Skip to main content
Radar Türkiye
Discover events in the app
Open
Radar Türkiye

The Kastamonu Table, from Etli Ekmek to Pastırma

A day in Kastamonu often begins with a simit and ends in the late afternoon with an etli ekmek fresh from a stone oven. In between there may be a slice of pastırma, a bowl of tirit or a plate of ekşili pilav.

Radar TürkiyeRadar Türkiye4 Kasım 2026
No ratings yet

Sign in to like and rate

The Kastamonu Table, from Etli Ekmek to Pastırma

A day in Kastamonu often begins with a simit and ends in the late afternoon with an etli ekmek fresh from a stone oven. In between there may be a slice of pastırma, a bowl of tirit or a plate of ekşili pilav. The cuisine page of the Kastamonu Provincial Directorate of Culture and Tourism lists the province's dishes one by one and notes that a large share of them are protected by geographical indications. A 2024 academic study of Kastamonu's geographical indications, based on Turkish Patent Office records, also finds that the province has 21 gastronomic products with a geographical indication. This article reads that table through the official registration documents and the records of the provincial directorate. We look first at etli ekmek and pastırma, then at simit, then at the dishes of the districts and the sweets. At the end there are a few suggestions on how a visitor to Kastamonu can put this table together.

Daday etli ekmeği

The provincial directorate presents etli ekmek as one of Kastamonu's most delicious dishes and describes it briefly: a thin dough is rolled out, a minced meat filling is spread on it and it is baked in a stone oven. According to the same page, the similar version baked on a griddle is called et ekmeği. The best known form of this bread is Daday etli ekmeği. It appears in the records of the Turkish Patent and Trademark Office as indication of source number 378; the application was filed by Daday Municipality on 9 November 2017 and registration took place on 15 August 2018. Its geographical boundary is the province of Kastamonu.

The registration document also gives a short history of the bread. According to the document, Daday etli ekmeği emerged in the 1950s in the ovens where village bread was baked. The bakers put a mixture of mince, spices and onion inside simit dough for themselves and for friends they could not refuse, baked it in the ovens used for village bread and simit, and brushed it with butter. When the bread became popular and everyone asked for it, the first Daday etli ekmek bakery devoted solely to this bread was set up in 1965. The document writes that since those years many people have come to Daday from neighbouring districts and even provinces to eat etli ekmek, and that the bread has contributed greatly to promoting the area.

The document also lists what makes the bread different. The mince is prepared from the meat of cattle fed on thyme in the Kastamonu highlands, and its proportions are fixed: 10 percent neck, 10 percent brisket, 20 percent rib and 60 percent leg. The mince is half fat and coarsely ground. Sourdough is used in the dough, and the dough is kneaded a day in advance. Besides the mince, the filling contains grated dry onion, black pepper, chilli flakes, cumin and salt.

Making it is a craft. According to the document, the dough is divided into pieces of 250 grams each and rolled out with a rolling pin to a circle about 60 centimetres across and 1 millimetre thick. The filling is placed on it and it is folded into a half moon. It is put into the stone oven with wooden peels and baked for 5 minutes over an oak wood fire. When it comes out of the oven it is brushed with butter. The document also describes the tools used: a cylindrical rolling pin usually made of beech, a wooden peel with a two metre handle, and a thin metal tool called the eysiren that is used to divide the dough.

The inspection criteria are interesting too. They include baking the bread in a stone oven over an oak fire, keeping the oven floor at about 300 degrees, cleaning the sinews from the meat thoroughly, and eating the product hot where it is made. That last item is really a piece of advice for travellers: etli ekmek is not something to be wrapped and taken away, but a dish to be eaten beside the oven.

Kastamonu pastırma

Pastırma is the second great name of the Kastamonu table. It appears in the Turkish Patent records as indication of source number 711. The application was made by the Kastamonu Union of Chambers of Tradesmen and Craftsmen on 29 December 2017, and registration took place on 29 March 2021. Its geographical boundary is the province of Kastamonu, and according to the document all stages of production must take place within this boundary.

According to the document, the meat used in the pastırma comes from cattle aged two to two and a half years that have been raised in the Kastamonu highlands. From the most valuable parts of the animal, first class pastırma such as sırt, kuşgömü and şekerpare are made. The document defines kuşgömü as the finest kind of pastırma, because the tenderloin it is made from is free of sinew and tender.

Production begins by cutting deep slits, called şaklama, into boneless back meat. The meat is salted generously with rock salt, stacked and left for three days. Once it has lost most of its water, the meat is pressed under weights and then washed. It is then dried in the sun for about 30 days in the breeze from Mount Ilgaz, in open areas called sayvan that are roofed and enclosed with wire screens. The document writes that thanks to sun drying and the difference in temperature, the inner and outer layers of the meat dry at the same time, which is why the pastırma is not hard.

The dried meat is coated with çemen. The composition given in the document is as follows: 60 percent water, 30 percent fenugreek flour, 8 percent Taşköprü garlic, 1 percent red pepper, half a percent cumin and half a percent salt. The coated pastırma is hung back in its place in the sayvan, then kept for two or three days in the çemen room. When it is ready to eat it is sliced by hand with sharp knives; according to the document, the slices are on average about three quarters of a millimetre thick. Kastamonu pastırma is generally produced between September and April.

Simit and simit tiridi

According to the provincial directorate's description, Kastamonu simit is made by shaping rested dough into ropes, twisting them, dipping them in apple or grape molasses and baking them in the oven. The directorate names its crispness and the absence of sesame as the simit's most important features and presents it as an essential part of breakfast. The dark colour and slight sweetness given by the molasses set it apart from the simit of other cities.

Simit is not only for breakfast. Simit tiridi is prepared by adding bone broth boiled in a pot to Kastamonu simit broken into small pieces, then pouring garlic yoghurt, fried mince and butter over it. In this way yesterday's simit becomes the next day's hot meal.

The dishes of the districts

Kastamonu cuisine is the cuisine not of a single town but of twenty districts, and the provincial directorate's list shows this clearly. Devrekani hindi banduması is a dish with a geographical indication prepared with the meat and broth of turkeys raised in the district, dried yufka pastry and walnuts; the directorate writes that cooking and serving it requires knowledge and skill specific to the area. Taşköprü kuyu kebabı is made by lowering lambs of six to ten months, raised on aromatic plants such as thyme, into a hot pit without touching any vessel and cooking them with the heat of the bricks. Locally this dish is also called biran or büryan.

On the grain side, İhsangazi stands out. Siyez is one of the most widespread ancient wheats; Kastamonu siyez bulgur is obtained from siyez that is boiled, dried and then cracked in stone mills. According to the directorate, siyez wheat, its bulgur and its flour are closely identified with the district of İhsangazi. İhsangazi ekşili pilav is made with this bulgur. Onion, pepper, mint, dill, parsley, nettle, mallow and vine leaves go into it, sour ayran or sour yoghurt is added, and a buttery sauce is drizzled over the top.

For rice, the name of Tosya comes up. The directorate writes that Tosya has long been one of the country's most important rice producing centres and that Tosya rice is grown in a limited and fertile part of the Devrez valley. The kara çorba of Pınarbaşı takes its colour and its name from kızamık ekşisi, a sour product made from the fruit of the kızamık plant that grows in the area. The kül çöreği of Araç is a round bun with a thick crust, baked for 35 to 40 minutes in hot oak ash after the flames have died down. The akdene göce soup of the same district is made with cracked barley, yoghurt, butter and mint.

Sweets and confectionery

Kastamonu's sweets demand at least as much effort as its dishes. The provincial directorate describes the making of çekme helva in detail. First the base of the helva is prepared by roasting butter and flour over a low heat for about an hour. In a separate pan, sugar, citric acid and water are boiled until they reach a hard candy consistency and are then turned out onto a marble counter. When the sugar has cooled a little it is formed into a ring and stretched by four to six people pulling on it. This continues until the sugar has drawn the roasted flour into itself and become thread like. The helva is then pressed into trays, compacted and cut with a knife.

The sweets of the coastal districts are on the list too. Cide ceviz helvası is prepared over three and a half to four hours by adding plenty of walnuts to a mixture of beet sugar, egg white, citric acid and water; according to the directorate, it is a local tradition to take this helva on important visits such as a marriage proposal. Çatalzeytin fındık şekeri is made by coating roasted hazelnuts with syrup, flour and starch in a copper pan, and according to the directorate it has been made in Çatalzeytin since 1918. Devrekani cırık tatlısı is prepared by frying a runny batter twice and sweetening it with cold syrup. Kastamonu üryani eriği is a dried plum made from the ala plum, which takes its name from being peeled before it is dried.

A few suggestions for setting the table

If you are planning a day of eating in Kastamonu, keep the morning for simit; as the directorate says, simit fresh from the stone oven sells out quickly, so early hours are better. Eat etli ekmek as the registration document requires, hot and beside the oven; if you are on the Daday road, stopping in the district means seeing the place where this bread was born. For pastırma, September to April is the production season. Taşköprü garlic is ready to eat after the first week of July.

Look for the geographical indication wording and emblem on the product you buy. The registration document for pastırma states that the words Kastamonu Pastırması and the indication of source emblem should appear on the product or its packaging, or where that is not possible, somewhere visible at the business. For Daday etli ekmeği, too, the name of the geographical indication may be used on the business's menu and serving papers. Long keeping sweets such as çekme helva and fındık şekeri are the easiest souvenirs to take with you when you leave. It is impossible to finish this table in a single day; but getting to know one taste from each district explains Kastamonu far better than a map.

Sources

Comments

0/1000

Be the first to comment