çiğ köfte, istanbul, türkiye.

My digital watch flickers neon at a random place in time after midnight. There has been a copious amount of alcohol consumed no matter what type. Anything scotch- or Guinness-related sits at the top of the totem pole. The amount varies depending on prior dinnertime expenditures and the number of pints or shots already down the hatch.

All things aside, I am drunk. Or at least slightly intoxicated. Scratch that, I’m very, very, very tipsy and meandering home with a vast number of people, or I’m packed in a car with the poor soul in the driver’s seat who has to make sure I don’t do anything regrettable.

Even if you have just the faintest semblance of a coherent thought, the main thing on most people’s minds is food. That is if they aren’t yearning for a toilet or the side of a freeway. Let’s pretend it’s food on your mind and you just need something, anything, to stifle the gastric juices churning around and cogitating with frothy brews or a hard dram of tequila. If you ask most people from America, at least those who are in college or have recently departed from the said institution, the chorus will come out in two words: Taco Bell. When messily sloshed, that pink-and-purple emblem whacks a gong through your brain, and the focus is only on one thing: stuffing as much faux-Mexican down your throat.

Outside of the sunny and contiguous 48, you might have something remarkably unappealing as pub fare; or it could be something that just has an excessive amount of flavors because you’re either numbed from whisky after whisky or flattened down by cheap beer (or insert favorite alcohol here). While studying for a semester overseas, there was this burger joint on the way back to campus open until the ungodly hours of 4am. All of us would cram into the one-roomed, linoleum-floored, fast-food spot – labeled Zabi’s – and order a decently priced burger and fries one should not eat when stars are still out. Drunk and thoughtless, senses taking over and making the choices, it was the smartest thing to do. And really, after how much had been spent at the pubs or clubs, did it really matter if that burger cost £4 or £9? We were starving; it was late; we needed something to occupy the time for a tiny bit longer.

Let’s arabesque over to Istanbul, my current locale. Around here corner shops and takeaways are numerous, and many of these spots are open later to cater to those who’ve imbibed more than the normal çay-sipper. Walk by a shop while inebriated, and temptation usually wins. You have your food. You leave stuffed and satisfied until the morning hits.

I questioned a few of the people here to see what they classified as good drunk food here in Istanbul. There were different answers, the best ones being kokoreç and işkembe, the latter apparently a remarkable hangover-prevention food. But I wanted to tackle both of those delicacies in a sober frame of mind at a later date. Not to fear: I soon targeted a decent, quick eat that helped tackle a bloc not tackled yet in the repertoire of drunk dine-outs. As I headed back to my apartment one night a few weeks ago, my eyes zoomed to the right. I saw what I had been craving (at least for that infinitesimal moment before running over the threshold and placing my order). That, my friends, is çiğ köfte.

Most expats – and probably most locals – will sneer and tell me that it isn’t a food to savor whilst smashed. I should be in the right frame of mind and appreciate all that this dish has to offer. Touché. But I don’t agree 100%. You can eat as much as you like without any alcohol in your system. Add some, and it remains delicious. My stance is that it even becomes a transcending experience when booze has traveled down your throat before you eat your portion of çiğ köfte. Nothing fades. The spices stay, the flavors explode in full force, and you remain satisfied.

You might be asking, what is it çiğ köfte?

Well, it is an amalgam of ingredients: bulgur wheat, onions, parsley, mint, water, a tomato-pepper paste, and then raw mincemeat (but not always). All of this is kneaded together quite thoroughly. I’ve walked by these shops and the preparers almost always are behind the glass ceaselessly kneading this mixture, one second’s pause and the world ends. The kneading process is said to ‘cook’ the meat.

Here’s a nice shot of it before being tucked neatly away.

I always order it in sandwich form, so I have a healthy serving of it wedged in a dürüm-like bread, a few leaves of lettuce as its bedtime companions. Normally it is best to drink a heat-reducing beverage with çiğ köfte (ayran being the preferred choice); whilst drunk however, one’s taste buds are normally weakened from the bland and watery beer most likely consumed. The spices – not too unmanageable – kick in after the first bite and continue to keep you awake as you’re stumbling back to your place of residence.

The flavors last, and bite after bite brings more until your mouth is back into its numbed state. This time it’s more a tingle than a yawn-drenched field of despair that the humdrum pilsener will bring. I appreciate every bite – more so than a Hawaiian burger from Zabi’s sluiced in ketchup or a Nachos Supreme at Taco Bell.

Take your intestines and tripe soup and save it for another day; this is what sets me straight. And we need more people who enjoy sculpting their food. See this guy and how much fun he’s having, and then go and nibble some çig köfte drunk (or sober). It’s your call.

*Both images taken from the Google search engine. I take no credit for either, although I still quite like the second shot.

jellied eels. london, england.

There are times when I imagine what something unknown might look like; I get snapshots that paint a vividly screaming scene that has no basis on truth.  Perhaps it is the optimist in me, full of hope that what is being described to me will indeed be delightful and pleasant.  Spotlights stream and flash overhead, gimmicky neon signs point at whatever it is, and it becomes the most alluring thing in the world.  As I sipped on a Samuel Smith’s bitter at The Princess Louise in London and heard about jellied eels and that – if I were to eat one thing while in the city and make it quintessentially “London” – this dish should be what I must try, I received a few images in my head.

The lighting of the café was dim and smooth, an orange glow you might find if a lamp shone from behind maroon curtains.  On the plate was a mound of what looked like orange gelatin, the kind you’d create from what’s inside Jell-O boxes; within were pieces of what could be mistaken for mandarin pieces or grapes and bananas.  Something delectable and refreshing during a hot August afternoon, so good that I was tempted at the moment to run off to one of the markets (if only they were open)!

My goal for the rest of the week was to get to the markets around Tower Bridge, or perhaps some little café that could have served the London trademark (eaten mainly by the poor) since the 18^th century.  My sister – currently residing in London – did not see the intrigue and possible delights that consuming jellied eels might provide, but she went along for the journey to M Manze, located in Peckham.

A queue had already formed out the door.  Also available at the shop were pies and mash, covered with a green-hued gravy coined as “liquor.”   We ordered eels, and then two pies and two helpings of mash if the eels proved uneatable.

As we marched to an open booth, my eyes skirted over other people’s dishes and found no one – not one person – putting down on any form of eel, jellied or stewed.  This, to me, was a warning sign.  Nevertheless, I sat down and looked at the plate; my visions of the beautiful aquatic dish shattered on a rank wooden table, replaced by a wriggly heap of what I hoped might be lemon gelatin surrounding what I hoped might taste like the eel sushi I’ve eaten (and liked).  The fork in my hand stabbed a piece that did not have much of its corpse-like skin, and I ate it.

The jelly served as the name suggested:  it gelled the pieces of eel together into a hideous quasi-cooked pile of seafood better left in the 18^th century.  In spots it looked as if it had not quite thawed out, and my teeth scraped against hardness only to be bluntly described as bone.  There was no real taste, only a bit of the fishiness one might expect with such a dish, no fruity sweetness or even excessive saltiness you’d find in some seafood.  The gelatin served to bring out the slimy aftertaste, thankfully quelled by a few sips of lemon Fanta.

The pie and mash were a godsend.  The crust was crispy and not too filling, and the inside held a meager stuffing of mince that would leak out upon fork perforation.  The blandness did not rule for long, for the liquor seeped through the potatoes and brought a nice mixture of parsley and salt into my mouth.   The pie and liquor combination made me a contented cow, pleased with not having to eat any more of the eels and insisting my sister to taste the destruction.

With the pies and the mash fully gone, we quickly left the eels behind in a prison that Bill Cosby would be ashamed of.  The women behind the counter waved us off, not knowing we had left a fresh helping of jellied eels for them to pitch.  It is best left in a bin.

So.  On to bigger and tastier things.