Istanbul Street Food Comments...

I love it when people comment. All this stuff on Istanbul has caused a bit of a stir which is brilliant. The "Paunch" is syndicated on Food Candy where Kinni has written a fantastic response to the post on Istanbul street food. Thanks also to MasterChef champion Steven who has got a great blog called the Urban Foodie who was really nice about the post too. G Barran has suggested the best place for street food in Istanbul is http://www.ciya.com.tr/.

From Kinni:

"I lived in Izmir in '93-'94. I've never had such wonderful food. I have no compunctions about eating from street vendors, and did so at every opportunity-- especially the mussels. The only thing I wouldn't eat from a street vendor are those pretzel like rings in your first pic. We used to call them hepatitis rings. The kids who sell them would take one of the rings, place it on his head, then balance a peice of scrap wood on his head with dozens more rings stacked on top. The overall structure was usually larger than the child, so the whole thing would come crashing to the ground every two blocks. The kid would chase the rings around, restack them and resume his rounds. Who knows how many days those things had been sitting around anyway.

I knew a lot of Americans there who refused to eat local food. They would eat at the McDonald's, which doesn't taste the same as American McDonald's, but I guess the name gave them comfort. They would go to the AAFES (military commissary) and buy food that had been frozen for the past 6 mo.--this includes bread and cereal, or yummy Danish shelf milk, and all of the meats, eggs and cheeses had been shipped from Western Europe. I mean really, these people are in sheep central.

There was no shortage of beautiful, fresh, artisinal cheeses and gorgeous fresh meats. The bread that was brought to the door every morning by the building manager was delightful. The produce situation was a little strange, because you can't always pick your own. They do expect you to take a few items with bad spots, nothing that couldn't be cut off. The only complaint I have about Turkish fare is the limited beer selection-- they have two-- just two, and I'm not sure how much femaldehyde I consumed. No food safety scare tactics will ever diminish my desire to return to Turkey and eat it all!"