Turkish Pide with Cheese/Meat Filling

In Turkey, pide with various types of filling is sold in special restaurants. In Melbourne, almost all Turkish restaurants serve pide freshly baked on the day. Since I frequently buy pide from these restaurants, I have never thought of baking at home. Coming across with a recipe recently, I thought I should give it a try, and it turned out great.

The recipe was enough for four medium sized pide, and I filled two with cheese and the other two with lamb meat filling.

For the dough
3 cups of plain flour
1 tablesp sugar
1 teasp salt
2 teasp instant yeast (or 1/2 tablesp fresh yeast)
1.25 cup water

1 egg, lightly beaten, for glazing

For the filling
250 gr minced meat (preferably lamb)
1 onion, diced
2 tablesp vegetable oil
1 teasp tomato paste
100 gr capsicum, diced finely
salt and black pepper, to taste
1/2 teasp dried mint

1/2 teasp sweet paprika

400 gr grated cheese
salami, or sucuk (Turkish spiced-salami)

1. Mix flour, salt, sugar, yeast and water in a bowl, knead until well-mixed. Cover, and let it rest for an hour until it has risen.

2. For meat filling, stir-fry the onion, add meat, continue stirring from time to time. Add capsicum and tomato paste. Add salt and blackpepper to taste, along with paprika and mint. When the meat has cooked well (at least 20 minutes), set aside to cool slightly.

3. Set the oven to 200 degrees. Divide the dough into four pieces. (Rub some vegetable oil to your hands beforehand so that the dough is easier to handle). Using a rolling pin, obtain circular flat pieces. Then extend each piece from the sides, using your hands, and obtain oval shaped pieces.

4. For cheese pide, brush the flat dough with egg, sprinkle with grated cheese. Add salami, if using. For meat pide, spread the filling directly onto the flat dough.

5. Fold one cm. of the dough from the sides. Bring together at the tips. Brush with egg. Cook on lightly greased oven trays at 200 degrees, for about 20 minutes until the dough starts changing colour, and the cheese is bubbling. When out of the oven, brush with olive oil or butter, before serving.

Poğaca (Turkish Cheese Pastries)

These Turkish pastries are fairly easy to make, and delicious. They are typically filled in with feta cheese, or lor peyniri (Turkish cheese similar to ricotta), although mince based potato filling is also common. Preparation time of dough is short, but the dough needs at least one hour of rising time. Once it doubles its size, the dough should feel light and fluffy.

Turkish recipes rarely specify the amount of flour required. I used approximately three cups, adding in the flour slowly so that the dough feels soft to touch. According to Turkish way, it should feel as soft as the "earlobe".

1 cup milk
2 teasp dry yeast
1 teasp sugar
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1/2 cup butter, melted
1 teasp salt
flour, amount as required
1 egg yolk
Sesame seeds and/or nigella seeds

200 gr feta cheese
1 egg white
1/4 teasp paprika
fresh flat-leaf parsley or dill

Bring milk to room temperature. Add sugar and yeast, and stir until melted.

Add butter, vegetable oil and salt, and stir. Slowly add flour and stir. Once it starts to blend in, knead lightly. Dough is supposed to be soft to touch.

Cover dough, and put aside so that it rises (an hour or so).

Set oven to 180 degrees.

Once the dough has doubled in size, break it into egg-size pieces. Spread each piece in your palm to have a round shape. Put in some of the filling, and bring opposite sides of the dough together to cover the filling. Place onto a lightly greased oven tray. Brush with egg yolk, and sprinkle with sesame seeds and/or nigella seeds.

Filling: Break feta into pieces using a fork. Mix in egg white, paprika and fresh herbs.