Bolani

Make the same dough and roll out into yufkas, cut into 20 cm long pieces. Fill with spinach, purslane or ground meat. Fold over and seal, the fry in hot oil, and serve hot. If you want them to puff, you can make them from a yeasted dough.

Wild Game

Wild game is prepared fried, sautéed and as kebap. The most commonly consumed wild animals are bedene (quail), kuyan (rabbit), kepter (pigeon), kiyik (deer) and fish.

Poultry, including tabuk (chicken), gaz (goose) and kul kul (turkey) are used in soups, and their meat is cooked in a wide variety of dishes.

Other Animal Products

Şirçay (Milk Tea)

Boil milk with crushed walnuts, and add a bit of salt. When it has reduced a bit, add a glass of tea and two walnut-sized pieces of butter, serve.

Kuymak

Beat egg with salt, water and flour, fry small amounts in oil.

In traditional Turkistan cooking, meske (butter) and dumbe (tail fat) is used. Once these fats were used in all cooking, but now vegetable oils are more often used, largely because of health concerns.

The main seasonings are cumin, black pepper, mint, and red pepper. Cumin and black pepper are used in nearly all dishes. Mint is sprinkled over soups. Ground red pepper is used as an optional garnish. The most common salad (zalata) is cucumber tomato and peppers, cut fine. The vegetables used in salads are also served plain.

Üy nanı (homemade bread) is the most commonly made bread. To make it, the flour is placed in a deep bowl, and oil, salt and fresh yeast, and warm milk. After kneading, it is allowed to rest a half hour, then formed into pieces the size of a medium melon, and flattened by hand. The rounds are around 20 cm wide, higher at the edges, with a hole in the middle. These are arranged on a greased pan. The inner part is pricked with a fork; the holes are only on the surface and do not go entirely through the bread.

The rounds are then spread with a mixture of yogurt and nigella seed and put into the oven. This bread was once made in a tandır or pit oven, but now is baked in regular home ovens.

Sweets

The traditional sweets are Selle, Zenze and Bağursak. These are made for weddings and holidays.

Selle

The flour is placed into a deep bowl and for each kilo of flour, 5 eggs, margarine and sugar are added. Sugar is to taste. Milk is added to make a medium “earlobe consistency” dough. The dough is left to rest for 20 minutes, then rolled with an oklava. The dough is then cut into 2-cm wide strips; these are rolled longwise into circles and fried in hot oil until lightly brown. These may be fried on kebab skewers in order to maintain their round shape.

Zenze

Make the same dough as for selle, but after rolling, spread with vegetable oil and roll into short rolls (to 30 cm). Cut these to make spaghetti-like strips, and form into circles as with selle and fry in oil in the same way.

Boğursak

Start with the same dough. Take walnut-sized pieces and either roll over a screen to make a pattern on them, or press with a fork, and fry in oil. Drain and put into a sugar syrup. They may be eaten without the syrup as well.

Milk is most often made into muhallebi, as well as şirgürüç. Şirgürüç is made in the same way as kiçiri, but whereas kiçiri is cooked to porridge consistency, şirgürüç is like soup, with more water. After cooking it is poured into soup bowls. This is topped with a spoon of yogurt and a bit of chopped parsley.

Drinks include küves (a type of soda), ayran, kımız (fermented mare’s milk) and compotes made from various dried fruits.

In winter preparation, rice, chickpeas, mung beans and flour are the most important provisions. Summer vegetables are also dried for winter. Pickles are important as well, a common recipe follows:

Pickles (Turşu)

Put green peppers, cucumbers, Armenian cucumbers, carrots and green tomatoes into brine. In winter, before consuming, wash out the excess salt.

Another recipe:

Place a bit of these ingredients into a jar, add crushed garlic and mint alternately with the vegetables, until the jar is full. Fill with vinegar and let stand one week. It is now ready to eat.

Dried fruits are another important winter provision. The most common are sliced melon and dried plums. Apples are sliced and dried, and grape juice is boiled into pekmez. Meats are cooked in their own fat, then packed into clay vessels for winter. Kazı, a type of horsemeat sausage, is made in large quantities.

Much yogurt is made from milk; in the local language yogurt is known as katık, butter as meske, and cheese as penir.

The most common breakfast foods are murabba (preserves), tukum (eggs), kaymak (clotted cream) and şirçay (salted milk tea, see above).

Lunch includes şorva, vegetable dishes and pilaf. Dinner is lighter, and generally consists of milk products.

For those working in the fields and gardens, easily carried and heated homemade dishes are prepared.

Those who live more traditionally eat on a sofra spread on the floor; this is known as a desterhan. More modernized families in towns and cities eat at tables.

Chief Informant: Vacide Alkış, born 1960. Studied at Gazi University Department of Vocational Education. Presently a teacher at the Girls Vocational High School. Adana Turkish Cuisine Collection Project, Question Book, Ministry of Culture and Tourism, National Folklore Research Office Publications, No. 62, p. 16, Ankara 1985.

Information on Other Informants:

a. Zekeriya Şarhan, born in West Turkistan, 1920, Married, Grade School education, freelance worker, male.
b. Hacı Turgun Oğuz, Born in West Turkistan, 1920, Married, Grade School Education, freelance worker, male
c. Hayrunnisa Asrim, Born in Kokan, West Turkistan, 1927, Married, Grade School Education, housewife.