A Turkish breakfast to a friend in Lisbon

 

We Turks love having breakfast, it is very traditional for us. Of course, you have to skip the big breakfasts while maintaining a healthy sports life, but a Saturday / Sunday breakfast is never indispensable. You can find various cheeses, olives, different types of eggs cooked differently, butter, lots of tomatoes in summer, pastries, fried foods (although I don't eat much), “simit”, “gözleme”, honey, jam/marmalade and all kinds of local flavors at the breakfast table.

So I wanted to prepare a simple breakfast for a non-Turkish friend of mine (if I say foreigner now, it will be marginalizing 😊 ). I had bake a cake the night before and I took it to him as an extra.

Breakfast prepared by my cousin

My friend has a house with a sea view and a nice kitchen, we decided to sit at his house because it was quieter and more beautiful. He made a gesture and bought us some tea leaves to brew. I had brought the “sucuk” that I wanted to taste, which I had recently vacuum-packed from Türkiye, and we were going to eat it. What is “sucuk” , the meat of animals such as cattle, buffalo, sheep or mixtures of these meats in certain proportions are used, stuffed into the intestine and ready to sell and then cooked on the grill and eaten with pleasure 😊 I think it is similar to Spanish chorizo? Let those who know talk 😊

My plan was to make “menemen”, not with peppers and onions, but simply with grated tomatoes and eggs. I didn't know what he liked, so I served it plain, and I wanted him to taste the “sucuk” separately, so I was going to cook it in a pan and serve it immediately.

While I was making a nice cheese plate, he was surprised that I was trying so hard for breakfast. I said, this is how we like it on weekends, it should be pleasing to the eye, it should have every ingredient you like. Unfortunately we had forgotten olives, and we didn't have any salami or cheddar. Of course I didn't bother with frying, I don't eat fried food in the morning either. I sliced the tomatoes thinly and placed them on the cheese plate, and then some arugula from Portugal on top, and it was a nice plate. I poured the olive oil over the ingredients and oh my!

Menemen and “sucuk” had to be eaten hot, so I left them for last. In the meantime, tea was brewing, of course there was no teapot, I had 2 milk pans, we heated water in one and brewed the tea in the other. I gave him a lemon slice because I drink it with lemon, he liked it 😊 Then, instead of butter and honey, I improvised and arranged brie cheese and honey on a plate, they were actually very harmonious.  I wished there was  “simit” here too !

Then it was time to make the king and queen of the table. Since I couldn't add peppers, I grated the tomatoes in a pan and cooked them a little, added salt and pepper, a little oregano and chili pepper and broke the eggs, they cooked quickly anyway. After slicing the “sucuk”  and turning it well in the pan, we went to the table with our teas.  I didn't mix the “sucuk”  with anything because it should be a free shot and I wanted it to taste.

We enjoyed our breakfast in the kitchen of the house with a view of the Portuguese ocean, although not an Istanbul Bosphorus view. He liked the Turkish breakfast, it's a nice endeavor. I always like to prepare breakfast for myself on the weekends and if someone ask me I could prepare for my friends.

Below you can find a nice picture of the breakfast I had on the first morning of my last visit to Turkey 😊

 

Türkiye breakfast

What do you enjoy eating for breakfast? Let's meet in the comments! 😊