Last week I hosted folks from a London-based designer agency who are meeting with food-conscious people around the world to gather insights about the use of fruit and vegetables. We talked a lot about the Turkish food culture that I had embraced and made a part of my pantry and diet. We touched upon both fresh seasonal produce and the second life it gets in the form of salça, pekmez, ekşisi, tarhana, dried vegetable skins used for stuffing, seasoning made of dry vegetables, dried fruit and other ways of preservation. Besides sharing these insights, I got a few insights myself in particular about how I eat. I mean how I really it which appeared different from what I thought.
Fancy Dressed Cheese Köfte Salad
Stuffed Green Pepper Boats: Why We Go To Restaurants
The other day I had a glimpse of what it feels to be a chef (as opposed to a cook). We had a family of regulars over at our countryside restaurant. They are an Istanbul couple whose weekend house is conveniently located near to our place in Sapanca. And they are parents to a little blue-eyed girl, a dream of any Turkish mother or grandmother (ask my mother-in-law). Placing their order they inquired whether I can make “my pasta”.
Sigara Böreği: Sinful Turkish Snack Going Healthy
If there is a traditional Turkish food item that leaves neither room for polarized opinions nor doubt about having the second helping it is definitely sigara böreği, cigar-shaped pastry of paper-thin dough (yufka) stuffed with cheese. It has also been a hit on my cooking classes always resulting in the discussion on how to organize yufka export to the sigara böreği craving foodies outside of Turkey.
