
cocktails
herbal teas
minted yoğurt shake
pickled carrot and beetroot juice
wild thyme tea
drying (kurutma)
duck and silverbeet parcels
duck and sour cherry gözleme
dumplings see mantı

E
Efendy (Balmain)
eggplant
in Anatolia
charred salad
purée
smoked eggplant kepab with lamb
stuffed dried
stuffed with beef
stuffed with peppers and tomatoes
eggs
Cretan, with wild weeds
poached
scrambled
spicy sausage with
ekmek
ezme

F
feta
 in Anatolia
and kale börek
nettle and feta fritter
watermelon and feta salad
figs
in Anatolia
and hazelnut salad
sleeping
walnut-stuffed
filo
firin (baking)
fondue, Black Sea
fork biscuits
freekeh in Anatolia
freekeh stuffing
fritter, nettle and feta
fruits see also apricots; cherries; dates; figs; pmegranate
melon stuffed with chicken and cashews
orange and wild thyme salad
quinces, poached, with sour cherries
watermelon and feta salad

G
garfish in vine leaves
garlic in Anatolia
garlic sauce
garlic shoots
Gaziantep eating places
Gaziantep pistachio nuts
ghee
goat and dates in baked yoğurt
goulash, beef
gözleme
gözleme, duck and sour cherry
grains
bulgur see bulgur
freekeh in Anatolia
freekeh stuffing
lamb and barley porridge
 purslaine and ancient grains stew
rice see rice dishes
grape and almond soup
grape leather stuffed with walnuts
green bean pickles
green olive and walnut salad

H
halva see helva
hamsi
havyar
hazelnuts
in Anatolia
and fig salad
Kurdish-style börek with
and milk baklava
helva
in Anatolia
semolina, with raspberry iced yoğurt
herbs in Anatolia
humus

I
incini
islak
Istanbul
eating places
lokantas
spice market
Izmir

J
jams
juice see drinks

K
kadayif pastry
kahve see Turkish coffee
kangaroo pastırma
Kantin
katmer
pistachio pancakes with clotted cream
Kavala cookies
kaymak
clotted cream with rose jam
Kayseri
kebap (grilling)
chicken with prune orzo
lamb and smoked eggplant
lamb with barbecued salad
liver
loquat
sole skewered with braised fennel
veal
keşkek
köfte (kneading)
lamb and beefball soup
red lentil
soggy burger
spice mix
technique 36
veal with rice and eggs
veal with white bean and tahini salad
venison tartare
kurutma (drying)

L
labne (minted yoğurt balls)
lamb
in Anatolia
and barley porridge
and beef dumplings
and beefball soup
kebap and smoked eggplant
kebap with barbecued salad
liver kebaps
pastry with see böreks
 ram’s eggs
ribcage roasted
and rice soup
sheep’s head soup
shoulder pie
spicy lamb topping
leblebi
leeks in Anatolia
leeks stuffed with chicken and chestnuts
lemonade, basil
lentils
red lentil and bulgur soup
red lentil meatballs
lime, pickling
lime marinade
liver, veal
liver kebap
lokanta
lokum
Turkish delight
loquat kebap

M
mackerel with barberries
mahlep
mantı (dumplings)
beef
and chickpea stew
lamb and beef
oxtail with yoğurt broth
maraş.
meatballs see köfte
melon stuffed with chicken and cashews
meyhane
meze
midnight express
Mikla
milk and mastic pudding
mint in Anatolia
mint yoğurt
mozzarella, buffalo
muhallebici
Muhammara sauce
mullet, red, pan-fried with okra
mullet roe
mussels stuffed
mussels with tarama
mustard dressing

N
narito
nettle and feta fritter
Noah’s Ark pudding (aşure)
nuts see almonds; hazelnuts; pistachio; walnuts

O
octopus grilled
offal
kokoreç
lamb liver stuffing
liver kebap
ram’s eggs
sheep’s head soup
veal liver
okra
olive and walnut salad
onions in Anatolia
orange and wild thyme salad
Orfoz
Ottoman donuts

P
palace pudding
pancakes
gözleme, duck and sour cherry
pistachio with clotted cream
Pando
paprika butter
parsley in Anatolia
parsley salad
pasta
egg with walnut and bottarga
orzo pilav
prawns, crunchy
pastane
pastırma
in Anatolia
böreks
eggs with
kangaroo
salmon and baby zucchini
white beans baked with
pastry see also baklava; böreks
in Anatolia
filo
gyoza
kadayif
for lamb shoulder pie
pistachio
rice-paper
for veiled rice
water
yufka
pâté, broad bean
pepper salça
peppercorns in Anatolia
peppers, bullhorn
pickles, fried green bean
pickling lime
pickling technique
pide breads
in Anatolia
baking
finger pide
with four cheeses
with spicy lamb topping
pie, lamb shoulder
pistachio
 in Anatolia
baklava
pistachio pastry and buffalo mozzarella
poğaça
pomegranate
deseeding
dressing
glaze
humus with spicy sausage
molasses
porridge, lamb and barley
prawn and haloumi casserole
prawns, crunchy
puddings see desserts
pulses see beans (pulses); chickpeas; lentils
pumpkin with tahini
purslaine and ancient grains stew

Q
quails, freekeh stuffed
quinces, poached, with sour cherries

R
Ramadan rice-paper baklava
restoran
rice dishes
in Anatolia
rice pilav
rice pudding saffron layered
rice veiled
standard fillings with
rocket salad
rose jam
rose petals, candied
rose syrup

S
saffron and carrot dip
saffron layered rice pudding
salads
bulgur, mint and cucumber
celeriac with quince and orange
eggplant charred
fig and hazelnut
green olive and walnut
lamb kebaps
parsley
red onion and sumac
rocket
sumac
tomato, walnut and sumac
watermelon and feta
white bean and tahini
wild thyme and blood orange
zucchini and goat’s cheese
saiça
chilli and capsicum
paste-making process
pepper saiça
salep
salmon pastırma and baby zucchini
salsa see salça
sardine birds
sarma (rolled, rolling technique)
sausage see sucuk
scallops with kangaroo pastırma
scorpionfish soup
seafood dishes
in Anatolia
bottarga with pasta and walnut
bream, vodka and mustard-cured
calamari
garfish in vine leaves
mackerel with barberries
mullet, red, pan-fried with okra
mussels stuffed
mussels with tarama
octopus grilled
prawn and haloumi casserole
 prawns, crunchy
salmon pastırma and baby zucchini
sardine birds
scallops with kangaroo pastırma
scorpionfish soup
snapper whole in celeriac milk
sole skewered with braised fennel
squid with green chillies
whitebait and Black Sea cornbread with leeks
whiting sandwich with tarator
Selim Usta
semolina domes
semolina halva with raspberry iced yoğurt
semolina helva with raspberry iced yoğurt
sesame rings
shakes see drinks
sherbet
silverbeet parcels
simit
sesame rings
snapper whole in celeriac milk
snow cone, strawberry and rose
sole skewered with braised fennel
soups
chicken and yoğurt
cold almond and grape
çorba
lamb and beefball
lamb and rice
red lentil and bulgur
scorpionfish
sheep’s head
yoğurt with chicken
soy and cream sauce
spice rub
spicing (baharat)
spring onions
squid with green chillies
stews
bread and beef
 dumplings and chickpeas
purslaine and ancient grains
stewing (tencere) technique
strawberry and rose snow cone
sucuk (spicy sausage)
in Anatolia
with eggs
sumac salad
sweets see desserts

T
tahini, pumpkin with
tarama sauce
tarator
teas see drinks
tencere (stewing) see stews
terbiye
tomato, walnut and sumac salad
tomato paste
tomato sauce
topik
Turkey
history of
Turkish alphabet and pronunciation
turkey pudding
Turkish coffee (kahve)
Turkish delight

V
Van breakfast
veal dishes see beef and veal dishes
vegetable casserole
vegetarian dishes see also salads
chickpea domes
eggplant stuffed with peppers and tomatoes
purslaine and ancient grains stew
sour cherry-stuffed vine leaves
vegetable casserole
water pastry with feta and kale
 zucchini flowers, stuffed
venison tartare
vine leaves, sour cherry-stuffed
vodka and mustard-cured bream

W
walnuts
paste
sauce
walnut-stuffed figs
watermelon and feta salad
wheat, roasted
whiting sandwich with tarator

Y
yoğurt
broth
goat and dates in
iced raspberry
labne (minted balls)
making
mint
minted shake
sauce
soup with chicken
and tahini topping
Yörük people
yufka pastry

Z
zucchini
in Anatolia
and dill topping
flowers, stuffed
and goat’s cheese salad
patties
zuppa turca with chocolate custard
Published in 2015 by Murdoch Books, an imprint of Allen & Unwin

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