So, let's go try Turkish cuisine. In this article, we will tell you about the cuisine of Turkey, and of course, we will present the recipe for cooking the most famous juicy meat dish in Turkey - kebab. We will also tell you about drinks, salads, vegetables and sweets.
Let's start with the history of Turkish cuisine. Let's plunge into history a little. There are many parables about the history of the kitchen, but no one has told us any reliable information. Some say that everything comes from Ottoman cuisine, others say from Balkan cuisine, and still others - that from Middle Eastern cuisine.
We can confirm one thing for you, any recipe for cooking a dish contains spices and seasonings, as well as fresh herbs and actually grown vegetables. It follows that the roots of Turkish cuisine originate from the eastern continent. And do not forget that Turkish cuisine is the progenitor of many cuisines of the world, such as Western European cuisine, Central Asian cuisine and others ...
Mmir of Turkish flavors and aromas at breakfast
Breakfast in Turkey does not start very early, at about 7-8 o'clock in the morning. According to Turkish tradition, there should be boiled eggs, cheese with butter, tomatoes, olives, red peppers, cucumbers, and honey... Let's talk a little about olives. Many people mistakenly believe that in addition to olives, olives are also grown in the world. In fact, the division into olives (green) and olives (black) exists only in Russia. Believe it or not, they are one and the same product.
On one of the excursions to the historical city called Phaselis, the Turkish guide told us very interesting facts about olives. It turns out that Israel has long been considered the birthplace of olives. It is here that the best varieties of this fruit are grown. The difference between green and black olives is their ripeness. By the way, you will not believe it, but there are about 300 varieties of olives in the world. And when you see black olives in a store, you should know that they are dyed olives.
Let's go back to breakfast. We forgot to mention Turkish spicy sausage, which no breakfast is complete without, and you can also be served bread products with fancy names:
Pita is a thick yeast-dough tortilla, also served with baked cheese or meat ingredients.
Simit are regular sesame bagels.
Lahmajun is the so-called Turkish medium baked pizza, which contains both vegetables and minced meat. By the way, as a rule, it is cooked very spicy, so beware of trying this in the morning.
Gozleme is a regular flatbread made from thinly rolled dough stuffed with cheese and spinach.
Berek - small baked bagels. They are prepared from lavash and cut into small triangles filled with cheese, herbs and spices.
After breakfast, tourists usually go to sleep or sunbathe on the beach under the hot Turkish sun. With regard to tanning, we advise you to sunbathe from 10 to 12 in the morning, and in the afternoon only after 4 in the evening. More likely to get sunstroke!
Lunch on traditional Turkish cuisine
It is 12 o'clock in the afternoon, which means it’s time for lunch. Turkish cuisine at lunchtime is transformed into completely different ingredients. Meat dishes for lunch in Turkey are served mainly from poultry meat, since other types of meat are very expensive in the country. Many important are lentil or beef offal puree soups... Also on the table you can see: eggplant with garlic, tomatoes, beans, different types of nuts (especially pistachios)... From spices: parsley, black and red peppers, cumin, mint, thyme.
A special ingredient in Turkish cuisine is everyone's favorite eggplant... Not a single meat dish is complete without it. As a feature, we can find Turkish kebab with eggplant, or as it is called in Turkey - kebab. Eggplants are added in large quantities to salads, as well as appetizers and even jam.
No Turkish cuisine lunch is complete without fresh fruit: apples, grapes, figs, watermelon, plums, melon and more. A selection of fruits for every even the most sophisticated taste. From drinks you will be offered compote from sour plum, very tasty.
The time after lunch starts to go very slowly. The world of tourists seems to be dying out, the street becomes empty, and the sun begins to really warm up, so it is simply not possible to sunbathe. Until the evening, we usually whiled away the time in the pools with water slides in hotels.
At 6 pm and Turkish resorts at sunset begin to come to life and prepare for dinner.
Dinner and traditional Turkish cuisine
Dinner in Turkish cuisine is necessarily accompanied by a meat dish, usually kebab or baked fish grilled (anchovies, sardines and other types depending on the time of the season). In combination, baked vegetables are served with meat, for example tomatoes, beans or spinach.
You can also taste the traditional mutton, which in our time is only a small part of Turkish cuisine, once cooking lamb on a spit was a very important ceremony at some holiday, but now it is a rare occurrence due to the high cost of meat. And here pork you will not find here, as you are spending your vacation in a Muslim country.
From drinks to your choice wine (white or red). But we have already told you how to choose the right wine for meat in the article about the choice of wine.
For dessert, to your surprise, a very large assortment of sweets is presented:
Baklava - dough sweets soaked in fruit syrup with pistachio sprinkles.
Revani is a pie made from semolina and soaked in sweet syrup.
Lokum is a 100% oriental dish made from cubes of honey with sugar, with the addition of dried fruit filling or with different types of nuts.
Helva is a sesame and sugar paste with the addition of cocoa.
Syutlach - rice and thick porridge with the addition of vanillin.
Pekmez is a syrup made from a thickened grape extract.
Quince tatlysi - quince cut in half is cooked in syrup, then after cooling it is served with kaymak (very thick Turkish cream).
Kabak Tatlysy - boiled pumpkin with sugar
Gyllach is a dessert dish made from filo rice dough, impregnated with milk and ground walnuts, decorated with pomegranate seeds.
Lokma - ordinary balls of dough, deep-fried and poured with sugar.
Jezerye is a jelly dessert based on carrot syrup, pomegranate juice or other fruit jelly sprinkled with pistachios.
You will be interested to learn about tips and where it is better to go to rest in Turkey, in our separate section about the country.
Kebab recipe at home
Now, as promised, the recipe for cooking kebab at home:
We take fatty lamb and onion... Do not try to add eggs and bread, this is a cutlet, but Turkish, here everything is different. TO lamb with onions we add spices: black pepper, garlic, cilantro and Little basilica... Now we pass the lamb through a meat grinder and knead it with our hands for a very long time and throw it on the table with force. This breaks apart the fibers of the meat and gives it a delicate flavor and also imparts viscosity.
As soon as the minced meat becomes viscous, we begin to put it on a skewer. It is imperative to fry only on coals and without a flame. At home, of course, a kebab cooked in the oven will not be as aromatic as on charcoal, but we compensate for this disadvantage with spicy oriental sauces dzatziki or curry paste... We serve necessarily with pita bread, tomatoes and fresh salad.
So our journey through Turkish cuisine has come to an end, we hope that we have brought to you all the fabulous aroma of Eastern Turkish cuisine and reinforced with knowledge about some Turkish dishes. You can read about other exciting travels on our website with all the tips for travelers - travel-picture.ru
