Have you ever wondered what fuels the vibrant lives of the Turkish people? Let’s embark on a culinary journey to explore the daily meals that nourish and delight them
A Day in the Life of a Turkish Eater
Breakfast:
- The Weekday Rush: While elaborate Turkish breakfasts are reserved for leisurely weekends, weekdays see a more streamlined approach. A medley of cheese, sliced tomatoes, cucumbers, and olives takes center stage, often accompanied by tahini and pekmez or butter and honey. Eggs are a staple, enjoyed hard-boiled, as omelets, or sunny-side up, often paired with flavorful Turkish sausage.
- The Star of the Show: The undisputed breakfast champion is menemen, a simple yet satisfying dish of scrambled eggs mixed with sauteed tomatoes and peppers.
- Fresh Bread: No Turkish breakfast is complete without a loaf of freshly baked white bread, typically purchased from the local bakery each morning.
- On-the-Go Options: For those with limited time, simit, a crispy sesame-coated bagel-like bread, or poğaça, savory rolls filled with cheese, olives, potatoes, or minced meat, offer convenient and delicious options. If you’re lucky, you might find su böreği, a delightful lasagna-like breakfast dish with layers of pasta-like sheets drenched in butter, feta cheese, and parsley.
Lunch:
- Home-Cooked Delights: At home, lunches often feature bean dishes like taze fasulye (green beans cooked in olive oil with tomatoes and onions) or nohut (chickpeas prepared similarly). These are served with rice, bulgur pilaf, or fresh bread.
- Staple Dishes: Homes often have readily available staples like kısır, a fine bulgur salad with tomatoes, tomato paste, pomegranate molasses, parsley, and mint. A cold potato salad with pickles, peppers, onions, and parsley, and a Turkish coleslaw of grated carrots, purple cabbage, and parsley dressed in olive oil and lemon juice are also common.
- The Tray Delight: Tepsi börek, a savory pastry baked in a tray with layers of phyllo dough and fillings like cheese and spinach, fresh herbs, leeks, or minced meat, is a popular choice for quick and satisfying meals.
Lunch on the Go:
- Fast-Food Favorites: For those who eat out or order in, Turkish fast-food classics like döner, köfte, and lahmacun reign supreme. Döner shops often sell out after lunch, while lahmacun, a thin-crust Turkish pizza filled with spices, tomato, onions, and ground meat, offers an affordable and satisfying option. The yogurt-based ayran is the traditional beverage accompanying these meals.
Dinner:
- Beyond Kebabs: While Turkish cuisine is renowned for its kebabs, home-cooked dinners often focus on vegetarian dishes. Meat dishes, like köfte or stews, may be present, but the emphasis is on seasonal vegetables and beans.
- A Balanced Meal: Dinner typically starts with a soup, followed by rice, yogurt, a fresh salad of greens, tomatoes, and cucumbers, and a serving of fruit for dessert. In summer, watermelon is a refreshing dessert enjoyed by many.
Late-Night Bites:
- Offal Delights: The Turkish love for late-night street food often involves offal-heavy dishes like kokoreç (grilled intestines) and kelle paça (soup made from sheep’s head and feet).
- Tantuni Durum: For those seeking a less adventurous option, tantuni durum, a wrap of grilled cubed and spiced meat, is a popular choice found in Turkey’s original food trucks.
A Culinary Adventure:
Turkish cuisine is a vibrant tapestry of flavors and textures, offering a unique and delicious culinary experience. From the simple pleasures of menemen to the hearty flavors of tepsi börek, each meal reflects the rich culture and traditions of the Turkish people. So, the next time you find yourself in Turkey, be sure to embark on your own culinary adventure and savor the authentic flavors of this remarkable cuisine.
Dessert, coffee, and tea
One cant really talk about Turkish cuisine without touching upon the famous coffee, tea, and sweets. Turkish coffee isnt so much a type of coffee as it is a style of preparation that involves finely grinding the beans, boiling them with sugar, and serving it in a small, concentrated cup, grounds and all. (The grounds are not ingested.) But dont think that Turks are drinking this every morning on their way to work: regular coffee and espresso drinks are equally popular, so when Turkish people drink Türk khavesi, its often savored after a meal.
Far more ubiquitous is Turkish tea, or çay (chai). Almost everywhere you go, whether you’re perusing a store, settling down to eat, or taking a seat at a roadside cafe, you’re offered tea. Go for the black tea and never accept the apple tea version (it’s entirely fake and meant only to appeal to tourists!). The best versions will be smooth and flavorful, so pleasant that no sugar is necessary. (Milk is out of the question!).
Candy shops and bakeries are everywhere, just in case youre in the mood for a sugary snack. I had the experience of trying a lot of different types of baklava, and even at stores that were supposed to be the best in town, the majority of them were not as fresh as I had hoped. However, I was thrilled by the sheer variety of phyllo, nut, and honey pastries that were available everywhere: they were triangle, square, and round, filled with walnuts, and covered in pistachios.
Given how well-known Turkish delight, or lokum, is in the UK, I was shocked to discover how few Americans are familiar with it. These gummy gelées are made with starch and sugar, cubed, and then dusted with powdered sugar. They come in flavors like pistachio, rose, lemon, and bergamot (shown above at the far left). However, we also witnessed lokum (pronounced “loh-KOOM”) being made in the Ottoman manner, which involves sweetening it with honey, shaping it into long logs with corners, rolling it in pistachios and other nuts, and slicing it off as needed, much like rustic bread.
Now that Ive made myself sufficiently hungry, Im going to go hunt down a sweet snack. Im pretty sure I still have some lokum saved especially for this occasion.
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FAQ
How many meals a day do Turkish people eat?
What is Turkey’s national dish?
What do Turkish people typically eat for breakfast?
What foods are used in Turkey?
Vegetable or meat stew is typical home food. Turkish cuisine uses many vegetables, and some of the most used vegetables are zucchini, tomato, onion, eggplant, cauliflower, green beans, potatoes, spinach, chickpeas, garlic, and lentils. The most used meat in Turkey is lamb meat, followed by cattle and chicken meat.
What to eat in Turkey in summer?
In the hot Turkish summer, a meal often consists of fried vegetables such as eggplant (aubergine) and peppers or potatoes served with yogurt or tomato sauce. Menemen and çılbır are typical summer dishes, based on eggs. Sheep cheese, cucumbers, tomatoes, watermelons and melons also make a light summer meal.
Is Turkey a good place to eat?
Turkish cuisine is one of the world’s top cuisines, joining the ranks of French, Chinese, Italian, and the like. Like the country’s cultural mosaic, the food of Turkey is very colorful and contains countless different influences and tastes.
What to eat in Turkey during Muharrem?
All the Anatolian peoples have cooked and are still cooking aşure especially during the month of Muharrem. Some traditional Turkish desserts are fruit-based: ayva tatlısı ( quince ), incir tatlısı ( fig ), kabak tatlısı ( pumpkin ), elma tatlısı ( apple) and armut tatlısı ( pear ).