What are the common foods enjoyed by Turkish people?

Answer 1

With a long history, the Turks have a rich culinary culture. This wealth

is evident in the rich variety of foods. Throughout the country, eating

habits exhibit variety according to history, region, and even among

various sections of society such as urban or village dwellers, however,

there are common features despite these differences.

A typical breakfast comprises of tomatoes, feta cheese (fresh white

cheese) black olives, ekmek (bread) with a preserve, honey and perhaps an

egg. At breakfast, main beverage is tea.

Lunch often starts with a soup (as does dinner) and a variety of

vegetables and fish or meat.

Dinner would always open with a selection of meze and are what tapas are

for the Spanish. Then comes the main course of perhaps a pilav (a rice

speciality), more vegetables and a meat or fish dish. All the dishes for

a meal are served at the same time. In any case, the zeytinagli (olive

oil dish) course is always present. The meal would end with fruits.

All dishes can be conveniently categorized into: grain-based, grilled

meats, vegetables, fish and sea-food, desserts and beverages.

The foundation of the Cuisine is based on grains and vegetables. Dry

beans or chickpeas, bulgur pilaf accompanied by an onion, have become

practically the symbol of Turkish food, and are the most popular foods

among the rural people. Lemon and yogurt are used to complement both meat

and vegetable dishes, to balance the taste of olive oil or meat.

"Yogurt" is an important element in Turkish cuisine. In fact, the

English word yoghurt or yogurt derives from the Turkish word yoğurt.

Yogurt can accompany almost all meat dishes, vegetable dishes, meze and

mantı. In villages, yogurt is regularly eaten with rice or bread. A

thicker, higher-fat variety, süzme yoğurt or "strained yogurt"(aka Greek

yogurt in the western world), is made by straining the yogurt curds from

the whey. One of the most common Turkish drinks, "ayran", is made from

yogurt. Also, yogurt is often used in the preparation of cakes, some

soups and pastries.

There are major classes of meatless dishes. When meat is used, it is used

sparingly. Even with the meat kebabs, the "pide" or the flat bread

occupies the largest part of the portion along with vegetables or

yogurt.

The foundation of Turkish food is, if anything, the dough made of wheat

flour. Besides "ekmek" - the ordinary white bread, "pide" - flat bread,

"simit" - sesame seed rings; "manti", dumplings of dough filled with a

special meat mix, are eaten with generous servings of garlic yogurt and a

dash of melted butter with paprika; "börek" a whole family of food made

up of thin sheets of pastry (yufka- a thicker and baked version of

phyllo dough) stuffed with variety of ingredients fall into this

category. Next to bread, "pilav" is another staple in the Turkish

kitchen. The most common versions are the bulgur (cracked-wheat) pilaf

and the rice pilaf.

"Kebap" is another category of food which, like the börek, is typically

Turkish dating back to the times when the nomadic Turks learned to grill

and roast their meat over their camp fires. Given the numerous types of

kebabs, it helps to realize that you categorize them by the way the meat

is cooked such as the "sish kebab" and "döner kebab"( aka gyro) .

"Izgara"-mixed grilled meats are likely to include lamb chops, "köfte",

or "sish" (cubes of meat). The way of preparing ground meat will

be the "köfte" (meatballs). These are grilled, fried, oven-cooked or

boiled, after being mixed with special spices, eggs, and grated onions

and carefully shaped into balls, oblongs, round or long patties. Another

popular dish, inspired by the nomadic Turks who carried spiced, raw meat

in their saddles, and known to Europeans as "steak Tartar", is the cig

köfte (raw meatballs). Here, it is made of raw, double ground meat, by

kneading it with thin bulgur and hot spices vigorously for a few hours.

Then bite-sized patties are made, and served with flat leaf parsley,

known for its stomach protecting qualities.

Along with grains, vegetables are also consumed in large quantities in

the Turkish diet. The simplest and most basic type of vegetable dish is

prepared by slicing a main vegetable such as zucchini or eggplant,

combining it with tomatoes, green peppers and onions, and cooking it

slowly in butter and its own juices.

A whole class of vegetables is cooked in olive oil. These dishes would be

third in a five-course meal, following the soup and a main course such as

rice or börek and vegetable meat, and before dessert and fruit.

Practically all vegetables, such as fresh string-beans, artichokes, root

celery, eggplants, pinto beans, or zucchini can be cooked in olive oil,

and are typically eaten at room-temperature. So they are a staple part of

the menu with variations depending on the season. Then there are the

fried vegetables, such as eggplant, peppers or zucchinis, that are eaten

with a tomato or a yogurt sauce.

"Dolma" is the generic term for stuffed vegetables, being a derivative of

the verb "doldurmak" or to fill; it actually means "stuffed" in Turkish.

There are two categories of dolmas: those filled with a meat mix or with

a rice mix. The latter are cooked in olive oil and eaten at room-

temperature. The meat dolma is a main-course dish eaten with a yogurt

sauce, and very frequent one in the average household. Any vegetable

which can be filled with or wrapped around these mixes can be used in a

dolma, including zucchini, eggplants, tomatoes, cabbage, and grapevine

leaves.

In addition to these general categories, there are numerous meat and

vegetable dishes which feature unique recipes. When talking about

vegetables, it is important to know that the eggplant has a special place

in the Turkish Cuisine. This vegetable has a richer flavour than that of

its relatives found elsewhere and it is said that there are more than 40

ways of preparing the eggplant.

Similar to the Spanish tapas, "meze" is the general category of dishes

that are brought in small quantities to start the meal off. These are

eaten, along with wine or more likely with "rakì", the anise-flavoured

national drink of Turks sometimes referred to as "lion's milk", for a few

hours until the main course is served.

The bare minimum meze for raki are slices of honeydew melons and creamy

feta cheese with freshly baked bread. Beyond these, a typical meze menu

includes dried and marinated mackerel, fresh salad greens or purslane in thick yogurt sauce with garlic, plates of cold vegetable dishes cooked or fried in olive oil, fried crispy savoury pastry, deep fried mussels and calamaris served in sauce, tomato and cucumber salad, and fish eggs in sauce. The main

course that follows such a meze spread will be fish or grilled meat.

When the main course is kebab, then the meze spread is different. In this

case, several plates different types of minced salad green and tomatoes

in spicy olive oil, mixed with yogurt or cheese, "humus" chick peas

mashed in tahini, bulgur and red lentil balls, "raw köfte", marinated

stuffed eggplant, peppers with spices and nuts, and pickles, are likely

to be served.

Grilling fish over charcoal, where the fish juices hit the embers and

envelope the fish with the smoke, is perhaps the most delicious way of

eating mature fish, since this method brings out the delicate flavour.

"Hamsi" is the prince of all fish known to Turks: the Black Sea people

know forty one ways of making hamsi, including hamsi börek, hamsi pilaf

and hamsi dessert! Another common seafood is the mussel-eaten deep fried,

poached, or as a mussel dolma and mussel pilaf.

The most well known sweets associated with the Turkish Cuisine are the

Turkish Delight, and the "baklava", giving the impression that these may

be the typical desserts eaten after meals. This is not true. First, the

family of desserts is much richer than these two. Secondly, these are not

typical desserts as part of a main meal. For example, baklava and its

relatives are eaten usually with coffee, as a snack or after a kebab

dish.

By far, the most common dessert after a meal is fresh seasonal fruit. The

most wonderful contribution of the Turkish Cuisine to the family of

desserts, that can easily be missed by casual explorers, are the milk

desserts - the "muhallebi" family. These are among the rare types of

guilt-free puddings made with starch and rice flour, and, originally

without any eggs or butter.

Grain-based desserts include baked pastries, fried yeast dough pastries

and the pan-sauteed desserts. The baked pastries can also be referred to

as the baklava family. These are paper-thin pastry sheets that are

brushed with butter and folded, layered, or rolled after being filled

with ground pistachios, walnuts or heavy cream, and baked. Then a syrup

is poured over the baked pastries.