Do you recall that scene from My Big Fat Greek Wedding where the father explains that everything was invented by the Greeks? Don’t mention that here in Türkiye… or rather, just use the same logic but assume that the Turks invented it.
Take for example, “Greek yogurt” — strained thick plain yogurt. It is called “süzme” if you are looking for it in the grocery store. The plain non thick yogurt is actually although fairly thick, but this stuff will not separate and you can stand a spoon up in it!
Testing a different brand.
Oh, and we should mention that yogurt is actually Turkish. The word come from the Turkish yoğurmak “to thicken or curdle” but the actual process also come from the Turkish peoples who moved from the central Asian steppes into Anatolia and Mesopotamia. The assumption is that yogurt was discovered by mistake when some milk was left in a goatskin… did you read my article about the goat of all cheeses?
The Ottomans made yogurt a big part of their cuisine and yogurt continues to dominate modern Turkish food. It is completely normal for Turks to eat yogurt as one of the sides of their every day meal (like eating ketchup, olive oil, or butter with everything). I see lunches that comprise of one container of meat or beans, one container of grain, maybe rice or bulgar, one container of yogurt, and one container with lemon, parsley, and a pepper, either spicy or not. In the dining room at work, there is always bread free for anyone to take to make their meal. This ties into cultural practice of providing bread or meals to those in need.
One of the main Turkish beverages is made from yogurt and water. Ayran is often served with a foamy head, created by running the yogurt mixture through a pipe or blender.
Once upon a fairytale, I had read to me stories of far away lands where boys in baggy Turkish pantaloons chased each other through markets with silk draped souk stalls, knocking over giant baskets, all while the colors of a thousand (and one) spices wafted through the hot sunny air…
Spices in drawers.
Stereotypes are hard to break. Adana is a modern city. But, I keep looking for that souk experience of my fairytales. Obviously without the humidity. And icky smells. Just colors and brightness.
Fresh sumac.
But, do you know where I find that in Adana? In the nut stores. And in the spice shops. While one can buy spices in the normal grocery store chains, it is still possible to find speciality stores with an “exotic” flavor. Often there are spices that I have never heard of or ever seen in leaf or bark form. In the nut stores, the sale of nuts is serious business often with a roaster outside (to attract custom with the aroma), but these stores also sell Turkish delight, candy, and other snacks. Mainly confectionary.
I don’t know. Potpouri?
The spice stores sell many kinds of spices but also often function as apothecaries, carrying olive oil shampoo, or baldness remedies. Some of the products are to be steeped as a tisane, or smoked, or applied as a salve.
I would like to say that these stores are located in the souks of my imagination. They are not. For that I may have to go to Izmir. Or Istanbul. Adana is too practical, I guess.
Adana? Where is that? That is the reaction one usually gets to mentioning Adana. Although the city may not be famous, the Adana kebab (kebap here) certainly is. So what is it exactly?
It is a hand made artisanal hand minced lamb (must be from a male sheep younger than one year) elongated meat patty shaped around a metal skewer. It is grilled over an open charcoal fired grill. The Adana kebab is always grilled well done. There is a high percentage of pure white tail fat chopped into the meat mix to add juiciness and flavor. Non spicy red bell pepper can also be chopped in with the mix. The mixture is minced with a special crescent shaped cleaver, called a “zirh.” The percentage of meat to fat is 5 to 1. After the mixture is made, according to the recipe, it should be rested for a day.
There are some assumptions that the Adana kebab is spicy. It is not. Although the accompanying jalapeño chili can be. Each portion of Adana kebab is about 180 grams and it takes a master’s touch to make the meat mixture stick to the skewer so that it can be turned often while cooking. While the meat is cooking, the juices are soaked up with flat bread. This bread is served with the meat. It is fun to watch the master (“usta”) form the kebab. It takes a bit of water and a lot of skill to quickly move the hand up the skewer creating a wave of meat.
Like all kebabs, there will be the obligatory free salads (Don’t pay! They should be free!) and a grilled chili pepper and tomato. The kebab is served with flat bread, usually pide, so you can make your own delicious bites. Like most food here, you can spice or flavor the food as you like, with a sprinkle of red pepper powder, salt, or drops of lemon.
The typical drink with the Adana kebab is ayran, savory salted yogurt, or şalgam, fermented turnip. Or ice cold raki, alcohol made from grapes and flavored with aniseed.
Adana is proud and famous for the Adana kebab. Now that the Adana kebab is a designated cultural origin food, the city holds festivals of kebabs…
My informal guess is that there is a kebab shop on every block. At least one. Maybe two or four. So every day is a kebab festival!
Did I mention this yet? One of the startling things about Adana is the hairy goat cheese. It’s called “tulum” and it’s an aged white cheese. Tastes good. But the packaging is a bit hairy.
A cheese waiting outside a store.
The tulum is made by filing a goat skin and letting it age. This was a practical solution in the days of yore. One does not have to buy the whole goat of cheese. As customers buy the cheese, the top is peeled down, the outside of the cheese is scraped of bits, and then the cheese is cut.
A tulum cheese being opened.
But, when I’m driving along and see one of the headless tulum cheeses with arms straight out… I’m reminded that I’m not in Kansas. Especially like the other day when the smiling cheese lady (in the photo) fed me a piece freshly cut from the goat.
Some people, mostly foreigners, find this a bit gross and reminds them of why they want to be vegan. So maybe I should have done a warning…
I like to sit in the front seat of the taxi so I can enjoy the sights out the window. Sometimes I see things that surprise me. One day, I saw a goat torso waving at me… I had to stop and take photos. It’s cheese made inside a goat. It is the goat of goat cheese. Some might even say the G.O.A.T., greatest of all time, of goat’s cheese.
A “tulum” cheese that has been cut into.
This cheese is called “tulum” or “goatskin/sheepskin” cheese. There are local varieties with some being placed in brine after cutting, akin to Greek feta. The cheese is aged for three to six months inside the skin.
The cheese is fairly strong in flavor but not as much as one would think.
Simit is the “Turkish bagel” or so they say. I did not think so until I had the kind that sort of reminded me of a bagel. There are subtleties to simit that I have not yet fully comprehended. Some are coated in butter, some are coated in sesame seeds, some are baked harder, and some are coated in molasses. These are the five types that I have discovered in Adana. Apparently the molasses one is special to Adana. (Scroll down to see it)
Fluffy sesame simitTwisted slightly chewy simitBaked like pizza simit – also chewy — pizza bottom crust.Dipped in molasses simit – crunchy and sweet.Kazan, I think. These are twisted, chewy, and basted in molasses.
There is an old simit shop that has been around for more than 100 years, supposedly. They do one kind of simit. The kazan. Each simit costs around 10 lira. Bread prices are controlled by the government.
Generally, simit is a breakfast item, or a tea item. There are simit vendors who roam the streets and usually the simit they sell is the kazan simit. Simit is often paired with a processed cheese product sort of like the pie shaped Laughing Cow. The Turkish variety is funkier and takes getting used to. I am now digging it.
I have my favorite places and those usually bake fresh simit all the time. It is wonderful to smell fresh baked simit and even better to chew into it.
Many years ago, I went to a fabulous hammam (the idea of it being a “Turkish bath” was introduced in 1644 even though the tradition is more than 2,000 years old and started as “thermae” in Rome) in Istanbul. Now that I live in Adana, I wanted to find the experience again.
I asked some colleagues if they went to the hammam. As one man said to me, “No, I do not like strange men touching me… and especially when I have no clothes on.” Fair comment, fair comment. I asked others who told me that they did not go the hammam. No tradition of it now that everyone has a bathroom in their own home. In the old days, people had no running hot water in the home so they went to the bathhouse.
The hamman tradition is a remnant of the Romans (again, it’s all about those roads leading to Rome). The Romans also had no baths at home. The bath houses were a place to do more than bath. One went there to exercise, eat, and socialize. Everywhere the Romans went, they built baths (and roads). Even after the “fall of Rome” the Roman empire continued as the Byzantine Empire, then as the Ottoman Empire. Fast forward a century, and the hammam still exists.
Recently I learned that in olden times (I assume Ottoman times), mothers would go to the hammam to find a wife for their sons… well, I guess that is a sure way to do a visual inspection. I cannot speak to the visual inspection thing, but what I do know is that most young people and many others do not use the public hammams anymore. On top of which at many of the hammams, they have private rooms.
A hammam in Adana which is easy to identify by the skylights.
Despite what the modern Turks prefer, I was looking forward to getting regular Turkish baths. So I went searching. Most of the hotels have Turkish bathhouses. So far, I can see that they are staffed with Balinese women. One hotel had Balinese women for the English speakers and Turkmen women for the Turkish speakers. Generally the price is around 2,000 to 2,500 for a Turkish bath at a hotel. You do not need to be staying at the hotel to use the hammam.
It may seem a mystery for many so I will explain the basics of the Turkish bath. The men and women are separated either by location or time (some days or parts of the days for women and others for men). You can make an appointment or walk in and see if they have someone available.
This is one of the hammams in Adana. They have a plunge pool. Note the Turkish towels on the shelves.
Some places will have blue “shower caps” for your shoes for you to put on before you enter the spa area.
Some of the shoe cover machines do not use blue shower caps.
Once you enter, you will be taken to a locker room where you put your belongings in a locker (including your underwear although I’m told that some people keep it on). Then put on the robe or cotton wrap and paper slippers. Some places will make you shower before, but some do not have showers at the beginning. Then someone will guide you to the sauna, then the steam room (the sauna and steam room are optional), and then to the room with the golden taps and golden dish to rinse yourself. The person bathing you will be wearing a Turkish towel as well or maybe that and a top (if a woman). After you, and they, have rinsed you enough, they will indicate that you lie down on the warm marble slab (which is usually octagonal and in the center of the room) where they have placed a Turkish cotton towel.
Then, the person will take a special scrubbing brush and scrub a few layers of skin off you. This will be all over you, except for the genitalia. But very close. They will indicate when you need to roll over, when you need to sit up, and so on. They will scrub your face and wash your hair as well. They will massage you a bit. Then you will be rinsed off again.
Then you lie down on the warm wet towel again. And the best part happens… they take a cotton “pillow case” and suds it up in a cauldron. From there, they squeeze the suds and bubbles over you. It is marvelous. The warm bubbles effervesce on you like giddy bubble bath champagne. It is bliss.
A view showing the marble bench where you would sit and rinse yourself (also from the fancy place in Istanbul).
After the hammam is over, you may be covered in more towels and taken out to a rest area. There you may be offered tea or other restoratives.
Typical rest area in a hotel spa.
And then you pay. You can tip if you want to. Some places want cash payment which I find a bit…
One day when in Flushing, Queens, I felt the need to find a foot rub. Maybe Chinese reflexology. After all, I was in one of the largest Chinatowns in the world.
I looked at the map and there was a place nearby with a 5-star rating. I eventually found it in a high rise behind a bakery (to the left of the green awning in the photo).
The reflexologist was a gentle soul who bathed my feet first before working on my meridian lines. Luckily my Mandarin-speaking friend showed up so she could do some translating. Not that I remember very much as I was too busy feeling relaxed.
Ms. Annie Wong was a treasure. I wish I lived nearby. Because I was the first customer of the day, I got my 90-minute foot massage for around 50 bucks.
I highly recommend finding places like AW Spa when in Chinatown Flushing.
This is my first Ramazan (Ramadan) in Adana. I wasn’t sure what to expect. I recalled from Dhaka, that during Ramadan month, those observing Ramadan did not eat or drink during daylight hours. Every evening, the breaking of the fast, iftar, was a celebration. There were celebrations with family and gifts given. It was a festive time.
Ramadan follows the moon so this year is in the winter (February 18 to March 19). This year is the year 1447 in the muslim calendar.
So what is different her in Adana? Adana is a fairly open minded place. When I got to Adana, the locals told me that I should expect to see restaurants open during Ramazan and that people would also be drinking alcohol. This is so. Also, many restaurants closed for the first week of Ramadan but then opened up again.
Mini pide with mozzarella, potato, white cheese, sausage, and kale.
What was great interest to me was the food. Apparently eating “pide” is a Ramadan thing. It’s also an every day thing, but more so at this time. I noticed a different kind of mini pide and I have a feeling that these are only available during Ramadan. Today, March 14, is international pi/pie day (3.14) and pide is a kind of pie so quite appropriate.
Many bakeries are open around the clock so that was something to try out during this time. I discovered some lovely bakeries and almost all gave me samples, tried to serve me tea, and gave me freebies. Very hospitable.
Since you can’t take an Adana kebab as a souvenir, one has to (has to) find a magnet or mug as a souvenir. Recently, I was at the women’s cooperative, Adana Kadın kooperatifleri Birliği, for brunch and it turns out that they also have a shop (one is sitting surrounded by things to buy) so that is my recommendation for where to buy souvenirs.
Adana is famous for its clock tower, orange festival, Roman bridge, and the kebab. This shop, located conveniently in old Adana (just down from the clock tower, on the side of a park, Ziyapaşa Parkı), is a nice reprieve from the heat and bustle. Or cold and wet.
The orange festival is the biggest event of the year in Adana.
Aside from souvenirs like magnets, they also have handmade items and food for sale. And as I mentioned, you can eat there. The staff are very nice. It is hard to not buy a basket or hammer pants (which is the baggy style that many people wear here).
The other place I would recommend for souvenirs is Starbucks. Sounds odd? The Adana mug is adorable.
There are also other places to find souvenirs but one has to search. Or stick to the main touristy street.
When a cup of tea costs $20, then you might as well get as many brews out of it as possible. The tea tasting I did in New York seems a world away from Adana, and centuries ago.
One of the pours.
When I went to Chinatown Flushing in New York, I went on a tea tasting at Fang Gourmet Tea. After selecting two teas (at $20 each), the tea connoisseur explained the tea, washed the miniature cups in hot water, and brewed the tea. Five times for each tea. After each brew, we tasted the tea again.
The tea changed color with every brew.
I’ll admit that this may be too subtle for me. After a while, it just tasted like ‘tea’ to me. I could see the change in color, but I started to hallucinate that I was making up flavors and aromas just because I was supposed to be able to detect them… actually, what I found most interesting was the tea person. She had worked there for decades. She was calm and deliberate with all her movements. She really sensed every nuance in each brew… and I think she found our obtuseness a bit amusing.
The skein of a filter.
After the tasting, we could buy the teas. These are not cheap. Nothing below $45. The shop was filled with tea paraphernalia that we could buy.
Fast forward a few centuries and I live in Adana where tea is offered at every meal. And in between. But here the tea is the color of mahogany. (Turkiye has the highest per capita of tea drinking at three kilos per person, per year.)
Cig kofte are uncooked balls, here made with wheat and served like a lettuce wrap.
It seems at times like everything has the same name. The word, “köfte,” is the word for meatball. But, it’s not always made of meat. And it’s not always a ball. It seems like köfte refers to a ground meat formed into a ball, lump, or along a skewer (to make the famous Adana kebab).
A really famous dish of köfte is more of a hand formed polygon? I was out to eat at a local cafeteria and I ordered the Çiğ köfte which is raw meat balls. Most places do not make them with meat. They are made with bulgur, which is cracked wheat. This is because eating raw meat involves a higher risk and many restaurants do not want to take that risk. But, at the local place that we went to, one of my colleagues was a big cautious about the raw vegan balls because they are formed by hand.
The ones in the photo were delicious. Slightly tangy and spicy. Served in a lettuce wrap, they become a vegan or vegetarian raw food ball. It’s actually very modern food even though the history goes way back.
İçli köfte made by a Turkish mom.
Stuffed meatballs are also famous. Called İçli köfte in Turkish, these stuffed balls are called kibbeh in the middle east. One can make them with the pointy ends so that they look like lanterns or as perfectly domed balls like the ones made for me by a Turkish mom.
The ones I got were the kind that one boils like a dumpling. They were stuffed with ground meat. The exterior was made of bulgar wheat. These can also be fried.
