The story behind Turkish Delight

Totally agreed when it comes to baklava. I never had it done right in the US, and definitely not in the Bay Area. The best Turkish food I had was in Kirkland, WA and the best baklava I had was in Turkey at Gulluoglu.

I have the fotunate/unfortunate experience of growing up eating home-made baklava. I grew up going to an Eastern Orthodox church and most of the congregation was either immigrants or descendants of immigrants (including myself, great-grandmother was from Syria, along with some of my grandmother's siblings. My grandmother happened to be born in the US).

I used to find most of it disappointing at best. My tastes have loosened up quite a bit since then because not only did I give up church, but I'm far removed from the area now.

Not always possible, but baklava is pretty easy to make and stores really well (since you want it cooled first anyway.)

I have the same fixation with galaktoboureko (so many semolinas that are not grainy enough) but hardly anyone serves it :(

If you see this - which corner store on Post & Powell?

Maybe it should be obvious, but I couldn't figure it out. :)

There are two typical ways to make Turkish delight. One is the "easy western" way - sugar, rosewater, gelatin. This is obviously not halal. The second is the "hard authentic" way: sugar, rosewater, cornflower.

Cooking confectionery is a real trial. For Turkish delight, you heat a large amount of sugar for a very long time making it hover between a very tight temperature tolerance. If you go over you make toffee, if you go under you make caramel. After a few hours, you mix in the cornflour slurry, mix for a few more hours, and then pour to set.

In my experience, your cornflour lumps (three hours wasted), the temperature spikes or drops (fail), sticks (fail) or you get hot sticky napalm on extremities.

However, if you pull it off it is delightful, and your Turkish friends will be very impressed!

Perhaps read the article?

Ali Muhiddin Haci Bekir in Sirkeci is the defacto choice - their store still looks exactly the way it must have looked in the early 1900s. Cafer Erol in Kadikoy has a very nice storefront and a LOT of variety, and pretty decent hard candy ("akide") too. Divan is more of a western patisserie and has many locations, but good. Cemilzade is the off-beat version of Haci Bekir, also in Kadikoy. A lot of options: pomegrenate, saffron, twice baked, clotted cream ("kaymak"), coffee, coconut, pistachio, almost any fruit imaginable etc etc.

Just don't get the boxed stuff, and get a lot of variety of flavors. Also I seem to be the only person who hates the rosewater, but maybe that's just me.

For baklava, it's really a labor of love and there's a lot of great old and small shops. Gulluoglu used to be great and is still quite OK, but feels a but mass produced now. Smaller options are Köşkeroğlu, kafadaroğlu etc, but I don't know if it's worth seeking out especially - just duck into whatever small shop that seems busy during the day.

Probably what might be a better experience is trying /unfamiliar/ desserts: Kunefe is crispy shredded puff pastry with cheese in it, doused in syrup, served HOT with pistachio on top. Tulumba is the turkish take on churros. Halva is made of tahini and sugar, and is getting more popular in the US. Kazandibi is pudding that's been caramelized / burnt at the "bottom of the pan" - traditionally the gelatin in it comes from chicken breast (you can't taste it). More often it's now the "fake" version, still delicious. Lokma is turkish fried dough. Kabak tatlisi is made of pumpkin. There's so much to try, just get the stuff which you don't know what it is.

One thing to remember is that Turkish sweets are quite sweet - you're only meant to have one small piece. Of course that won't stop many of us from getting a whole plate :-) Usually you can ask for a half portion at a shop.

Finally if you're near Kadikoy, hit up Ciya too - regional foods from across Turkey that you can't find in many other places.

Hope you enjoy your trip!

Hey! Unfortunately it's a bit hard to find English resources - both in the sense that there aren't many to begin with but also the books are difficult to get hold of.

Classical Turkish Cooking by Ayla Algar is, well, a classic. People often think the recipes aren't descriptive enough. But also it's quite comprehensive and has a lot of history too.

Aegean Flavors by chef Didem Senol is a wonderful take on aegean cuisine in Turkey - highly related to greek food.

Oklava by chef Selin Kiazim is a bit more of a modern / upscale restaurant take - she runs one.

Claudia Roden's book is not only about Turkey but quite great.

Hope this helps!

I think also people severely underestimate how bland and repetitive the average person's diet used to be at the turn of the century, before food engineering and junk food. Meat and sweets were a luxury in a lot of places. Haute cuisine was reserved for the richest.

In the same token there are a lot of modern sweets that I find to be overly sweet. For example a lot of the Starbucks sweet coffee drinks are so sweet that they make me gag.

I find most modern sweet things to be disgustingly sweet, but Turkish Delight is one of the few sweets that I really like because it's not overwhelmingly sweet.

> "one of those things that was really amazing at the time, but just can’t compare to modern sweets"

Taste is subjective/cultural. I visited Istanbul early this year and brought back home (to São Paulo, Brazil) some boxes of Turkish Delight, several flavors, and they run out really fast with family and friends. Everyone loved it.

Personally I'm not a fan of modern overly sweet treats.

I read somewhere (can't recall where) that the fact that it's not that good was exactly why CS Lewis chose it. Even in his time it was considered "meh."

The notion being that people need little motivation to sell out.

The book was also set during the Second World War where sugar was rationed in England. I'm sure any sweets would have been highly prized by children.

Down with Hershey's chocolate flavoured dairy product!

Yeah, the Carbury's stuff really is a far cry from real Turkish delight. It's like comparing Haribo strawberries to real strawberries.

It's funny, I adore rosewater and pine Turkish Delight, but think of Aplets and Cotlets as that weird, bad candy that comes with your rations in the Boy Scouts.