Forays and Failures in Turkish Cuisine: Menemen

I am many things, readers, but there are also many things I am not.

One of these things is a world-class chef.

My limited catalog of cookable recipes includes grilled cheese, macaroni and cheese, baked goods, and breakfast food. You can already imagine how many times I've been down the "dinner for breakfast" road since being in Turkey.

But, I want to learn to cook, because I like to bake... however, most of these Turkish dishes just seem completely out of my reach. So, imagine my excitement when I discovered menemen at this really precious family-run restaurant down the street from our apartment.

Holy cannoli, it is delicious. Eggs, peppers, tomatoes, olive oil, and awesome are the main ingredients. And as I'm eating it, I'm thinking to myself, "I can freaking make this, no problem!"

This blog post is sponsored by that particular incidence of overconfidence.

A few days later, I round up my supplies and I get cracking (literally, since I'm using eggs.)

The victims were collected and looking oh so tasty. As per my recipe, I put my oil in the pan and get it all a-simmering. Then, I add my tomatoes and peppers and sizzle them up until they're cooked but still have a little crunch to them.

You are going to be so delicious

 Oh my gosh, you guys. I was so confident. I mean, I took pictures of this whole event. This was going to be great-- my first step towards mastering Turkish cuisine.

LOOK AT THIS ACTION SHOT.
You don't take these sorts of pictures all willy-nilly.

 So, I add my eggs. Two, to be precise. And I am so pumped. But I realize, because of the difference in the densities (SCIENCE) of eggs and oil, it doesn't seem as though all of eggs are being thoroughly cooked. Even though I have my typhoid vaccination (you would know this if you've been following my adventures for the past two months), I'm not trying to get salmonella or botulism or whatever you can get from uncooked eggs.

And here, readers, is where I make my fatal error.

I began to push my eggs around the pan.

And then everything in the world changed. The whites of the eggs began to change, the yolk began to become less translucent. Oil and egg culminated in a dance that can only be produced at high temperatures over a partially-functional stovetop.

If you can't tell, I pretty much made scrambled eggs.

Pictured: not menemen.

Not that they weren't good, because they were great, they were just not what I had hoped for. I mean, I'm not trying to write blog posts about scrambled eggs. I'm trying to be cultured here.

And just so you know, I tried this again like three days later.

Eggs still scrambled and not menemen.

Don't think I won't keep you posted.