Comments on: Time for Turkey

By: Fiona

Fiona — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 17:25:26 +0000

Hi all – I’m a new visitor here and my husband (who is coeliac) and I went to Istanbul for 5 days in late October. We absolutely loved it!
But…despite reading warnings from other coeliacs about the ‘Ottoman’ rice – he still was ill for 3 of our 4 days. Such a shame! But only in the mornings luckily. The culprit was vermicelli noodles in the rice. I’d read warnings to look out for small red flecks but these were about half a centimeter long and brown and we thought they were onions! We queried it with the waiters of several places and showed them his print out of the Turkish Coeliac card. The answer came back ‘It’s fine – there’s nothing you can’t eat in the rice’. The biggest problem we had was getting the waiters to take the cards to the chefs – they were all far too cavalier and we never really felt the chef had been shown the cards properly. Sorry to be negative but the cards were useless for John.
Finally, on the final night, these brown shreds looked bigger than before and I tasted one on its own and realised immediately that it was noodles. The difficulty is that when you take a full forkful, in semi darkness, you just don’t feel the texture.
We still loved Istanbul but it really wasn’t easy for him as a coeliac there. Just to warn people!
Best wishes, Fiona

By: genevieve

genevieve — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 16:34:03 +0000

I loved my time in Turkey, albeit brief.
I highly recommend Hotel Kelebek in Cappadoccia. Incredible surreal terrain & the food was yummy. Breakfasts in Turkey were almost always a nice mix of sweet & salty, with hard boiled egg, nuts, olives, honey, yogurt, tomato/oinion/parsley salad…and rich coffee or mint tea.
Bon Voyage!

By: H.Peter

H.Peter — Fri, 17 Oct 2008 20:41:19 +0000

Turkey being somewhat of a not so developed country (outside Istambul), you will find a lot of food that you can enjoy without hesitation as it is made from scratch and mostly without the help of Nestle or other “kitchen helpers”.

I spent some time along the coast in the Bodrum area and what I do remember was those giant open fire grills with whole lamb or pork being roasted. The best BBQ outside of North Carolina? Fresh vegetables galore, yoghurt based sauces with local spices and herbs.

Not exactly a meal, but equally enjoyable is the Turkish Pine Honey. Dark Amber, strong flavor, just excellent.

By: Chris

Chris — Sun, 12 Oct 2008 02:02:16 +0000

Hi Hilary,

This is going to be a fantastic trip — I can’t wait to read you posts when you return. Unfortunately, I don’t have any restaurants listed in Turkey — maybe you could be the first to post some to our listings.

Good luck and have a fantastic trip — can’t wait to see some photos.