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| Black and white, just like my family. |
I had trouble narrowing down recipes from Turkey, so I had to split this between two days because I picked so many. Plus, I had a three-day weekend so I had some extra time. For the bread, I made a Turkish Ramadan flatbread called Pide. I put my flour in a bowl and mixed a package of yeast into it. Then I added in some warm water and stirred with a fork, adding in some warm milk after that and doing the same. I added in a bit of softened butter and olive oil, working that into the mix before adding in the sugar and salt. Then comes the hard part: I kneaded it for like 10 minutes before turning it out onto a floured surface and kneading for another five minutes. Then I let it rise for about two hours while covered with a piece of wax paper that I sprayed with cooking spray instead of using a damp cloth. After that, I removed the cloth and divided them into two with a knife and shaped them into loaves (you can pick either oval or round. I picked round). With that knife, I cut a slight circle into the dough about an inch around the edge and then did a criss-cross pattern in the middle of it. In a small bowl, I whisked together a little plain yogurt and an egg yolk and brushed it on top of the loaves generously and sprinkled some black sesame seeds and white sesame seeds on top (the recipe calls for nigella seeds, but I didn’t have any, and I thought the black and white seeds would look cool). I baked this at 430ºF for 30 minutes or until it was golden brown. This was actually really good. It was soft in the middle, and although it was browned on the outside, the crust was very soft. The nuttiness of the sesame seeds was quite subtle.
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| I have this say, this was so gouda. (Sorry.) |
My main dish today was Karides Güveç, or Turkish Shrimp and Vegetable Casserole. I boiled my shrimp (I used fully cooked frozen shrimp) in salted water for a couple minutes and then took it off the heat and rinsed them in cold water to keep them from cooking any more than that. Then I cleaned and diced some onion, garlic, green peppers, tomatoes, and mushrooms. I heated a little olive oil in a saucepan and fried my onions and garlic a bit before throwing in the green peppers. After that sauteed for a few minutes, I added in my tomatoes, mushrooms, a little tomato paste and some salt and pepper along with a pinch of crushed red pepper flakes. I let that simmer down until most of the liquid was gone, stirring often so it didn’t stick to the bottom. Then I added in my shrimp to this and stirred everything really well and transferred the whole thing to a casserole dish. Before I put this in the oven, I covered it in grated cheese: the recipe calls for fresh Turkish kashar cheese, but I just grated some fresh smoked gouda. I set this to broil on the top rack in the oven, so that the cheese starts to bubble. This was really good, and the smoked gouda really added to the dish. That was probably my favorite part.
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| Not too bad, even without the orzo. |
To go with this, I made a Turkish-style rice pilaf with orzo, except not with orzo. (The stores are still a little shaky on how they’re stocked, and my husband couldn’t find any at two different stores. Since I wasn’t using that much, I just broke up a handful of spaghetti into orzo-sized pieces. Not the same, but it’ll do.) In a shallow saucepan, I melted some butter and oil together and added in the bits of pasta to it. I stirred this continuously until it was a dark golden color. Then I added in my uncooked rice and stirred it all together until it was coated in the oil. Then I slowly added my chicken broth to this and a little salt and pepper. I brought this to a boil, stirring a little, and then I turned my heat down and put the lid on it. When all the liquid was gone, I removed it from the heat to let it continue steaming (without taking the lid off, of course). Then I stirred it up a bit before serving. Despite the fact that this was using pieces of broken spaghetti, it was quite good and went well with the shrimp and vegetables.
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| It's ok no one liked them. I ate the rest for breakfast today. |
But yesterday, I made a couple of dishes, too. For dinner, we had Mücver, or Turkish Zucchini Fritters. I actually saw these in a polyglot group, and they looked so good that I HAD to try them. And keep in mind there are a ton of variations on these, too. I made mine by grating a zucchini and putting it in a mixing bowl along with some shredded carrots, feta cheese crumbles, a little dill, a little mint, and a little salt and pepper (next time, I’m adding in some cumin and spring onions). I stirred in one egg (you might need two, depending on how watery your zucchini is) and then stirred in the flour. My recipe didn’t call for enough flour, so I added enough to make a light batter around the vegetables (otherwise, it won’t fry up right, as I found out with the first batch). Then I took a little vegetable oil and heated it up, dropping spoonfuls in the skillet and flattening them into a patty. Once one side was browned, I flipped it to brown on the other side, and then let it drain on a paper towel. I don’t really know what they put on them, if anything, but I did put a little bit of ricotta cheese on top and it was good. Knowing that no one else likes zucchini, I wasn’t surprised that I was the only one who liked these.
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| I ate three. Maybe four. |
I also tried my hand at Lemon Turkish Delights. I think the real Turkish Delights are made with rosewater, but I don’t like rose-flavored anything since I think it smells like old-lady perfume. So, the lemon ones were a good alternative. I suppose you can make them whatever flavor you want if you can find an extract to use. And this recipe was also probably not traditional, since I made it in the microwave. (But it’s also 90 degrees here, so not using my oven/stove any more than I have to is a great thing.) In a 4-qt Pyrex bowl, I whisked together some cornstarch and water until it looked like milk. Then I microwaved for 2 minutes and whisked again with a fork. I microwaved it again for 3 minutes and whisked again. At this point, it was starting to feel like glue. Then I added in a bunch of sugar and some corn syrup. I put it in the microwave for 5 minutes, but I didn’t watch it close enough and it boiled over and made a huge mess out of everything. So, I paused and had to clean up this sticky mess. It felt like a toddler had been here. And that toddler was using a hot glue gun. Then I microwaved it for 3 minutes, pausing every time it got close to overflowing. And then I whisked again. Then I did another 3 minutes in the microwave, and you guessed it, whisked again. At this point it’s starting to get really thick, and I added in a tablespoon of lemon extract and a little bit of food coloring (we had to go with orange because apparently the two stores my husband went to didn’t have yellow at all). I microwaved it for 3 more minutes and stirred and repeated that one more time for good measure. Then I felt like it was probably thick enough. I sprayed a loaf pan with cooking spray and poured it out in there, smoothing it out as best I could and let it sit at room temperature for two hours to firm up. After this, I turned it out and cut it into 1” squares. In an old butter cookie tin, I used wax paper and placed them in there, using another sheet of wax paper between the layers, and let it sit out for almost 24 hours to completely firm up. When it had set up, I mixed together a little bit of cornstarch and powdered sugar together in a bowl and gently tossed each of the candies into the powdery mix. This was my first time making candy (I don’t really count Brazilian brigadeiros as candy, but maybe I should. Who knows?), and I’ve always been a little cautious to attempt it, but I think it turned out pretty well. And they were quite tasty if I may say so myself. So, I can at least say I know how gummy candies are made (somewhat).
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| I loved everything about this meal. Like, really, really loved it. |
I used to say that any country that was once part of the Ottoman Empire had some great food. And, well, I’m not wrong. I don’t know what it is, but I love food from this area of the world. And I’ve read that Mediterranean diets are among the healthiest for you (probably minus the Turkish Delights). And I made it through several lessons of Turkish Duolingo. I like it and am starting to get the hang of things. I may stick with it. Who knows? Maybe I’ll make that trip to Istanbul before my life’s up and see the real Bosporus.
Up next: Turkmenistan
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