I have no legitimate excuse for my long absence. School got crazy, life got busy, and then all of a sudden it was spring break. My friend Lauren and I decided to go to Beirut and Istanbul, but at the last minute our plans were diverted. Higher powers forced us to abandon our excursion to Lebanon and the decision was made to spend the whole week-long break in Istanbul. As disappointing as it was, a week in Istanbul is not exactly a bad alternative. In fact, I was soon to discover it was probably the best possible alternative. To make up for my lack of posting, this one is a monster.
I am in love with Istanbul. I am pretty sure everyone who I have ever talked to who has visited that city has felt the same. The atmosphere is enchanting, the energy intoxicating, and the history prolific. I took over 750 pictures, some of which are posted on Facebook for those who have access and are interested. If you aren't on Facebook but want to see them, leave a comment with your email address and I will send them! We did so much in our short time there, crammed each day with sights and adventures, I could easily write 10 posts just about what we did each day. Lauren is actually probably going to do this on her blog, so those who are interested can
check it out. But that is not the purpose of this blog. And truly one of my favorite things about Istanbul was the food. So, instead of boring you with the details of my days, I am going to elaborate on the spectacular culinary sensations I experienced in this great city.
Let's begin the way you begin meals in Turkey:
the Mezze
Mezze are small dishes sometimes served as appetizers and sometimes just eaten together as the meal itself. Mezze are great because they let you try a bunch of different things without decimating your wallet or your stomach. Mezze are similar throughout the Middle East, but with each country putting their own spin on classic dishes and always at least one or two "national" dishes
. Babaghanoush, hummus, and tabbouleh are some of the most common and also the ones non-Middle Easterners are likely to be familiar with. But in this part of the world, mezze don't stop there. Everything from salad, cheese, and meats can be served as mezze. In my last post, I wrote about kusa and warek. Both of these are often served as mezze. In Turkey, these kinds of dishes (vegetables stuffed with rice or ground meat) are known collectively as dolma. One of the best restaurants I ate at in Turkey (a classic Ottoman restaurant just off Istaklal Street called Haci Abdullah) listed "mixed dolmas" as a menu item. Being unable to chose from the plethora of mezze options, Lauren and I ordered this. A familiar plate arrived at our table:
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| Kusa and Warek in Jordan, Dolmas in Turkey, Mahshi Wara' inab in Egypt, and Stuffed Grape Leaves and Lebanese Zucchini in America |
The warek (which was listed as Stuffed Zucchini on the English menu) was prepared almost identically to how my host mother prepared it on that first day. Slightly more garlicky and boasting a bit more meat, they were delectable. The grape leaves served at this particular restaurant were not anything to write home about, but on our first night in Istanbul Lauren and I stumbled upon a little Circassian restaurant, called Ficcin, right off Istiklal and ordered several mezze here as well. Our selection included grape leaves, eggplant with tomato and yogurt, and Circassian chicken.
Lauren's favorite was the chicken, but I was partial to the grape leaves. They were different than those I have had anywhere else. Quite often the downfall of this dish is the grape leaves themselves. The leaves are often purchased in jars, packed in a briny solution that can make the grape leaves almost intolerably sour. Indeed, Lauren was convinced she didn't like grape leaves, but then she tried these. The inevitable sourness that comes from the leaf was mellowed and delicately balanced by a surprising sweetness to the filling. Turkish preparation of this dish often contains small raisins or currants in the stuffing, along with pinenuts and occasionally cinnamon. While not overpowering, the sweet stuffing offers the perfect counterbalance to the wrapping. While not the most delicately prepared version of this dish I ever had, the taste was far superior.
Many of the mezze in Turkey make ample use of one of this region's favorite vegetables:
Eggplant
For those of you who have been following this blog from the beginning,
I did a post a while back about my version of a classic Turkish dish, Imam Baylidi. I had been inspired by a meal I had with my family in a Turkish restaurant in Washington, D.C. (Cafe Divan). I can now say I have had the real deal! And it was different from both previous dishes. And it was delicious. The most prominent difference was the addition of green pepper and some sort of nut in the stuffing. But the most important elements of the dish have been the same through all the variations: slightly sweet, incredibly silky eggplant, savory stuffing, and an pool of olive oil surrounding it.
Eggplant was featured in most of the meals we had in Turkey. Despite our excessive ingestion of this versatile vegetable, Lauren declared towards the end of our trip that she wanted to only eat eggplant for the rest of the trip. We didn't do that exactly, but we incorporated it into almost every meal we had.
One of our favorite eggplant dishes was part of a meal we had at a classic Turkish eatery:
The Lokanta
The most common kind of Turkish eatery, a Lokanta essentially functions like a cafeteria. When you enter the establishment, your eyes are met with an overwhelming amount of food. Heaping trays sit in rows enticing you with inviting aromas and colors. To say you are flush for choice would be an understatement. And our eyes were far bigger than our stomachs. After dinner, Lauren and I agreed it was one of the fullest we had ever been in our life.
Choosing was difficult, but we eventually settled on 3 small dishes each and a meat dish to share. We both got rice and chickpeas, but we also had a mushroom dish, grape leaves, kusa (stuffed zucchini), a warm eggplant concoction, and some chicken kofta.
Everything was delicious, but our favorite was the eggplant. Served warm and bathed in olive oil, it melted in your mouth. Anyone who says they don't like eggplant has probably never eaten it like this. When prepared well the silky sweetness of the flesh is irresistible. At first we spread it onto bread, but soon we were inhaling heaping spoonfuls by itself.
And all this for about 10 Turkish Lira (about $6)! Which brings me to another of our favorite culinary experiences in Turkey: Street Food
Stick with me here, because street food is almost always impossible to photograph flatteringly and often sounds a bit strange when described. Our all time favorite Istanbul street food definitely falls into both these categories. Even the name sounds unappetizing. We referred to them throughout the trip as "spice burgers," (taken from the reference that recommended for these tasty bites, the
Wikitravel site for our neighborhood in Istanbul). Upon further research, I learned that these burgers are actually called "Islak Burgers." Sounds fine in Turkish, but it translates to "Wet Burgers." It is probably better that Wikitravel neglected to mention the real name, as it probably would have deterred us. And that would have been tragic.
The stand pictured above is supposedly the "original" makers of the burgers, but their extreme popularity (particularly among the post-bar crowd) means that on this one corner there were about 5 or 6 restaurants selling these strange snacks. We tried one other place next door to Kizilkayalar, but we found the original superior and never strayed again. So what exactly is a wet burger? Smaller then American burgers but definitely packing more punch, the burger patty itself is actually doner meat (those huge cones of meat that rotate on a vertical spit, usually called gyro in America). This means the meat has a much more garlicky, spicy flavor than the average cardboard-like fast food burger. But the patty inside is not what makes this burger special. What makes this burger special is the oily, garlic-infused, tomato-based sauce that it is drenched in. The sauce is actually on the outside and the inside of the burger, which contributes the the buns sogginess. The burgers are then placed in a glass incubator (a Turkish Bath for hamburgers!) and steamed so that they become even more "wet." It sounds pretty disgusting, but trust me, all this amounts to one incredibly tasty burger.
After a night of drinking and gypsy music, there is nothing better than a steaming hot Islak burger from Kizilkayalar. Except maybe 2. Or 3...
Anthony Bourdain actually did a little segment on these sinful burgers for his show No Reservations. It is only briefly mentioned in the
Istanbul Episode (starts 2:12, ends 2:55), but their inclusion emphasizes their importance in Istanbul's culinary nightlife.
When you approach a kumpir stand, it looks more like a salad bar. Topping choices are arranged in front of you and your options are extensive. Meat, cheese, vegetables, pickles, and sauces are all available, and you can have as many as you want!
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| Source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/sanafarooquie/page6/ |
First they cut open a GIANT baked potato, taken straight from the oven. Then they put a hunk of butter and a fistful of cheese inside, mash it all around until you have a sort of buttery, cheesy mashed potato mixture and then the adornment begins. Sausage slices, corn, peas, mushrooms, cabbage, couscous, pickles, beet sauce, yogurt, mayonnaise, and ketchup are just a few of the choices. My philosophy? The more the merrier! Calories don't count when you are on vacation, right?
I've talked about meat and veggie dishes, but no trip to Istanbul is complete without:
Fish on the Bosporus
On our third day in Istanbul, Lauren and I took a ferry up the Bosporus to th
e point where it meets the Black Sea. The last stop on the ferry was a small seaside town on the Asian side called Anadolu Kavağı. We were starving when we disembarked and our hunger was anticipated by eager restaurant owners in the small town. One even started flagging us down before the boat docked! The options were pretty much the same everywhere: grilled fish, fried calamari, fried mussels, a salad and a drink for 15TL. We chose one that looked popular. The first thing to arrive was a small plate of vibrantly colored salad. Glistening in the hot sun, the green lettuce, orange carrots, and purple cabbage looked like a floral arrangement. It was beautiful. And tasty.
Soon after, our seafood arrived. A beautiful piece of grilled flounder sat innocently by the decadently fried squid and mussels. The flounder was good, a little fishy, but meaty and substantial. But the stars were the deep fried delicacies. The crispy coating of the calamari revealed the soft, chewy white cephalopod when torn open. Mild and not in the least bit rubbery, it was clearly as fresh as it gets! Skewered and served piping hot, the shellfish converted Lauren into a mussels believer. Their flavor was a little overwhelmed by the breading, but it wasn't hard to pull this away and get to the succulent fleshy morsel inside. Sprinkled with lemon juice and dipped in a garlic yogurt sauce, perfection!
Of course one of the main reasons why Turkey's food is so delicious can be found in one place: The Spice Bazzar
Turkey is famous for its grand bazaar, the largest covered market in the world, where you can buy anything and everything you can think of. It is a lot of fun and I definitely made some good purchases there, but my favorite shopping experience of Istanbul was in the smaller, but equally lively, Spice Bazaar.
Don't let the name fool you. This is not just a place for spices (although it used to be more so). Overflowing from the rows of shops are also fragrant teas, colorful dried fruits, and some of the finest nuts in the world. Lauren and I visited on our first full day in Istanbul and got bags full of peanuts, pistachios, roasted corn kernels, walnuts, almonds, dried cranberries and pineapple, and banana chips. We made sure to carry a little bag of these snacks with us on all our sightseeing trips and they kept us going all week long.
The energy in the Bazaar is lively, almost frenetic. Shop owners try to persuade you to look at their goods, shoving handfuls of tea under your nose and offering special Turkish love and sex potions. But my favorite part of the experience was the visual aspect. Every storefront is bedazzled by vibrant
hanging fruits and veggies and the huge bins of colorful spices spill out onto the walkway. Everything takes on a sort of reddish, orangey-yellow hint and I never figured out if it was from the plethora of dried flowers and berries and piles of curry, sumac, chili, turmeric, cayenne, and saffron or from the dim, hazy lighting coming from the glowing insides of the innumerable shops.
Anyone who knows me is probably wondering how I have gone so long without talking about anything sweet. Well, since we started the post with mezze, I thought we would end with:
Dessert
Turkish desserts are similar to other middle eastern desserts, but usually with a twist. First of all, almost everything is covered in crushed pistachios, giving desserts a electric green color we don't usually associate with sweets.
The picture above shows trays of the most common Middle Eastern dessert, or at least the one best known throughout the rest of the world: Baklava. What I have learned since arriving in the region is that every country prepares it slightly differently. Turkey's variation? You guessed it, adding pistachios to the filling. Delicious!
But the dessert I really want to tell you about is another treat that is common throughout the region, and is also prepared differently everywhere. The dish is called Kunafeh and it essentially consists of shredded phyllo and some kind of cheese. However, Lauren had a version here in Jordan that forgoed the first ingredient for a burned sugar topping and in Egypt the second ingredient is often left out. Coming from Egypt, I though of Kunafeh as a little bird's nest of shredded wheat, sometimes covering a sweet nut and cream filling. But apparently the dish is originally from Nablus and in this version Nabulsi cheese is the key ingredient. Nabulsi cheese is a soft white cheese that can be salted and eaten in savory dishes as well. It is the most common kind of cheese here in Jordan. When fried, this cheese takes on a stretchy, rubbery consistency, not unlike melted mozzarella. The concept of cheese in dessert is somewhat foreign to Americans (we prefer creamed version of dairy in after-dinner treats, i.e. whipped cream, heavy cream, cream cheese, etc.). I was skeptical at first too. But Lauren assured me that it was good, so we ordered it at a classic Ottoman restaurant we ate at. It was so good, we went back a second time later in the week and ordered it again!
The Turkish version takes the cheese and forms it into a thick, round patty. It is fried, covered in simple syrup and coated in a vermicelli-like pastry called shredded phyllo. It tastes and looks very similar to shredded wheat. This round patty is then covered with more syrup, sprinkled with pistachios and served warm. And it is sinfully, sinfully delicious. The crispy shredded phyllo crunches between your teeth as your chew the sweet cheese. The texture is a bit unfamiliar, but the taste is out of this world. If you are in the Middle East and want to treat yourself to a decadent delight, I highly recommend finding yourself some good kunafeh. It shouldn't be too hard...
I will promise again to try to be better about posting, but I make no guarantees. But I have a few cooking classes arranged by my program coming up and I do promise to share these experiences (and some recipes insha'allah!) as soon as I can. And Lauren and I are determine to try to recreate some of the spectacular meals we had in Turkey and I will be sure to document our kitchen exploits. Also, recently developments indicate that I may be in the Middle East this summer. If this is the case, I will continue to blog as best I can in my new location. I'll keep everyone updated!
