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At my grandmother’s house, it was a mansion really, where I spent most of my holidays we had these enormous mulberry trees, 2 of them at the front yard. AnD 2 normal sized ones in the garden. Enormous meaning taller then our 2.5 story … Continue reading
Travel & Leisure’s July issue, featuring a small interview with me about travelling, food and istanbulfood.com.
Unfortunately it is in Turkish, but here it is anyway…
It has been a very long time for me since my grandmother has left me, endless… She was the one who thought me a lot of things about food like the first time I put my hands on a big tripe to wash it on a big kitchen sink under the hand freezing running cold water. Those trotter, tripe soups simmering all night long, the smell of the kitchen after a pot full of strawberry jam made, scratching the bottom of the pan with my small fingers, eating the unbaked cake batter…
Tarhana soup was one of her things, which she used to prepare during summer months, when the ingredients like pepper and tomatoes are at their best and let it dry on a thin tea towel under the sun. Soon to be a rich, thick, floury soup, tarhana was loved by the whole family and scooped down on the winter days.
Tarhana is a very common soup all around Turkey, being prepared at almost every region, city, villages, with different ingredients, techniques. As I don’t have my grandmother with me anymore neither her magic hands, tarhana I consume on winter months is prepared by Yurdagül, our long faithful helper at where my mom lives in Yalıkavak. As is cooking, no tarhana she sends me is the same every year, which I love.
She uses döğme (wheat), flour, home made drained yogurt, red peppers, tomatoes, onions, garlic, mint and of course Yalıkavak’s parching sun and lovely breeze. She first brings to boil the onion, tomatoes, peppers in little water, after a little cooled down she adds wheat, flour, garlic, mint, yogurt and mix them together, forming a thick batter. Then she covers this big pot with a piece of tülbent, a see through cotton cheesecloth, to avoid the flies. She punches and kneads this mixture, every now and then for 3 to 5 days. After this yeasting process she tears little pieces size of meatballs and lays them under the sun for a couple of days, when the texture is dried out -but not completely- then she crumbles them through a sieve and let this dry a couple of days more. Portions it to her family, me, my mom, the other lucky ones, this has been one of my favorite shipments along with the other home made goodies.
Turning tarhana into a soup with some stock, maybe adding some mince meat or not, some pepper paste or not, drizzling it with butter and chilies… or not…
Sometimes all it takes is just a bowl of soup, to remind our most loved ones, most happy times hence they are never forgotten.
Note from Tuba: I wrote this piece to my granny, missing her everyday and to all the loving grandmothers of our world!
A sweet autumn noon, I took a bus to Oğuzeli to capture the the preparations for winter, wondering what is left out. After a bus drive for 40 minutes, I arrived the tiny town, without knowing it was such a small town… A little roundabout, baker, butcher, little grocery shop also selling fruit and vegetables outside, the streets deserted, some town people hanging around the butcher, no children around I guess they were at school.
Soon I started my walk with Hüseyin, who is in the vegetable drying business, vegetables like cucumber, aubergines, Antep pepper, zucchini which are all staple for Antep locals during winter months. Those beautiful dry vegetables, needled on a thin string and hung up on the roofs. There were not much left though… But you have the idea.
After the walk made us hungry, I politely asked lahmacun for lunch. Knowing that lahmacun is made from scratch here in Oğuzeli, like old times, like when there was no lahmacun and kebab restaurants all around. You buy your vegetables, take it to butcher, he makes the topping of lahmacun, then take it to the bakery where it is finished.
Hüseyin got his little tray and we went to the grocer to buy the zerzevat, meaning vegetables, and spices. Then to the butcher, feeling happy as a school girl waiting for candies only this is better than candy! He told the butcher how many lahmacun we would want, then left the tray to him. The butcher of Oğuzeli… I think he is everyone’s favorite person in this small town, when you think about the meat consumption on every meal.
Cut some meat from ribs, some fat, and some from the brisket of a mutton carcass, then started cutting all the ingredients with zırk. Everything is getting smaller and the tiny shop started to fill with the fragrance of garlic, Antep pepper, tomatoes, pepper paste then the fatty mutton meat. All you need a loaf of bread or a pide, to swipe all the escaping juices.
I was not the only one there, we were sharing the tiny shop with this small boy, standing quietly, waiting for his turn to come, for him to tell his mother’s order. On the counter waited biber dolma, peppers filled with mince meat and hot pepper paste, waiting for its owner, they soon will be baked in the neighbourhood bakery as well. A humble lunch for a local. Jealous!
After all slurping, waiting, and praying he finished cutting everything with zırk, he put the mixture in the tray. While hopping to the baker, right across the butcher and grocer I was testing my patient. This was too good to wait! At least I had my photo machine to stall me…
A little flour on the counter, the baker started playing with the lahmacun dough, stretching it, then topping it with our mixture, passing on to the shovel, soon they will be cooked in the wood burning oven. While I was there chatting, more trays arrived and lined up on the counter, waiting for their turns.
The taste… Well, there is nothing like a freshly made from scratch lahmacun in the world!
The mutton, the spices, the aroma, the taste of the wood, eating on the newspapers, the friendship over the table, everyone around stopping by for a bite, tucking in with your hands and the fat is dripping from your elbows…
There are no restaurants in Oğuzeli, but friends and a butcher, a baker, a grocer…
Istanbul Food was on the roads again so better late then ever…
Happy everything to all!
Dear Istanbul Food’ies…
Although I eat a lot outside, sorry, I do not post so often.
I do not mean every place I have been to is bad, or insufficient, but simply, they do not meet the basic expectations. Believe me, even in Istanbul it is not easy to find genuine, sincere, sustainable food. After all I am a food professional and a local, I do not like whatever I eat…
Istanbul Food is after the perfect bite, not any bite.
But you know already that this is not a regular tourist food guide, right?
Beautifully golden from roasting with milk in a big bad oven, Nevşehir pumpkin seeds are great source of nibble, at least for me. They are crunchy, lightly salted and delicious, it is real deal Nevşehir pumpkin seed, you even get the milk taste in your mouth, a slight taste.
Travelling through lands of Nevşehir, you see the pumpkins, crushed, laying on the fields, all the seed taken out, and the flesh of the pumpkins left for the animals to feast upon. You may find this odd, but the pumpkins are not used for anything else then producing seeds. This is one of main incomes of the farmers around Cappadocia these years, since the demand has risen for this gold nip tuck.
Get yourself a bowl, set the dvd, tuck yourself in the blanket!
It is good for the soul.
Winter is coming! yey!
I recall the days, when I was a small girl with pony tails, my granny sending me to our neighbourhood baker to get the pide for dinner, before they break their fast. I got in the line, wait for the hottest, sweetest pide with money tucked in my hands. The elder ones pat on my head, pinch my cheeks with the lovely words, sending their regards to my granny. I always saw my friends in the line, sent by their families.
I remember the wiggling movements when the shovels came out with pide on them. The line starts to move, the ones who got their pide moving out of the baker with full hands and happy faces, passing the the newspapers wrapping pide from one hand to another, trying to avoid the heat of it.
When we got the pide we used to race till home trying not eat the pide or drool over and always rewarded for our patience, me and my friends. Everyone knew each other, everyone trusted each other, we all shared our tables those days, not long about 30 years ago…
