What I Love About Turkey #1

Whew, it's been a week. I'm not exactly sure what, if anything, happened...but it's over and the next one is about to start.

First, some business:

1. Note the change of font color--thanks to two blind 20somethings you can no longer blame me if your current level of vision is not sustained.

2. I made some deliciousness tonight by accident and I want to be sure I record it before I forget what I did...and perhaps you will try it, make suggestions, tell me that it's crap and I must not really have taste buds, scream because you burned your house down, etc. As a warning, proportions may not be exactly correct as I didn't measure things, so I'm guesstimating here.

A lunch or dinner in two parts:

1. spicy citrusy "rusty" pasta
2. green on greens

Spicy Citrusy "Rusty" Pasta

1/4 lb shape pasta [i'm not really sure the quantity...i kind of just used a handful +-; using whole wheat pasta adds a nice nutty flavor and some texture]
1 tomato, cut into 8 segments
1 small onion, cut into rings
1 small carrot, cut into rods
1 small orange or tangerine, cut into 8 segments with peel still on [Seville or blood oranges would be great, i think]
1 tsp red pepper flakes [add more if you want more spice]
1 tsp orange juice
olive oil
salt and pepper, to taste
parmesan cheese, shaved

1. preheat oven to 375 F.
2. toss tomato, onion, carrot, and orange in a bowl with red pepper flakes and juuuust enough olive oil to coat. spread on a baking sheet and put in oven. roast until vegetables are tender and beginning to caramelize along the edges [the carrots may not be tender, but that's ok].
3. take vegetables out of oven and let sit. bring a pot of salted water to a boil and add pasta. cook to al dente. drain and return pasta to the pot.
4. cut peels off of oranges, attempting to keep the juices [you can keep the peel on some, it adds a nice bitter flavor].
5. add roasted items to the pasta. add orange juice and some olive oil. toss together. salt and pepper to taste. top with parmesan.


Green on Greens

salad:
1 handful of watercress
1 small [ie of the pickling type] or 1/2 medium cucumber, cut into rounds
1 celery stalk, cut into crescents
1 handful of parsley

vinaigrette:
fresh lemon juice
extra virgin olive oil
fresh ginger, minced
fresh mint leaves

1. put all the salad ingredients together in a bowl
2. [the vinaigrette is to taste, so just play around with the proportions a bit. watch out for the ginger, though] put the vinaigrette ingredients in a blender [a hand blender is great here] and blend until mint is finely chopped and the liquid is milky and thickened slightly. if you don't have a blender, whisk the ingredients together with a fork, but make sure you've chopped the mint finely beforehand.
3. toss salad with vinaigrette.

ta-da.

Ok, on to pleasure.

I haven't written for awhile because, well, I have some topics I'd like to discuss and I'm attempting to get some pictures. Unfortunately, people and things are just not in the mood to be helpful in the photo department. So, in the meantime, I'm going to start a thread I plan to continue throughout my stay here. It's called:


What I Love About Turkey

1. cigarette warnings

Did you know that smoking cigarettes: assassinates, blasts, butchers, dispatches, exterminates, fritters, kills, murders, shoots?? Well, if you missed that mid-90s memo, now you know. the Turkish cigarette box won't let you be fooled [icmek = to smoke, to drink; oldurmek = the definitions given above]. It's great! I love it!!


2. how much other people, especially Turks, love Turkey

This is some graffiti I found on the wall of the Ankara Kalesi [Ankara Citadel] in Ulus. It may have been written by another traveler. However, I'd be willing to bet a couple of dolmus rides worth of Turkish lira that this was actually written by a citizen of Turkey, likely of Ankara itself. Seriously, I can not tell you how much the Turks love Turkey. Unless you've been to Turkey you've never experienced a sense of nationalism quite like Turkish nationalism. It's a somewhat famous quality of the general Turkish persona, in fact.


3. walking up/down the re-opened (!!!) Ataturk Bulvari and almost walking into open pillars of electricity every 10-15 steps.

Apparently, I got here at just the right time. Ataturk Bulvari, a main thoroughfare in Ankara, has been closed the past 6 months for repairs/revampage and it's given a lot of people a hell of a time. It caused all the bus and dolmus routes to be changed and taxi rides were oftentimes made longer [= more expensive]. Last weekend the boulevard was re-opened and there were fireworks. Six months is record time for Turkish construction, apparently, so people are particularly excited. The road is beautiful (?) and up-to-date now, but they still have some work to do...like putting up all the street lights. For the most part, they seem to have started the job 50 times over, but just haven't quite finished it...leaving pits and wires poking out throughout the already pocked/non-existent sidewalk. Knowing my clumsiness and my tendency towards weird ailments, one of these days I'm just going to trip into a pit and get electrocuted. I'm pretty sure it's gonna happen. I'd bet my life on it?


4. street names

I live 5 blocks from Genghis Khan Street! There are some great street names here. Apparently, though, names of smaller, unimportant streets are constantly changed. It's not uncommon that a person will die and the street name will suddenly change to the name of the person. Consequently, according to my cousin, atlases and street maps are generally out-of-date the moment they are put on the shelves. But, for the main roads that don't change they are very useful. I would highly recommend the Sokak Sokak Ankara Kent Atlasi 1/10,000.

And that will end the first edition of What I Love About Turkey. It appears I'm not getting any better at writing less/picturing more. I'll keep working on it. Let me know if you try the recipes...i'm anxious to see what you think should be adjusted.

Later gators.