Lentil Soup with Bulgur (Bulgurlu Mercimek Çorbası)

Lentil soups are very common in Turkey. This one is traditionally made with red lentils. However, I like the taste of bulgur more with brown or green lentils. For this one I used French lentils. The peppery taste of French lentils along with dried mint was simply perfect for this winter soup. To try the traditional Turkish recipe, just replace French lentils with red lentils.

3 tbsp butter
1 medium onion, finely chopped
1/2 cup French lentils
1/2 cup bulgur (I used fine bulgur, but coarse is fine, too)
2 tbsp tomato paste
2 tbsp flour (I used whole wheat)
6-7 cups of stock
2-3 tbsp dried mint flakes
2 tsp thyme
2 tsp red pepper flakes
salt


























-Saute onion with butter until soft.
-Add flour stir constantly for 1-2 minutes. Add tomato paste, stir another 1-2 minutes.
-Add lentils, bulgur, stock, and salt.
-Cover and simmer until lentils are cooked for approximately 30 minutes.
-At this point, if you want a smooth soup use a blender.
-Add mint, thyme, and pepper flakes.

Dried mint flakes definitely brightens up this soup remarkably. For the power of dried mint flakes, this recipe is my contribution to Weekend Herb Blogging which was founded by Kalyn and is hosted this week by Anna's Cool Finds.

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Stuffed Onions (Soğan Dolması)

In order to promote circulation sales, once in a week most newspapers in Turkey come with a supplementary booklet loaded with recipes by TV celebrity chefs. Sad but true! Turkey has witnessed worse; in the past, newspapers offered even non-reading related "things" to increase their sales. Among those were vacuum cleaners, radios, TVs, dinner sets, silverware, cameras, bikes, etc. Unfortunately people subscribed for months to certain newspapers not for their content, political views, or their columnists, but for the items those papers were offering. Compared to TVs and plates, recipe booklets seem less harmless since you need to "read" those recipes.

My mom had packed a couple of food magazines and those recipe booklets when they came to visit us last April. One of the booklets is by a TV celebrity chef, Emine Beder whose dishes I usually find too greasy, and recipes unexciting. However, I have to give her credits; her measurements are very peculiar and when followed strictly, recipes turn out as expected--no surprises.

I found her recipes after the move while unpacking. Flipping through the pages, I found this jewel among ordinary recipes. I changed the recipe here and there, but remained loyal to it in principle. The result was magnificent. I think I will give her recipes another chance.


























2-3 red onions (try to pick large ones--the recipe called for regular onions, I chose to use red ones)
1/3 lb ground meat (beef or lamb)
1/4 cup rice
1 1/2 tbsp butter
2 tbsp olive oil
2 tbsp tomato paste
2 tbsp red pepper paste (if you cannot find it, use tomato paste)
1/3 cup crushed dried sumac
1 tsp dried mint flakes
1 tsp oregano leaves
1 tsp cumin
1 tsp black pepper
1 tsp or more crushed red pepper flakes
1 cup hot water
salt

- Cut the bottom parts of onions 1/4 inch and peel.
-Boil them until soft, but not too soft. Rinse and let cool down.
-Squeeze each one to get every single layer. You will be stuffing those layers. If slippery, use a clean kitchen towel to grip and squeeze.
-Wash rice in plenty water and rinse.
-Soak sumac in hot water for 15 minutes and drain. Save the water.
-Heat butter in a frying pan. Add pastes, spices, and salt. Mix well and cook for 3-4 minutes.
-Take the pan off the fire. Add ground meat, rice, and sumac. Mix well.
-Stuff onions with the mix and place them in a broad pot.
-Pour in sumac water.
-After it starts boiling, simmer covered on low for half an hour.
-Serve hot with crusty bread. We loved it, especially with yogurt.

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Oven Baked Zucchini Fritters (Fırında Kabak Mücver)

Mücver is, if you ask me, "the" zucchini dish. It is usually deep fried and served with yogurt, garlicy yogurt. However, in our house mücver is always baked, because it is healthier and lighter. We have oven baked zucchini fritter as a snack for afternoon tea-time or sometimes for dinner with salad on the side. We love it with plain yogurt. The recipe is my mom's.











2-3 medium size zucchinis, grated (3 cups approximately)
3 eggs
1/2 cup white cheese/ feta
1/3 or 1/4 cup fresh mint, chopped or 3 tbsp dried mint flakes
1/2 bunch parsley, chopped
1/3 cup dill, chopped
2-3 green onions, chopped
2 tsp baking powder
1/4 cup oil (sunflower, canola, corn, olive oil, etc)
~1 1/2 to 2 cups of flour
1 tbsp ground pepper or less
1 tbsp crushed pepper flakes (if you like it spicy)
salt (how much salt you need depends on how salty white cheese is)


-Put all the ingredients in a bowl and mix well.
-Pour the mix in a greased oven pan.
-Bake in a preheated oven at 380F for approximately an hour. Check with a knife to see if it's done.
-It's good with yogurt on the side.


optional: sprinkle 1/2 to 1 cup of grated cheese (mozzarella, cheddar, etc) on top 5 minutes before it's done.

Oven baked zucchini fritters is my contribution to Weekend Herb Blogging that was founded by Kalyn and is hosted by Vani of Batasari this week.

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Cabbage Stew with Beef (Etli Kapuska)

Kapuska is a hearty traditional Turkish stew whose name is derived from, I believe, "cabbage" in Russian. Although the name is imported, the dish is truly Turkish, or Turkish version of a multi-faced cabbage stew common in Russia and Eastern Europe. Kapuska is widely known and eagerly consumed in Thrace, as a result of Eastern European impact i.e. Albanian and Bulgarian immigrants, and also in the Black Sea Region of Turkey thanks to our next door neighbor, Russia.

Kapuska is cooked in different ways in Turkey: with garbanzo beans, bulgur, rice, ground meat, lamb, beef, or vegetarian. This recipe is based on how my mom and aunt, the Thracian part of the family, make kapuska.




















1/2 pound stew beef or lamb
1 medium cabbage, coarsely chopped
3 medium onions or 2 big ones, diced
3 tbsp butter or you can also use olive oil
3-4 tomatoes, diced or 1 can diced tomatoes
2 tbsp pepper paste (use tomato paste if you cannot find red pepper paste)
1 tbsp crushed red pepper flakes
1 tbsp paprika
1 1/2 cups of water
salt and pepper
red hot chilies or any hot chilies you want

-Heat butter in a pot on medium heat and add stew beef. First meat will get juicy and soak the juice in.
-Once it loses its moisture, stir in onion and cook until soft (approximately 5 minutes)
-Add pepper paste, red pepper flakes, and paprika. Stir for a couple of minutes.
-Add tomatoes, salt, and pepper. Cook for 5 minutes.
-Add 1 cup of water and simmer for 50 minutes to an hour until the meat is tender.
-Meanwhile chop the cabbage coarsely, wash, and rinse.
-When meat is cooked, stir in cabbage. Add 1/2 cup of hot water. Simmer for half an hour.

Serve with crusty bread to soak the delicious juice.

kapuska is tastier if it's spicy.

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Instant Coffee and Raisin Cake (Neskafeli ve Üzümlü Kek)

Although Turks are known to be a coffee --especially Turkish coffee--
drinking nation, we are actually obsessed with tea. Besides, it wouldn't be wrong to say that since late 80s Turks have become more of a Nescafé drinking nation. Instant coffee is cheap, easy to make, and tasteless compared to Turkish coffee. As a matter of fact Nescafé is consumed so widely that Turkish coffee became "the other" in its own land. 15-20 years ago, before globalization poked our lives, "coffee" meant Turkish coffee in Turkey. These days you have to specifically ask for "Turkish" coffee (Türk kahvesi) at a coffee house, restaurant, etc., because now "coffee" usually means Nescafé.

When my family was visiting, my aunt insisted on having instant coffee. After she left, the coffee container remained untouched for weeks until I decided to transform it into a new identity: cake mix. Apparently instant coffee can be flavorsome in baking.

1 1/2 stick butter or margarine, at room temperature
powder sugar, a little less than 1 cup
2 - 2 1/4 cups of flour
3 eggs
4 tbsp milk
8 tbsp instant coffee
1 cup of raisins
2 tsp baking powder


-Beat well powder sugar and eggs with a mixer until it becomes creamy (approximately 4-5 minutes)
-Add butter, milk, and instant coffee. Keep mixing.
-Add flour and baking powder. Mix all of them.
-Finally add raisins and stir with a wooden spoon.
-Pour cake mix in a greased cake pan.
-Bake at a preheated oven at 350-370F for 35-40 minutes.
-When it's done, wait for 5 minutes and then take the cake out.
-Once it cools down, sprinkle powder sugar on top.

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Vegetarian Potato Casserole with Green Lentils (Mercimekli Patates Oturtma)

Back in the 80s, when I was in the elementary school, to support farmers who couldn't sell their produce Turkish government had bought hard-to-melt-down amount of lentils. The government's solution for agricultural crisis created another problem: warehouses stocked with lentils.

Government's solution to this new lentil crisis was Ayşe Baysal, professor of nutrition and dietetics, aka "auntie Ayşe" or "auntie lentil." Auntie lentil appeared every single day, seriously, for months on TV, on the only channel of the time--the state's channel TRT1, and gave a lentil recipe. Behind this obsessive non-stop lentil recipe creation was, of course, the determination of government and auntie Ayşe to reduce the national surplus of lentils.

Turkish public learned from "auntie lentil" that 100 gr. lentils is equal to ? gr. ground meat; how to make phyllo dough pastries (börek) with lentils; or how to make dolmas with lentils. Some of these recipes inspired Turkish people to cook more with lentils, and some scarred us; they became a nation's nightmare or a part of its dark collective unconscious like "baklava with lentils"!! The idea annoys me to this day. (I wonder if anyone tried)

I remembered auntie lentil a couple of days ago when I wanted to make a traditional Turkish recipe, potato casserole, which requires ground meat. I am not really fond of ground meat and I was thinking about how or with what to replace it when I clearly remembered auntie lentil saying over and over again that lentils are perfect substitute for ground meat. And here we go...


























1 cup green lentils
5-6 potatoes, cut in 1/2 inch rounds (This time I used red potatoes, but any potato is fine)
2 medium onions, finely chopped
2 cloves of garlic, minced
2 big red Italian sweet peppers or 2 green chilies, finely chopped
2 tomatoes, diced
2 tbsp tomato paste
1 cup chopped parsley
3 - 4 tbsp olive oil
1 tsp cumin
1 bay leaf
crushed red pepper flakes
ground pepper and salt

-Boil green lentils with 1 tsp cumin, 1 bay leaf, and 5 cups of water until cooked. Rinse.
-Boil potato rounds in salty water for approximately 10 minutes. Don't let them get mushy; they should be cooked but firm.
-Heat oil in a pan. Add onions and garlic. Cook for 5-6 minutes until onion is softened.
-Add peppers and cook for 3 minutes.
-Add tomato paste and cook for 2 more minutes.
-Stir in tomato and lentils. Add salt and pepper (and optional crushed red pepper flakes).
-Cover and simmer for 10-15 minutes. (Add a little bit of water if it dries out)
-Grease an oven dish and place potato rounds. Cover potato rounds with lentils. Pour 1/4 cup of water.
-Bake in a preheated oven at 350F for 20-25 minutes.
-Sprinkle parsley on top before you serve.

The recipe turned out really good. We tried it with yogurt the first day; we loved it. And next day we heated it up in the oven with cheese on top. That was delicious, too.

This lentil recipe with my favorite herb parsley is for "auntie lentil" as well as for Simona of Briciole, my favorite lexiconist food blogger who is hosting Kalyn's Weekend Herb Blogging.

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Milky Celery Root Soup (Sütlü Kereviz Çorbası)

When it's really cold outside my mom would make the traditional tarhana soup (a fermented soup mix with tomato, yogurt and flour) with milk. In Turkey I wouldn't even try the milky tarhana, but here since I cannot find it, I crave it. This milky celery soup is a result of longing for tarhana. It turned out very good and is really perfect for cold weather.

1 cup cubed celery root
2 carrots, chopped in rounds
2 potatoes, cubed
5 cups of water
2 bay leaves
pinch of ground cumin
2 tbsp butter
2 tbsp flour
1 cup milk
salt


























-Place celery, carrot, potato, cumin, salt, bay leaves, and water in a pot. Cook until vegetables are cooked.
-Take out bay leaves and with a hand blender or a blender smoothen them.
-Put butter and flour in a frying pan. Make roux constantly stirring. Add milk and keep stirring until smooth. As soon as it starts boiling, pour this into soup.
-Stir well.

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