Turkish cuisine is the cuisine of Turkey and the Turkish diaspora. Although the cuisine took its current rich form after numerous cultural interactions throughout centuries, it should not be confused with other cuisines such as Ottoman cuisine or Seljuk cuisine. Turkish cuisine with traditional Turkic elements such as yogurt, ayran, kaymak, exerts and gains influences to and from Mediterranean, Balkan, Middle Eastern, Central Asian and Eastern European cuisines.
Dough is a thick, malleable, sometimes elastic paste made from grains or from leguminous or chestnut crops. Dough is typically made by mixing flour with a small amount of water or other liquid and sometimes includes yeast or other leavening agents, as well as ingredients such as fats or flavorings.
Levantine cuisine is the traditional cuisine of the Levant, in the sense of the rough area of former Ottoman Syria. The cuisine has similarities with Egyptian cuisine, North African cuisine and Ottoman cuisine. It is particularly known for its meze spreads of hot and cold dishes, most notably among them ful medames, hummus, tabbouleh and baba ghanoush, accompanied by bread.
Palestinian cuisine consists of foods from or commonly eaten by Palestinians, whether in Palestine, Israel, Jordan, or refugee camps in nearby countries, or by the Palestinian diaspora. The cuisine is a diffusion of the cultures of civilizations that settled in the region of Palestine, particularly during and after the Islamic era beginning with the Arab Ummayad conquest, then the eventual Persian-influenced Abbasids and ending with the strong influences of Turkish cuisine, resulting from the coming of the Ottoman Turks. It is similar to other Levantine cuisines, including Lebanese, Syrian and Jordanian.
Qatayef, katayef, or qata'if, is an Arabic dessert. It is a type of sweet dumpling filled with cream or nuts, or a folded pancake, similar to a Scottish crumpet.
Reshteh khoshkar is the traditional cookie especially for Ramadan in Gilan Province, Iran. It is made of rice flour, and filled with sugar, ground walnuts or hazelnuts, cardamom, cinnamon, ginger and spice, fried in hot oil or fat. Made of rice flour, wheat flour, sugar, almonds, walnuts, and cinnamon, it is slowly fried in oil. Rice flour batter is poured in a small container with multiple holes such that the rice batter runs out of it as fountain. This container is then used to make a pattern on a hot skillet with the running rice batter. The hot skillet firms up the rice batter and makes a thin patterned sheet of rice pastry. A filling of crushed walnuts, sugar and sometimes other ingredients is placed in the center of the pastry and folded securely. This is then fried in oil and enjoyed.
Ka'ak or kahqa is the common Arabic word for cake or biscuit, in its various senses, and can refer to several different types of baked goods produced throughout the Arab world and the Near East. The bread, in Middle Eastern countries, is similar to a dry and hardened biscuit and mostly ring-shaped. Similar pastry, called "kue kaak", is also popular in Indonesia.
Kürtőskalács is a spit cake specific to Hungarians from Transylvania, more specifically the Székelys. Originally popular in the Székely Land, it became popular in both Hungary and Romania. The first written record dates back to 1679 and was found in the village of Úzdiszentpéter, while the first recipe appears in a manuscript cookbook dated in 1781. Earlier a festive treat, now it is part of everyday consumption. A similar pastry to kürtőskalács is Baumstriezel, originating in the Transylvanian Saxon communities.
Baklava is a layered pastry dessert made of filo pastry, filled with chopped nuts, and sweetened with syrup or honey. It was one of the most popular sweet pastries of Ottoman cuisine.
The poppy seed roll is a pastry consisting of a roll of sweet yeast bread with a dense, rich, bittersweet filling of poppy seed. An alternative filling is a paste of minced walnuts, or minced chestnuts.
Gâteau Basque is a traditional dessert from the Northern Basque region of France, typically filled with black cherry jam or pastry cream. Gâteau Basque with cream is more typical in the Southern Basque region of Spain.
Qurabiya also ghraybe, ghorayeba, ghoriba, ghribia, ghraïba, gurabija, ghriyyaba, or kourabiedes and numerous other spellings and pronunciations, is a shortbread-type biscuit, usually made with ground almonds. Versions are found in most Arab and Ottoman cuisines, with various different forms and recipes. They are similar to polvorones from Andalusia.
Shekarbura is a sweet pastry.
Kolompeh is an Iranian pastry baked in the city of Kerman. Kolompeh looks like a pie with a mixture of minced dates with cardamom powder and other flavoring inside. Dates, wheat flour, walnuts and cooking oil are the main ingredients. Pistachios or sesame powder are often used for decorating kolompeh.
Nan-e nokhodchi, also called Shirini-e nokhodchi, are cookies made from chickpeas originating in Qazvin, Iran. These are traditionally made from chick-pea flour and flavored with cardamom and garnished with pistachio. They come in varying shapes.
Nan-e berenji, or Nan-berenji (نانبرنجی), also called shirini-e berenji, is an Iranian rice-flour cookie originating from Kermanshah. Nan-e berenji literally translates to "rice bread". It is often flavored with cardamom, garnished with poppy seeds and formed into flat disks. They are usually white, but sometimes tinted yellow.
Arab Indonesian cuisine is characterized by the mixture of Middle Eastern cuisine with local Indonesian-style. Arab Indonesians brought their legacy of Arab cuisine—originally from Hadhramaut, Hejaz, Sudan and Egypt—and modified some of the dishes with the addition of Indonesian ingredients. The Arabs arrived in the Nusantara archipelago to trade and spread Islam. In Java, since the 18th century AD, most of Arab traders settled on the north coast and diffuse with indigenous, thus affecting the local cuisine culture, especially in the use of goat and mutton meat as well as ghee in cooking.
Lauzinaj, also spelled lawzinaj, lawzinaq, luzina is an almond-based confection known from medieval Arab cuisine. Described as the "food of kings" and "supreme judge of all sweets", by the 13th-century lauzinaj had entered medieval European cuisine from the Andalusian influence, returning Crusaders and Latin translations of cookery books.
