Guest Post: Learning to love Turkish food

Hi guys! Today's guest post comes from my little sister Kerry. Kerry is the second child out of five (I'm the oldest) and she offered to guest post for me. Isn't that sweet?

Hello Two Boos readers! I’m Amanda’s younger sister, Kerry. And just like her, I am a fan of food. But up until the last couple of years, you wouldn’t have known it. I was extremely picky and extremely bored with food. Then I met my boyfriend, Burc and everything changed.
Burc is from Turkey and I was privileged enough to go with him to his home town of Istanbul in September of 2008.



Here I am with a little pizza from the bakery down the street from Burc’s parents apartment. Amazing!
I fell in love with Turkish food. And after getting back home, I knew I had to learn to make it! So I’ve decided to share with you my first attempts at various dishes.



This is Sarma. It’s a seasoned ground beef mixture wrapped in grape leaves. Serve it with garlic yogurt and you have perfection! This dish is VERY time consuming to make and challenging…but I did amazingly well for my first try.



Here is my attempt at baked borek, a delicious pastry. Burc’s anne (mother) sent me a recipe that calls for a ground beef mixture. Let me tell you working with fillo dough is the toughest part. I also really needed a proper baking dish…not a cookie sheet. Borek can also be filled with many other ingredients. I love with stuffed with feta cheese and then fried! They call that version sigar borek because of the way the fillo is shaped.



The other night I made kofte, a sort of meat ball. (Wow, I didn’t realize all of these included meat!) I used corn starch instead of flour which actually worked great.



After combining all the ingredients, I shaped the meat into little baby patties.



Fried with a bit of oil



And viola!



Jasmine rice goes great with kofte.



And Yogurt! You wouldn’t believe how many Turkish dishes involve yogurt. Everything from kebabs to a ravoli called manti.



View from The House Café in Ortakoy, Istanbul Turkey.
Well guys that’s it for now! I hope you enjoyed it.

Thanks Kerry! Hopefully, I can get my littlest sister Emily to guest post too. I'd ask my 8 year old brother but he'd probably write about corn dogs.

Check out previous guest posts:

Post from my sister Sarah

Post from One Healthy Apple

If you ever want to guest post, let me know!