Jason Perlow

Havuc (with a 'tail' on the 'c') is the word for carrot. This post reminds me of another different between Greek and Turkish cuisines. Someone please correct me if I'm wrong, but Greece doesn't have kofte do they? Yes they do. Bifteki Kebab. and KEFTETHES. Beef Kofta, right? They also do it with ground lamb. And chicken. During lent they make em with chickpeas, which basically makes them felafel, I guess.

Pretty much the same thing has happened in the NY/NJ metro area. After 9/11, virtually all Turkish restaurants billed themselves as "Mediterranean Cusine" and re-did their signs and awnings to reflect this. I saw this happen personally in the town I live in, where the local place changed its name from "Kervan II: Middle Eastern Cuisine" to "Sapphire: Fine Meditterranean Cusine" in a single weekend. This is because "Kervan II" was vandalized due to negative reaction from 9/11. Yes, I think you are right. In Los Angeles, Turks seem to keep a very low profile. Something about Armenians having long memories. Ironic in this context given the overlapping cuisines. A lot of Turkish/Greek delis in Bergen County, NJ are owned by Armenians. Thats where I get my supply of Lahmajun when I have a hankering for it.

Pretty much the same thing has happened in the NY/NJ metro area. After 9/11, virtually all Turkish restaurants billed themselves as "Mediterranean Cusine" and re-did their signs and awnings to reflect this. I saw this happen personally in the town I live in, where the local place changed its name from "Kervan II: Middle Eastern Cuisine" to "Sapphire: Fine Meditterranean Cusine" in a single weekend. This is because "Kervan II" was vandalized due to negative reaction from 9/11.

Here's a dish thats the equivalent to Shrimp Saganaki: http://www.turkishcook.com/recipe.asp?Recipe=70 BTW according to a few different web sites, Shrimp Saganaki was invented in the 60's.

Apparently, the Turkish also have Avgolegmono (egg/lemon sauce), a common theme in Greek cuisine as well: http://www.turkishcook.com/recipe.asp?Recipe=76 and in a soup, although not with chicken, with lamb: http://www.turkishcook.com/recipe.asp?Recipe=8 You've gotta wonder where and in what dishes the cross pollination effect took place.

PATLICAN MUSAKKA is what the Greeks call simply Mousakka, but I think an interesting deliniation here is that the Greeks bake this with Bechemel (as they do also with Pastitsio and a few other dishes) whereas the Turks do not.

According to TurkishCook.com its a ISPANAKLI TEPSI BOREGI (Spinach Borek)

Have a look at: http://www.turkishcook.com/ very cool website.

Spanakopita (spinach pies) exist in turkish cuisine as well but I am not sure what they call them.

Most definitely, they have it. All kinds of dips and salads. Lots of em with eggplant. Chopped eggplant, spicy eggplant with tomato, bagaghanoush and hummus (aka melitzanosalata and revithosalata), etc..

So shoot me, but I like the cioppino at Aliotos.

Okay, but to ask an even tougher question, is there such thing as Cyprian cuisine? Or is it Greek and Turkish? Many Greeks who I have spoken to have told me that virtually every important dish we attribute to as "Greek" is actually Turkish in origin -- kebabs, gyro, taramsalata, revithosalata, baklava, even Mousakka -- is Turkish, but sometimes referred to by different names. As is the cheese we call Feta that both Greece and Turkey (and Bulgaria) makes a huge industry of today. This is due to hundreds of years of occupation by the Ottomans. Sure, there are dishes that dont exist in all three cultures simultaneously, but for the most part it is the same cuisine. I've never seen Pastitsio, Avgolegmono or Skordalia in a Turkish restaurant but that doesnt mean they dont share a common culinary ancestry and very similar preparation methods.

Oh oh.

Whoa! Thats gotta hurt. eGullet: Where Foaming (at the mouth) is in FASHION!

There's a Turducken recipe on the eGullet Recipe Archive, now in Alpha testing: http://recipes.egullet.com/showrecipe.php?r_id=192

So Vic, tell us what you really feel about the place. Don't hold back...

You went to a new Vietnamese restaurant without ordering Pho?

1g safran safran / azafran = Saffron

Yeah, there are a lot of korean stews and soups that you could almost classify as Nabe.

My sentiments exactly. My mother frequently made sukiyaki, but it was never a favorite of mine. Yosenabe makes winter weather bearable, even welcome. Nah, I dont subscribe to this. You dont want to use great cuts of beef for sukiyaki, you want to use it to flavor the broth for the vegetables and noodles. Sukiyaki (and shabu shabu) is still good. But I don't like it when the broth is too sweet.

Sukiyaki. Definitely.

actually eddie in San Francisco, "Chow Mein" is interpreted as what we in the East Coast refer to as "Lo Mein". Its a stirfried noodle dish.

I like Peoples Temple Guyana Brown Cooler. EDIT: Sorry folks, stupid topic deserves a stupid answer.

I am quite torn on this. The reason being, while I know that "Sweet and Sour Chicken" represents everything that is wrong with Chinese cuisine in america today, and how its one of those lunch special takeout dishes thats really given Cantonese regional cooking a bad rap... I like the dish. God I love it. When its done well, the crispy battered chicken nuggets, if flash fried to perfection and not too greasy, countered with a tangy-sweet and very vinegary dipping sauce, that is of the proper consistency just to coat the nuggets and not create a cloyingly sweet sticky mess, can be a great dish. Even though I know that its a complete bastardization of the original chinese banquet dish, I love it. When its bad though, oh boy is it bad. Cloyingly sweet, overly gloppy conistency, nuggets drenched in grease. Bad. very bad.

Its interesting that you say that tawa are always flat... because at a local Indian restaurant, Kinara, in NJ, they have a dish on the menu called "Chicken Tava" which they refer to as a wok/stirfry chicken dish. Do they use the Tawa in this dish, or is their some meaning to the alternate spelling with a V? PS: the Karahis are made by Le Creuset. And yes, I want one too.. http://www.lecreuset.co.uk/castiron/adventurous.asp It appears that they only have the Karahi in the UK catalog, not the US one: http://www.lecreuset.com/new/productguide_lc.php