Carob beansSometimes I take photos for
Orhan's web design customers. In March Orhan asked me to photograph a local food manufacturer,
Atiseri's products for their upcoming shopping website.
Atiseri's productsAtiseri produce carob nectar (keciboynuzu/harnup nektari), carob molasses (keciboynuzu/harnup nektari), carob powder, carob beans, tahini paste (tahin), halva (helva), candied Seville orange (turunc tatlisi), andiz extract and various other food and health products.
In return for shooting the photographs, Atiseri were kind enough to give me a selection of their products. The item I am most thankful for is the carob nectar. Almost every day for a few months I took a tablespoon of this syrup. In that time I never became sick, despite facing some stressful times. In 2005, whilst in Mersin Dad also took carob molasses daily after hearing about its nutritious value on his trip to Antalya.
Carob nectar is purer than the more common molasses because nectar is produced at a lower temperature.
Carob, also known as St. John's Bread (after
John the Baptist who was believed to have sustained himself in the desert on a diet of carob beans) contains many of the vitamins and minerals the human body requires.
The carob tree is native to the Mediterranean. In Mersin, random carob trees are found in many places including near the city-train station road and on the military base next to the Muftu River bridge. With its similar climate, it's not surprising that carob trees are also being grown in my homeland,
South Australia. Unfortunately, carob in Australia does not have a good reputation as it is largely remembered in the form of carob chocolate, an awful tasting chocolate-substitute semi-popular in the 1980's. Indeed, before coming to Turkey, this was my only knowledge of carob.
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Labels: food
Last night I walked to Peter's place to watch Australia play Sri Lanka in the
Cricket World Cup final live from Bridgetown, Barbados. Also watching, and learning the sport's rules at the same time, was Darryl from Canada, another expat resident of Mersin.
Despite a delayed start due to rain, the game made good watching, with Adam Gilchrist smashing the cricket ball all around the place and the Sri Lankans giving the run chase their best shot. I left once the Aussies were close to victory. This meant I missed the
farcical finish.
Peter loves his
meat pies so last night wife Cansin made the closest Turkish equivalent, a delicious "
kiymali borek" (mince meat pastry).
The traditional accompaniment to an Australian meat pie is tomato sauce/ketchup. Peter didn't just squirt the ketchup on top but carefully crafted a work of art:
Note for Turkish readers: the "OZ" on the artwork above is short for Australia and not the Turkish word of similar spelling.
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Labels: food, sport
The last few days of my trip to Pakistan coincided with the first half of
Eid ul-Azha (also known as the Feast of Sacrifice in English, Eid ul-Adha in Pakistan or Kurban Bayrami in Turkish).
Previously I have spent this feast in
Sivasli/Antalya,
Aleppo and
Pamukkale/Selcuk/Izmir. In 2003 I just missed out on spending the feast in Egypt.
Just like in Turkey, the most obvious signs of the of the holiday were livestock (mainly goats, sheep and cattle) in unusual places. I even saw two goats in the centre of Lahore dressed in jackets with their legs sticking through the sleaves!
Livestock feed markets for animals prior to their sacrifice, on the side of a Karachi road
A soon-to-be sacrificed Brahman cow in Lahore's old city
Goats in Lahore
A large livestock market on the outskirts of Lahore. Because of this market and the cars surrounding it my already late bus to Islamabad was delayed further.
I arrived back to Karachi too late to witness Hani's family sacrifice a cow and a sheep, but, of course, there was still plenty of food left over from the barbecue.-------------------
Labels: food, food photos, karachi, lahore, religious holidays
As I wrote
previously, Pakistani food is dominated by meat and not as spicy as I anticipated. Here are some some food photos from my trip:
Clockwise from the top-left: lentils, sandwich, a fried sweet, a curry and a plate containing lemon wedges, fried onion and fresh coriander. 
Chicken curry
The salad bar at the first wedding reception
The first wedding reception's main dishes: bread, fish, biryani, chicken, lamb and beef(?)
A type a pakistani pancake in the foreground and the wedding cake in the background
"Thick, Fatty & Naughty Special". A funny menu heading at the Cafe Zouk's Karachi restaurant
The BBQ Tonight restaurant's barbecues, Karachi
Different breads and kebabs at BBQ Tonight. Although the kebabs look very similar to Turkish kebabs, the taste varies.
A full Karachi meal with 3 or 4 different meat dishes
Biryani, lamb and bread at the second wedding reception
Sweets, including trifle, at the second wedding reception. I don't ever recall eating trifle in Turkey and seeing it here was a pleasant surprise.
A fruit and vegetable stall at the main Karachi Bazaar
Sweets, lentils and vegetable pasta on the Airblue flight from Karachi to Lahore
Chestnuts bought from the Lahore street. The chestnuts are eaten cold with salt sprinkled on them. This was the first time I'd eaten this species. On the Lahore street I drank fresh sugarcane juice, also infused with salt.
A Lahore sweet shop in the old city
Pawpaw, custard apple and chico, three fruits not found in Turkey. The custard apple in particular tasted delicious.
Efes non-alcoholic beer. I found this in a Karachi supermarket and have also seen it in Iran, but not in Turkey where it is produced.-------------------
Labels: food, food photos
I had to buy the above capsicums/peppers at the weekly Wednesday fruit and vegetable markets (pazar) just for their colours alone.
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Labels: food
I saw
Chinese cabbage ('Cin Lanasi') in Mersin for the first ever today, at the weekly fruit and vegetable bazaar ('pazar') outside the stadium. As my fridge is full, I didn't buy a monster 3 kg cabbage but my boss did and I took a quarter of his. Bring on the stir fries and salads...yum!
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Labels: food, mersin
The above photo (featuring Nesibe) was taken partially reflecting and partially through a glass pane.
A delicious and relatively light cream fruit cake from Denizkizi Pastanesi (Mermaid Cake Shop).
A section of my female boss' desk, featuring 4 telephones (two wireless landline, 2 mobile), a telephone battery, an air conditioning remote control, an escape key and a pen.
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Labels: food, gadgets, personal
