Street Food Warms Your Heart: Turkish Cuisine at 162 Upper East Coast Road - The Ambience The Manager The Menu The Signatures

The Cuisine

Turkey's historical cuisine has its roots in various cultures: Persia, the Middle East, Central Asia, the Byzantine Empire, and lands ruled by the Ottoman Empire in Asia, Africa and Europe.

Turkish cuisine especially its confectionery owes it's diversity to 2 key imperial cuisine: the Safavids in Persia (1501 to 1736), the Abbasids in Arab World (750-1238), also the Ottoman period (1299 to 1923).

The Ottoman Empire (also known as the Turkish Empire or simply Turkey), was a contiguous transcontinental empire founded by Turkish tribes under Osman Bey in north-western Anatolia in 1299. In 1453 the Ottoman state was transformed into an empire when Mehmed II led the conquest of Constantinople. During the 16th and 17th centuries, the Ottoman Empire was one of the most powerful states in the world in particular at the height of its power under the reign of Suleiman the Magnificent – a multinational, multilingual empire, controlling much of Southeast Europe, Western Asia, the Caucasus, North Africa and the Horn of Africa.

With Constantinople as its capital and control of vast lands around the Mediterranean basin, the Ottoman Empire was at the centre of interactions between the Eastern and Western worlds for over six centuries. It was dissolved in the aftermath of World War I; the collapse of the empire led to the emergence of the new political regime in Turkey itself, as well as the creation of the new Balkans and Middle East.

Anatolia the Asia Minor of Romans and heartland of Ottoman Empire has long been a melting pot of peoples and culture for thousands of years. Food played a central role in private & public life of the Ottomans. Sweet dishes e.g. mafis and zulbiye are presented as gifts to mothers with new borns; zerde are served at wedding and circumcision feasts; lokma, un helvasi or irmik helvasi are served after funerals. Sweet foods are regarded highly in Islamic culture. The Turks raised the spiritual significance of sugar & sweets to greater heights, and names the 3 day festival following Ramazan the Seker Bayram (Sugar Feast).

Turkish cuisine is a heritage of the Ottoman cuisine, which is a fusion of Central Asian, Middle Eastern, Mediterranean and Balkan cuisines. Turkish cuisine has also in turn, laid its influence on Western European cuisines as well. The Ottomans combined their own culinary traditions with influences from Middle Eastern cuisines, traditional Turkic elements from Central Asia (such as yogurt), to create various specialties.

Turkish cuisine itself vary from place to place depending on the region. The cooking of Istanbul, Bursa, Izmir, and rest of the Aegean region inherits many elements of Ottoman court cuisine, with a lighter use of spices, a preference for rice over bulgur, koftes and a wider availability of vegetables staw turlu, eggplant, stuffed dolmas and fish. The cuisine of the Black Sea Region uses fish extensively, especially the Black Sea anchovy (hamsi), has been influenced by Balkan and Slavic cuisine, and includes maize dishes. The cuisine of the southeast—Urfa, Gaziantep and Adana—is famous for its kebabs, mezes and dough-based desserts such as baklava, kadayıf and künefe (kanafeh).

The Beginnings

Turkish Cuisine at 162 Upper East Coast Road is solely owned by shipping company owner Mr Selahattin Ozcelik, and managed by Manager Mr Emrah Pehlivan, who just came on board Turkish Cuisine just six months ago. Turkish Cuisine opens its first outlet 13 years ago at Suntec City with a fast-food concept, followed by its second outlet with fine dining concept at 162 Upper East Coast Road, a third one opening soon in 2014 at Lau Pa Sat. Owner Mr Selahattin Ozcelik (Mr Selo) lived in Singapore for the last 35 years, and owns a shipping company. Being of Turkish descent, Mr Selo desires to showcase the culture and finer taste of Turkish Cuisine to Singapore. Currently the company has plans to venture into Malaysia.

The Ambience

The restaurant spots a fine dining concept, complete with art pieces that flanked the walls, teak wood dining chairs with high backs surround the rectangle dining tables.

The Manager - Emrah Pehlivan

Back in 1999, Emrah Pehlivan spent a good 12 years on board the Royal Caribbean Lines as its Cruise Manager, that brought him to many parts of the world. He loved the city of Singapore and decided to work here. Six months ago, he came on board Turkish Cuisine as its Manager to oversee the operations of the two outlets here in Singapore.

The Menu

For the full menu, please go to:

http://eastcoast.turkishcuisine.com.sg/menu_page.asp

The Signatures

Caravan Adana Chicken - This is the Caravan Adana Grilled Chicken priced at S$21.90. The chicken is grilled on flat skewer and served on smoked mashed eggplant and yogurt mixture topped with butter & tomato sauce.

How it is prepared : The chicken is nicely grilled & season with herbs & spices, and garnish with parsley.

Food Tasting Notes : The base is eggplant & yogurt mixture, has a creamy sourly flavor. The chicken meat is grilled thoroughly not over burnt, cooked thoroughly with the meat nicely tender not too tough, eat together with yogurt eggplant to give a creamy & savory taste with a tinge of spice coming from chili oil. When you dip the bread into eggplant & yogurt mixture, bread is fresh & tasty. The portion is generous & can be shared among 2 - 3 people. I like it that the chicken is sliced lengthwise in finger, bite size portion. Overall flavor : spicy, creamy, sourly, full of herbs spices aroma, a very healthy dish.

This is the Karalahana Dolmasi (Stuffed Green Cabbage Leaves) prepared based on a recipe from Black Sea Region of Turkey - the green cabbage leaves are stuffed with minced meat, herbs, rice, stewed & served with yogurt sauce, priced at $19.90.

Food Tasting Notes : The stuffed green cabbage leaves has a very strong fragrant mint smell, with a strong tinge of yogurt. When you cut the cross section of the cabbage roll, you will discover there is minced lamb meat, with onion, herbs and a fair bit amount of rice. The taste of the lamb is very gentle, the meat very tender, because it is stewed. The yogurt with parsley gives a fragrant, flavorful, yogurtty, minty flavor to it. Interestingly, the lamb does not taste gamey at all but has a mild tender flavor to it. The lamb is stewed and wrapped in cabbage leaves.

Has Has Kebap - This Signature below is the Has Has Kebap made with minced chicken meat marinated overnight with salt, pepper and bread crumbs.

How it is prepared : The marinated raw minced chicken is laid in the chiller for 24 hours overnight. The next day, to the minced chicken is added in all other spices and flavors including : garlic, shallot, onion, cumin, oregano, mint, to flavor it, then it is grilled over charcoal fire for about 8 to 10 mins.

Food Tasting Notes : The raw minced chicken is marinated with salt pepper overnight for 24 hours, with added in all other spice mix to flavor the minced meat. When it is grilled/cooked on charcoal fire, the kebap is made lengthwise served together with red cabbage, onions flavored with parsley, served with grilled green chilli, grilled tomato, Mix of flavor eaten with flat bread & other vegetable. Taste : spicy, full of aromatic spices, flavor rich, chicken cooked till tender juicy because they use charcoal fire, meat is cooked till tender not overly done, the charcoal fire cook it well slowly. herb spices flavor it well - rich mouthful of flavors. The smell of the chicken kebap is very fragrant when served hot. When you eat it with the cabbage that is flavored with vinegar & sugar, the onion flavored with parsley - there is an overall juicy, sweet taste coming from the meat, vinegary sweet flavor from the vegetables, plus natural sweetness from the onion to give a rich fragrant savory spicy flavor in your palate.