One of the things I enjoy most about living here is the FOOD!! Everything here is fresh and pretty much organic and extremely delicious. While most Turkish people prefer home-cooked meals, you can still buy chips, candies, and junk food (McDonald's, Dominos, Arby's, Pizza Hut, Burger King, etc.). For the most part though, the Turkish diet consists of fresh fruit and vegetables and meat. And bread! Delicious home made bread loaves that you buy fresh each morning. My favorite breakfast is bread still warm from the bakery with kaymak (a thick cream with about 60% milk fat!!) and vişne reçeli (sour cherry jam). I can't even describe the goodness of this flavor combination!
Turkey even has it's own version of street meat - kokoreç (coco-retch). There are kokoreç vendors on most every street corner after 9pm so that you can get your pre- and post-drinking fixes! I don't want to tell you what goes into kokoreç because it might stop you from tasting this amazing Turkish food but just think about North American street meat...we eat that and we're still alive right??
There is a place in Ankara that is famous for it's kokoreç - Atatürk Orman Çiftliği (or Ataturk Forest Farms). This is a farm in the middle of the city where honey and milk are also produced and where there is a small petting zoo. There are family tea gardens and LOTS of street meat. Groups of young people head out here after a night of drinking. They park their cars and open all the doors and blast traditional Turkish music and dance while they wait for their meals! Kokoreç takes a while to prepare. First, the meat is slowly cooked on a rotisserie over some hot coals. Then it is cut into smaller pieces and cooked some more. Then it is chopped up with spices and placed into a large bun - now its ready to eat! The process takes about 30 minutes so you have to find something to occupy your time as you wait! I love going there just to listen to the men prepare the kokoreç - they chop the meat into tiny pieces with two strange looking knives and the sound is just wonderful to listen to!
Here is a video I took of one of our favorite places to eat at in the Forest:
Another Turkish specialty you can find nearly everywhere is döner (doe-nair). Döner (or gyro or shwarma) is shaved meat roasted vertically on a spit. It is slowly roasted with wood or electric heat and often served over a bed of rice or inside of a pita or bun.
One of my favorite foods is manti. Manti is like a mini dumpling. I recently learned how to make manti on a trip to Yalova - it is time consuming but worth it! Traditionally, manti is made with spiced ground beef wrapped in a small square of dough. It is boiled like pasta. You eat manti with a very heavy butter sauce spiced with red pepper and sumac. Then you pour garlic yogurt over top and enjoy! Like Italian gnocchi, just a few of these will do!
In addition to traditional foods, there are of course traditional drinks here in Turkey.
The most popular is black tea or çay (chai). In fact, Turkey has the highest per capita tea consumption in the world! Tea is grown in the Black Sea region of Turkey and the most popular variety is Rize. Tea is had at (or after) every meal and also over the course of the day. The tea is prepared in a stacked tea pot. In the larger bottom part you boil water and in the smaller top part you steep tea leaves with boiled water. The tea is served in small tea glasses - you pour some steeped tea from the top part then dilute it to your preference with water from the bottom pot. Some Turks like very dark tea (like me!) and some like it very light.
Although 99% of the Turkish population is Muslim and Muslims are forbidden from consuming alcohol, there is still a large amount of Rakı consumed here. Rakı is an anise flavored hard liquor. You drink it from a special rakı glass. You put about 1 ounce of rakı in the glass and then dilute it with water - when you do this the rakı turns cloudy white. You also have a second glass of only water to temper the taste of the drink. It's very strong and not one of my personal favorites - but when you are having a fish or seafood dinner, rakı is a staple drink! If you enjoy Italian grappa or or Spanish orujo then Turkish rakı is for you!
It's really a good thing that I do alot of walking here because with the amount of bread and pasta I eat I should weigh about 300lbs!! But I can't help myself! The food is just too good to resist! I should just count myself lucky that their dessert consists of mostly fresh fruit and nuts and not rich cheesecakes and cakes!
One of my favorite foods is manti. Manti is like a mini dumpling. I recently learned how to make manti on a trip to Yalova - it is time consuming but worth it! Traditionally, manti is made with spiced ground beef wrapped in a small square of dough. It is boiled like pasta. You eat manti with a very heavy butter sauce spiced with red pepper and sumac. Then you pour garlic yogurt over top and enjoy! Like Italian gnocchi, just a few of these will do!
In addition to traditional foods, there are of course traditional drinks here in Turkey.
The most popular is black tea or çay (chai). In fact, Turkey has the highest per capita tea consumption in the world! Tea is grown in the Black Sea region of Turkey and the most popular variety is Rize. Tea is had at (or after) every meal and also over the course of the day. The tea is prepared in a stacked tea pot. In the larger bottom part you boil water and in the smaller top part you steep tea leaves with boiled water. The tea is served in small tea glasses - you pour some steeped tea from the top part then dilute it to your preference with water from the bottom pot. Some Turks like very dark tea (like me!) and some like it very light.
Although 99% of the Turkish population is Muslim and Muslims are forbidden from consuming alcohol, there is still a large amount of Rakı consumed here. Rakı is an anise flavored hard liquor. You drink it from a special rakı glass. You put about 1 ounce of rakı in the glass and then dilute it with water - when you do this the rakı turns cloudy white. You also have a second glass of only water to temper the taste of the drink. It's very strong and not one of my personal favorites - but when you are having a fish or seafood dinner, rakı is a staple drink! If you enjoy Italian grappa or or Spanish orujo then Turkish rakı is for you!
It's really a good thing that I do alot of walking here because with the amount of bread and pasta I eat I should weigh about 300lbs!! But I can't help myself! The food is just too good to resist! I should just count myself lucky that their dessert consists of mostly fresh fruit and nuts and not rich cheesecakes and cakes!
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