A Turkish cooking contest

Local Turkish women prepared desserts, and even some of those were made with vegetables.

By FAYE LEVY, YAKIR LEVY
Sweet, red and orange mini-peppers are pressed into cheese boreks. (photo credit: YAKIR LEVY)
Sweet, red and orange mini-peppers are pressed into cheese boreks.
(photo credit: YAKIR LEVY)
When I was invited to be one of the judges at the Turkish cooking competition at Pacifica Institute in Irvine, California, I was hoping to pick up some cooking tips as well. After all, the contestants were the graduates of a course given by talented cooking teacher Eren Aksoy.
Each participant (all were women) could prepare any savory dish she had learned during the course, and could add her own twist.
Some of the students prepared Turkish culinary classics, like boreks, Izmir meatball stew and chicken-rice pilaf. Among their creations, the winning dish was an innovative interpretation of manti, a Turkish stuffed pasta resembling tortellini. Second place went to the dish that happened to be the easiest to prepare – a traditional bean salad.
The participants in the cooking contest took care in the presentation of their dishes, using fresh vegetables, herbs, seeds and sprinklings of spices to make them attractive and appealing. The garnishes they used, like a single fresh mint leaf floating in a bowl of creamy-textured lentil soup, were elegant in their simplicity, not fussy or complicated.
You probably would not expect a bean salad to be the most colorful dish on the table, but the generous amounts of diced fresh tomatoes, green peppers and parsley that Amira Yousef mixed with the cooked white beans made her salad inviting and refreshing. To garnish the salad, she added a row of sliced hard-boiled eggs, sprinkled them with sumac, and topped the dish with a sprig of fresh mint.
Even the cheese boreks, another winning recipe, looked fresh and colorful thanks to the garnishes used by Lorena Gutierrez. Onto each borek she pressed pieces of sweet, red and orange mini-peppers and strips of green peppers, so that during baking the peppers were roasted and became embedded in the pastry. To give the boreks another layer of flavor, before baking she sprinkled the dough with za’atar, as well as black and white sesame seeds.
Although the goal was to prepare food that was delicious enough to win a prize, the entries looked healthful. The contestants’ generous use of fresh produce reminded me of why I love the Mediterranean diet.
Just about every dish had vegetables and fresh herbs incorporated in some way. A bowl of mashed potatoes enriched with yogurt was flecked with shredded carrots and chopped parsley. Lara Chandler served her winning saffron- flavored seafood manti with two sauces, including one of cucumbers, yogurt, mint and garlic, generously sprinkling the dish with slivered fresh mint.
The other sauce was olive oil and butter heated with shallots, pepper flakes, sumac and other seasonings.
For a second contest, local Turkish women prepared desserts, and even some of those were made with vegetables. There was a dome-shaped spinach cake embellished with rings of colorful berries, kiwi slices and chopped pistachios.
A three-layer semolina dessert was flavored with pumpkin, and garnished with pistachios and chocolate-dipped almonds. Other unusual desserts were spinach baklava and crying cake – a profiterole-like pyramid of round, cream-stuffed chocolate cupcakes doused in chocolate sauce, and adorned with strawberries and mint.
The dessert that won first place was the most traditional one – golden baked rice pudding. I suppose this shouldn’t be surprising, as rice pudding has been a favorite Turkish dessert for centuries. According to Mary Isin, author of Sherbet & Spice, rice pudding was one of the earliest desserts introduced by the Ottomans to European cuisine.
“Turkish rice pudding entered Italian cuisine in the early 16th century...Rice pudding is first recorded in 1529, on the menu served at [Italian duke] Ercole d’Este’s wedding banquet, where it is described as ‘Turkish-style rice’ cooked with milk, sugar, butter and rose water.”
■ The writer is the author of Feast from the Mideast.
Turkish white bean salad with vegetables – Piyaz
Use freshly cooked beans for this salad or, for a quick dish, canned beans.
You can vary the seasonings to your taste; some add red pepper flakes, freshly ground black pepper or fresh dill. If you like, garnish the salad with flavorful black olives.
Makes 5 or 6 servings
❖ 1½ cups dried white beans, 3 to 3½ cups cooked white beans, or two 400-gr. (15-oz.) cans white beans, drained and rinsed
❖ Salt to taste
❖ 1 large onion
❖ 1 Tbsp. vinegar, or to taste
❖ 2 to 3 Tbsp. strained fresh lemon juice, or to taste
❖ 2 to 5 Tbsp. extra virgin olive oil, or to taste
❖ ¾ cup chopped parsley
❖ 1 small sweet green pepper, cut in small dice
❖ 2 medium tomatoes, cut in small dice
❖ 2 hard-boiled eggs, sliced
❖ Ground sumac (for sprinkling)
❖ Sprig of fresh mint (optional, for garnish)
If using dried beans, sort and rinse them.
Put them in a saucepan with 4 cups water.
Bring to a boil. Cover and cook over low heat for 1 to 1½ hours, adding salt after the beans have cooked for about 45 minutes.
If you are cooking the beans ahead, keep them in their cooking liquid. Before using them in the salad, drain them; you can save the liquid for soups.
Quarter the onion and cut each piece in thin slices. Separate the slices into slivers.
If the onion smells strong and you prefer a milder flavor: Put the onion pieces in a strainer, sprinkle them with salt, rub them lightly between your fingers and let them stand 5 to 10 minutes; rinse the onions, drain them well and squeeze them lightly to remove the water.
Combine beans and onions in a bowl. Add vinegar, 2 tablespoons lemon juice, 2 tablespoons olive oil and a pinch of salt and mix well. Add parsley and green pepper. (If you like, at this point you can cover the salad and refrigerate it.) A short time before serving, cut the tomatoes in small dice and mix them lightly into the salad. Taste, and add more olive oil, lemon juice, vinegar and salt if needed.
Serve at room temperature in a shallow bowl.
Garnish the salad with sliced hard-boiled eggs, and sprinkle the egg slices with sumac.
Set a fresh mint sprig on top and serve.
Turkish baked rice pudding – Firinda sutlac
I adapted this recipe from one I received from Turkish cooking teacher Eren Aksoy, who blogs in English and Turkish at theanatoliankitchen.com.
Aksoy cooks rice flour, cornstarch or flour in the pudding mixture to contribute a velvety texture to the dessert. To give the pudding an appealing golden crust, she mixes part of the pudding mixture with an egg yolk, spoons it over the top of the pudding and bakes it. She sets the baking dishes in a water bath to keep the pudding from drying out.
Because the pudding thickens as it cools, Aksoy emphasizes that it’s best to make the mixture a little too thin before you bake it.
Turkish cooks usually flavor the pudding with vanilla sugar because it contains no alcohol; you can substitute vanilla extract.
If you wish, garnish the pudding at serving time with coarsely chopped, lightly toasted blanched almonds, pistachios or hazelnuts.
In Turkey, the pudding is traditionally baked in individual clay baking dishes. Ramekins or custard cups work well, too.
Makes 6 servings
❖ ½ cup Arborio rice or other short- or medium-grain rice
❖ 2 cups water
❖ 5 to 5½ cups whole milk, divided
❖ 5 Tbsp. cornstarch
❖ 7 Tbsp. sugar, or to taste
❖ 1 packet (about 10 gr. or 0.35 oz.) or 1 tsp. vanilla sugar or 1 tsp. pure vanilla extract
❖ 1 egg yolk
Combine rice and water in a heavy, wide medium saucepan and bring to a boil. Cook uncovered over medium heat, stirring occasionally, about 20 minutes or until rice is tender and has absorbed all or nearly all water.
Meanwhile, measure 1 cup milk for mixing with cornstarch. Spoon cornstarch into a bowl or measuring cup and stir in 3 tablespoons of measured milk, until mixture is smooth. Gradually stir in the rest of cup of milk.
Preheat oven to 200ºC (400ºF). Put six 300-ml. (1¼-cup) ramekins or custard cups in a roasting pan.
Add 4 cups milk to pan of rice and bring to a boil over medium-high heat, stirring often so milk won’t burn. Reduce heat to low.
Stir cornstarch mixture again to be sure it is well-blended, then slowly stir into pan of rice.
Cook over medium-low heat, stirring very often, until mixture thickens and returns to a boil. Add sugar and heat, stirring, about 2 minutes or until it dissolves.
Remove from heat. Stir in vanilla. Taste, and add more sugar if desired.
Pudding mixture should be thick but pourable; it should be thinner than you like, as the pudding will continue to thicken as it cools. If necessary, gradually stir in more milk in tablespoons to bring pudding to the right consistency.
Transfer 1/3 cup of pudding to a small bowl and let cool for 10 minutes.
Divide remaining pudding mixture evenly among ramekins or custard cups.
Mix egg yolk into small bowl of pudding mixture. Divide mixture among the puddings, spooning about 1 tablespoon onto top center of each portion, spreading lightly; it’s fine if it doesn’t cover all of the pudding.
Put pan of puddings in oven. Pull out the oven shelf and carefully add room-temperature water to roasting pan, adding enough to come halfway up the sides of the baking dishes and being careful not to splash water into puddings.
Bake for about 30 minutes, or until tops of puddings are brown in the center.
Remove puddings from pan of water. Cool to room temperature. Refrigerate 2 hours or until well-chilled. Serve cold