TURKS AT DINNER.

Otago Witness, Issue 1916, 10 August 1888, Page 31

TURKS AT DINNER.

The Turks -are, 'to a great extent, vegetarians. They eat beef rarely, pork or veal never. They indulge in drinks, lean fowls, and finally shoep, the flesh of which they cufc off in small pieces. These pieces are strung upon long spits, which are held and turned for some minutes over hot coals, where they arc slowly roasted, retaining all their juices. This is what is called kebab, a healthful and nutritious food, which Europeans find delicious. Turkish pastry is quite varied, and would not be disagreeable if honey and sugar were not used so abundantly, and if the taste of tallow could be excluded. Bakalava and ekmok kataif (thick cakes cooked in honey, perfumed with rose-water, and covered with caimak, a kind of cream) in particular recall very savoury memories. Pashas and rich Turks always have at their repasts a groat number of dishes, which the servants bring in on brass platters and place on a mat on the floor, or sometimes on small, low tables, around which the guests squat themselves. They eat in silence and in a grave manner,, and serve themselves generally with theii fingers as well as with their forks, and with their teeth as well a.s with their knives. Nevertheless, they deign to use a spoon to convey to their mouths food that is not very solid, like stewed rice malabi, a kind of cooked cream, and iaourt, thick and bitterish milk, of all of which they are very fond. Their orink consists of clear water; but this does not prevent them from imbibing before their repast a white liquor, raki, which is made of the gum of the mastic-tree mixed with alcohol. It is an agreeable drink, and is used like absinthe, the taste and properties of which ifc possesses. Its use, and even its abuse, does not bring remorse to the conscience of the Turks, for if Mohammed has forbidden them to use wine, he forgot, pro-

phefc though he was, to foresee the manufacture of raki, an invention more modern than his ov/n.