Istanbul: Recipes from the Heart of Turkey

For my birthday in February I got this beautiful cookbook.  Istanbul: Recipes from the Heart of Turkey by Rebecca Seal is a hardbound book with lovely photos by Steven Joyce.  I was excited to get it because the recipes are ones that a person could actually make - and remember Istanbul!

Friday Featured Art: Hagia Sophia Mosaic

I've been thinking again about our trip to Istanbul over spring break.  The Hagia Sophia Museum (Ayasofya) is one of the most incredible places I've ever seen.  I loved the beautiful mosaics, like this one of Mary, Jesus, and John the Baptist.  (I took this picture.)  If you go to the Hagia Sophia web site, there is a beautiful aerial view of the museum.  The yellowish roof peeking through the trees on the left just might be our hotel - we were that close.

Spoonmaker's Diamond

Thinking about the Queen's Diamond Jubilee reminded me of something fabulous that we saw in Turkey.  Topkapi Palace has an incredible collection of jewels.  This 86-carat diamond is known as the Spoonmaker's Diamond.  It is stunning.

Tulip Teacup

One of the souvenirs that I brought home from Istanbul was this tulip teacup.  I thought it was so beautiful.  It cost 10 Turkish lira, which turns out to be about $6.  Lovely.

Turkish Pillow

When we were in Istanbul, I bought this pillow cover.  The guy told us that the design along the edge is supposed to look like the fence at Dolmabahce - the palace of the sultans.  I don't have a great picture of the fence, but you get the idea.  Then I bought a yard of fancy fabric at JoAnn's to cover my chair.  It was on clearance for about $4.  (The books are a set of Robert Louis Stevenson classics that my mom sent to me - I'm running out of room for books!)

Pomegranate

When we were in Turkey, we saw pomegranates everywhere. I love that the pomegranate is a common design motif there. We saw lots of glass and ceramic pomegranates, like this one from Pasabahce Magazalari (a Crate and Barrel-type store that we visited at the mall).

Habitat

Habitat is a British store that we visited at the mall in Istanbul. They had a lot of interesting things, including beautiful kitchen linens and tableware (like these).

Turkish Treats

Sweet shops in Istanbul had very fabulous window displays. We went to one a couple of times for yummy puddings. At a coffee shop at the Turkish and Islamic Arts Museum, we found some sugar candy, like the picture below. We bought the golden, honey-colored kind with hazelnuts. The picture at the bottom is Turkish Delight (or lokum). I got these great pictures from the web site of the sugar candy company (Sekerci Cafer Erol) - and I think I figured out why so many of the English translations in Istanbul were so funny. Google Translate translated part of the page for me, and it turned out like this:

Erol Confectioners Jafar, this production technique that is completely against the respect from our experience in adding sugar candy sugar candy flavor adds a kind of dozens.

Thursday Text: Traditional Turkish Designs

I just ordered this book + CD-ROM from Dover Publications: Traditional Turkish Designs. (Yes, it's just graphics, but I'm counting it as text because it's a book...) I saw a lot of beautiful pillow covers at the Grand Bazaar in Istanbul that featured Ottoman embroidery designs. I didn't find one with a design AND a price that I liked, so after returning home I figured that I could get this book with the designs and embroider my own! I really liked the stylized tulip (seen below) and carnation designs.

Istanbul Design

There were some items in the Istanbul gift shops that featured really great graphic design. I didn't end up getting any, but I did write down the web site! Istanbul Koleksiyonu sells dishes, t-shirts, and notebooks with designs representative of the city. There are tons of seagulls in Istanbul, like on this bowl, and I loved the designs like on the notebook below with depictions of the skyline. (The web site is in Turkish...)

Turkish Tulips

An interesting fact about Turkey is that they're the ones who gave Holland tulips. Yes, they started the whole craze. I really love that tulips are a symbol of Turkey. This unusual variety is called the Istanbul Tulip (tulipa acuminata). It has pointy, knife-like petals. You can see a similar pointy tulip in the official logo of Turkey tourism, below.

{Istanbul Tulip photo from plant database.}

Spring Break

We returned Saturday from our spring break trip to Istanbul. On the way there we had a 10-hour layover in Paris. Then we spent 4 and a half days in Istanbul. It was all a really great experience for us. I'll have some fun things to share in the days to come...