Monday
Göreme Muhallebicisi: The Milkman Stayeth
In the world of chicken breast pudding (a traditional Turkish dessert made with thickened milk and thin strands of poached poultry), elasticity is the quality that the confection is judged upon above all else. Tucking into a real tavuk göğsü requires full concentration, a good bit of dexterity and the proper tool. A special spoon with a flat chopping nose – much like a spade – was designed just to deal with the situation and, as far as we know, this utensil is found exclusively in Turkish pudding shops.
So when we got a tip about a muhallebici where “the tavuk göğsü stretches off the spoon much farther than you could fathom,” we knew we’d be dealing with the genuine article. We set out for the Kurtuluş neighborhood and Göreme Muhallebicisi like bloodhounds on the trail. As we made our way up Ergenekon Caddesi, we suddenly found ourselves within the cozy fold of this unique district.
The rest of this previously published post can be found on CulinaryBackstreets.com, here.
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no responses - Posted 03.01.13
Editor’s note: This guest post was written by Nicolas Nicolaides, an Istanbul-born Greek who moved to Athens in 1988. Nicolaides is a Ph.D. student in history at the University of Athens whose research focuses on the Karamanlılar (Greeks from Central Anatolia). Once a resort town on the outskirts of the Greek ...continue
no responses - Posted 12.17.12
If Lades, which means “wishbone” in Turkish, provided an actual wishbone alongside the usual post-meal wet wipe and toothpick, we’d close our eyes and make a wish that we could eat their tandır, or oven-roasted baby lamb, seven days a week. These large knots of tender, fragrant meat lined with ...continue
3 responses - Posted 04.13.12
In the world of chicken breast pudding (a traditional Turkish dessert made with thickened milk and thin strands of poached poultry), elasticity is the quality that the confection is judged upon above all else. Tucking into a real tavuk göğsü requires full concentration, a good bit of dexterity and the ...continue
4 responses - Posted 11.22.10
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no responses - Posted 09.08.10
We recently wrote about the emergence of the “esnaf nouveau,” a new class of restaurant in Istanbul that puts a more sophisticated spin on the classic esnaf lokanta (or “tradesmen’s restaurant”), the place where working stiffs come to get their daily fix of traditional Turkish comfort food. To the list of ...continue
5 responses - Posted 07.23.10
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10 responses - Posted 06.16.10
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1 response - Posted 03.29.10
Ali Bey, the owner of a cubby-sized restaurant in Küçük Pazarı called Kısmet, sounded a bit like Bubba Gump listing the items on his menu: “Weve got chicken soup, fried chicken gizzards, shredded chicken breast, dark chicken meat too, chicken and rice, chicken with onions and peppers, and chicken breast ...continue
4 responses - Posted 03.26.10
For Turks, mealtime is often a complicated emotional drama, one that revolves around a lifelong effort to return to the culinary womb – in other words, their mother’s kitchen. In Turkey, Mom’s cooking sets the standard by which all others are judged and, truth be told, some of the finest ...continue
7 responses - Posted 02.19.10
If Lades, which means “wishbone” in Turkish, provided an actual wishbone alongside the usual post-meal wet wipe and toothpick, we’d close our eyes and make a wish that we could eat their tandır (oven-roasted baby lamb) seven days a week. These large knots of tender, fragrant meat lined with a ...continue