I made a small batch. Quite good.
My Turkish potato salad, taking inspiration from several recipes. This is an olive oil and lemon potato salad, rather than the yogurt version.
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My Turkish potato salad, taking inspiration from several recipes. This is an olive oil and lemon potato salad, rather than the yogurt version.
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Some Turkish vegan dishes.
I enjoy his blog and his recipes
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IZMIR KOFTESI
I love the version of this served at a nearby spot, and every time I eat it there I think the flavors are so simple I should be able to come pretty close at home. So I finally tried my hand at it.
Kofte mixture is seasoned very simply with grated onion, garlic, parsley, and scant spices, then pan-fried to seal, and finally simmered (or baked) in a simple tomato sauce with potato wedges. Served over rice.
As straightforward as anticipated, and as delicious.
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ADANA KEBABI
Probably my favorite of all the Turkish kebabs. Enjoyed them in Turkey, but have eaten a lot more of them in NYC. (Tbh the NYC ones are probably flavored a bit more heavily than the ones I ate in Turkey.) In Turkey they were lamb and beef, in NYC they are most often chicken or beef, occasionally lamb, and I often prefer the chicken version.
I made the mixture a day earlier and let the flavors settle for a day. I couldn’t find my grill pan until after I finished cooking them, ha, but the finger dents are more a factor than grill marks here, so oh well. Missed my giant flat skewers (pandemic purchase) that were procured specifically for these, though (but live with the actual grill in another state).
My preferred red meat substitute of choice at home is ground turkey because most ground chicken sold is way too lean and flavorless, but I can get dark meat turkey that’s fatty enough to keep kebabs or other things juicy.
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FASULYE / TAZE FASULYE
Green beans stewed with olive oil, tomatoes, onions, and garlic. This is my Turkish friend’s recipe, but I cannot bring myself to pour as much olive oil in as she does, even though I do love it when she makes it with aaallll the oil, lol.
Such a simple and delicious dish, and I am a goose for not making a big batch, because it goes with everything – or nothing, so good on its own too.
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Who is that?
I’ve also been meaning to ask you what your favorites are from istanbul & Beyond, which I bought on your rec over on the cookbooks thread a while back
I bought a huge bag of partially shelled pecans in Southern Illinois when I went for the eclipse - my god, they are delicious. I asked my sister to bring me another bag when we meet later this month for a bike trip in KY. They are my current favorite nut but truthfully I like most of them.
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SHORTCUT GOZLEME
Spinach filling similar to Borek. I added onions, garlic, pul biber, and parsley. Mild feta mashed and mixed in.
Instead of making the dough, I decided to use handmade flour tortillas I had bought for something else. Wet the tortillas so I could press together the edges to seal. BUT this could not compete with my over-stuffing, lol. So filling squeezed out.
Quick and delicious. I have more filling, and more tortillas, so this will be repeated!
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Clever! Must try, will also try not to overfill!
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I thought I was being “good” with extra vegetable content.
Would have been fine if I hadn’t tried to seal it, just folded over and cooked like a quesadilla.
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Gozleme with lamb, spinach, red pepper, shallot, and feta. Recipe is from recipetineats.com.
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Cookbook of the Month nominations for summer 2024 are live now. Please join us!
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@linguafood has been posting beautiful pictures of midye, Turkish rice stuffed mussels. Has anyone made these? Reliable recipes? I searched the menus of most of the Turkish restaurants in the DMV and don’t see any that serve them
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I think it’s a (late night) street food specific to Istanbul.
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This is a pretty reliable website, it might get you started.
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Oh yeah. Love midye dolmasi after getting hooked on them from the street vendors in Istanbul 
The mussels are very well-packed with rice, so when you take a bite it’s like a spoon pilaf or risotto with a mussel in each bite (the “spoon” is the top half of the mussel shell).
Ozlem’s recipe linked is good, though her rice is wetter than the street food version. Linking the recipe from Istanbul & Beyond below for comparison.
After stuffing them a few times (which is pretty laborious), I switched to making the rice, then layering the mussels on top. (If you do this, remember to steam the mussels separately, because the liquid will have grit that you need to strain out before adding back to the rice. The stuffed version entails cleaning the raw mussels of the grit before stuffing.)
If you do want to stuff them, don’t be fazed if the mussel shells crack open – one of the recipes I referenced instructed to tie them up with kitchen twine if this happens, because it’s not that uncommon a problem if you’re not an Istanbul mussel guy 
And finally, the rice is really flavorful – so feel free to just make the rice and use any other seafood component if cleaning and stuffing mussels one by one doesn’t appeal 
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