Get ready to explore the delicious flavors of Turkish cuisine with these 34 easy-to-make Turkish food recipes.
From the classic stuffed grape leaves (dolma) to the comforting hand-made Turkish dumplings (manti), you’ll find a variety of recipes that are perfect for any occasion.
Whether you’re a beginner cook or an experienced chef, these recipes are easy to follow and guaranteed to impress your family and friends.
So why not take a culinary journey to Turkey, and try something new and delicious today!
1. Noah’s Pudding Ashure Recipe
One of the most popular dishes available. It is made with wheat berries, legumes, as well as dried fruit and fresh fruit.
The Turkish always make large amounts of this dessert, so it can be shared with friends and family. Rice can be added as well as most anything that you wish.
2. Menemen
Menemen is actually a simple dish made of scrambled eggs and tomatoes. There is generally a variety of different peppers added.
This Turkish breakfast is cooked slowly so that it absorbs the most flavor possible.
3. Menemen 2
Another version of a great Turkish breakfast made with similar ingredients. This version has more of a tomato base to it. A mix of onion, peppers and tomatoes, then combined with other ingredients as desired.
Menemen is best served with a slice of crusty bread. This version of Menemen has a few added spices to it to make it more of a savory breakfast.
4. Vegan Pide With Minced Meat & Tomatoes
This recipe is certainly tasty. It is similar to pizza, however, it is made with flatbread. The toppings include spinach, minced meat and garlic sausage with cheese. An incredibly easy meal to make on a busy night.
5. Turkish Pide Bread
Turkish Pide bread is flatbread that is crispy outside and nice and fluffy on the inside. There is no kneading needed with this bread, which makes it a quick bread.
This bread is perfect for breakfast but is eaten with every meal. It can be kept as a soft crust when topped with damp paper towels after baking.
6. Feta And Spinach Pide
This yeast bread is a favorite in Turkey and quickly becoming a favorite in other parts of the World. The filling is made with Spinach, eggs and feta cheese. The filling is placed in the center of the rolled out dough and the sides are brought up and over to seal the filling in.
Before baking, make a slit in the center and fold the dough back so the filling is exposed and able to cook more fully.
7. Homestyle Turkish Pogaca
This breakfast bread has the texture of the American Baking Powder biscuit. These are generally filled with delicious fillings such as olives, feta and sometimes meat.
It makes a delicious all in one breakfast to grab and go when you are in a rush.
8. Turkish Katmer Pogaca
To be honest, these look identical to an American Crescent Roll. However, these Turkish Katmer Pogaca are much more flavorful and savory.
These Pogaca are filled with a white cheese and do have similar buttery layers just like the crescent roll.
9. Katmer Sweet With Pistachio
Katmer is known to be either sweet or salty. To turn the Katmer into a dessert is relatively easy. Adding Pistachio to it, along with cream and sugar will allow this to be more dessert like. When serving, a scoop or two of ice cream is added on top of the Katmer.
10. Tarhana Soup
This recipe is super easy to prepare and even easier to eat and enjoy. This soup can be had as a drink at breakfast and served as a side to accompany the main dish at dinner. It is made with a fermented grain made with yogurt or milk.
11. Turkish Red Lentil Soup
This soup can be made in 30 minutes. Before serving, drizzle fresh lemon over the bowl of soup. It is a great soup that is gluten free as well as vegan.
Red lentils are used often in Turkish cooking because they have a soft texture and are quick to cook. Combined with Cumin and Aleppo pepper this is super tasty.
12. Ezogelin Corbasi
This is a Turkish lentil and bulgur soup that also contains mint. This soup is very filling with brown rice, bulgur, peppers, onions and tomato, along with spices.
With this soup, the mint is not used as just a garnish, the soup simmers with the mint in the pot and covered for a very flavor-packed bowl of goodness.
13. Turkish Highland Meadow Soup
If you have never heard of hot yogurt soup, you are in for a treat. Seriously made with plain yogurt, mint and rice! This soup is healthy, filling and very satisfying.
This is a perfect soup when you are feeling under the weather. Similar to Chicken Soup.
14. Tripe Soup
This is a typical Romanian Soup made with beef tripe, garlic, sour cream and eggs with vinegar. Honestly, tripe is one of those foods that the majority of people avoid. However, when it is used in this soup as a main ingredient, the taste is unbelievably delicious.
Definitely a recipe to put on the top of the stack.
15. Turkish Tomato Soup With Meat & Pasta
A delicious soup packed with minced meat, homemade pasta and a savory sauce make this a complete meal. This soup has mint and chili flakes added to give it an extra punch. What makes this such a good soup is that it is tomato based.
16. Ground Turkey Soup
This is a filling soup that is loaded with protein, vitamins, and nutrition. There are vegetables such as mushrooms, celery, carrots, tomatoes plus more. This soup is often considered an Italian Soup. The seasonings and spices add to the abundance of natural flavor and make this a soup to remember.
17. Yuvalama
This soup is meant for festive celebrations. It is filled with chickpeas, lamb, as well as ground rice meatballs in a lamb broth.
To make the soup creamy and thicken it one adds yogurt, flour and egg. The meatballs in this soup are rolled so that they are smaller than the chickpeas.
18. Turkish Meat Rolls
These great little meat rolls are similar to meatballs but in a different shape. These are actually the same as meatballs, but with a slightly different spic to them. They also have mint and they rest in a sauce of yogurt which makes them super creamy.
19. Turkish Stuffed Eggplant
Eggplant is quite popular in Turkey. This recipe is one that is most often requested. It is healthy and delicious made with fabulous ground beef and peppers. Then stuffed into an eggplant and baked to perfection.
20. Fragrant Turkish Spice Lamb
A quick and easy dish to prepare. One that will send the aroma through your home and make your mouth water. Filled with apricots, pistachios, and a few select spices will be the hit of dinner when it is served over hummus.
21. Turkish Beef Kofte
Ground spiced beef shaped into a pattie form and grilled. With just the right amount of spices all meat should taste like these great Turkish Beef Kofta.
They are generally grilled, and many make them into kabobs and served with fresh vegetables and spiced onion all layered on a piece or two of flatbread.
22. Turkish Mint Manti
Savory and flavorful beef with mint is wrapped in delicate dumplings and served up hot and delicious. The dumplings sit in a rich tomato-based sauce that only adds to the exotic type flavor in this great meal.
23. Dolmas: Stuffed Grape Leaves
Dolma means stuffed. This recipe calls for a perfect mixture of black currants, pine nuts and spices combined with white rice and rolled up in grape leaves. Onions, dried mint, parsley and a bit of sugar, which can be eliminated, all make for one delicious and tasty meal.
24. Bamya Middle Eastern Okra Stew
This dish comes from the Middle East. It is an okra and tomato stew that is served over rice. This recipe is vegetarian, however you can add lamb or ground beef to make it a more filling and protein packed meal.
Okra is one of those foods that is often overlooked as delicious, this is not the case.
25. White Pudding with a Blackened Surface
White pudding with blackened surface is a dessert that’s served in almost every Turkish restaurant. It is the main dessert served after savory dinners.
It is creamy with a touch of sweetness that is not one to override the savory meal right before. A dessert that thickens as it sits in the refrigerator and the blackened surface is duff and cinnamon.
26. Easy Turkish Delight Recipe
A treat with a super soft texture and the delicate flavor of rose, this dessert is easy to make. You could use other flavors, however Rose water is the original and most common.
27. Kunefe
Another superb Turkish dessert that actually stems from Arab descent.
To put it simply, this is Phyllo dough that has been finely shredded that is covering goat cheese mixed with Kataifi paste or even ricotta cheese or half and half will work. It is almost a delicacy eaten after meals.
28. Bitter Almond Cookies
These are chewy cookies loaded with almonds from the Datca region. They are crispy on the outside and chewy and soft on the inside. They are made with a small amount of better almonds, just like in Turkey.
A flavor experience you will love.
29. Turkish Yoghurt Cake
This cake is very light and delicious, it is also very low in calories. This is the perfect ending to a perfect Turkish meal.
This dessert is best described as a cross between a fluffy and smooth cheesecake and a souffle. It is actually difficult to explain properly so that others understand. Tasting this is like visiting heaven.
30. Baklava Cheesecake
Baklava is a traditional dessert made with nuts and flaky and with a Mideastern flavor. Then these are covered with a delicious and creamy cheesecake.
These do take some time and patience, however all true delicious desserts do.
31. Baklava Crumb Ice Cream
This true Middle Eastern dessert is likely to change your mind on both ice cream and Baklava.
The dish includes crumbed Baklava and a mix of cranberries, dark chocolate and honey. The spices of cardamom and cinnamon bring this dessert full circle.
32. No Bake Chocolate Mosaic Cake
This is truly a layered cake that takes a little effort but will give you the most results from happy people.
This cake is simply layers of melted chocolate with a layer of crumbed biscuits, or cookies. The many layers make this dessert appear to be fancier than it is and the guests will love it.
33. Turkish Tray Borek with Cheese
This is a simple and ultra-delicious recipe for homestyle borek just like you would find if you were visiting Turkey. This food can be made easily enough with Phyllo dough and a mixture of cheeses. There are many Turks who will add some fresh Spinach in with the cheese and make it a meal.
34. Borek – Spiced Lamb Phyllo Dough
When you make a dish that looks this gorgeous, you will not believe how great it tastes.
This is phyllo dough wrapped around minced meat, savory spices, pine nuts and currants. This dough is then rolled and twisted into a spiral. Brushed with an egg wash and sprinkled with Sesame seeds this is a true Turkish delight waiting to be tasted.