We continue to walk through the streets of Izmir. It is possible to find numerous food and beverage places in these streets.
This time we meet a different restaurant: Ali Usta. It is located under a historic building. There are many tables outside.
It is possible to find many kinds popular street food in Ali Usta.
In front of the door there is a bench that sells stuffed mussels.
Midye dolma are stuffed with seasoned rice and served in their shells with a lemon wedge. A common street food , available on every corner of Izmir.
The restaurant consists of 3 sections. The first part is söğüşçü.
On a counter, the man peels the meat of the lamb’s head. Meats are prepared to be used in söğüş.
Söğüş very famous in Izmir. Tongue, cheek and brain of sheep head.
Lamb’s head is boiled in water. After resting for two hours, the head placed in the refrigerator is kept in the refrigerator for two hours and thus is ready to be used for söğüş.
The tongue, brain, cheek and other flesh of the head (inner cheek, eye, back of the ear) are separated from the head. The meat is finely chopped and seasoned thoroughly.
The meat is blended with fresh greens and onions as well as tomatoes.Spices are thoroughly fed into meats and the mixture is placed on lavash and rolled up and served without wrapping.
İn another section preparing tantuni.
Tantuni is a spicy dürüm consisting of julienne cut beef or sometimes lamb stir-fried on a sac with a hint of cotton oil. It is a specialty of the city of Mersin, Turkey.
The meat in tantuni is first crushed and boiled in salted water, then fried in cotton oil. Afterwards meat is wrapped with lavas bread together with chopped onions, chopped, preferably skinless tomato slices, green peppers and parsley. The resulting mass is seasoned with pepper, salt and possibly other spices, and served wrapped in lavash bread.
In the third and last section, preparing kumru. You can find detailed information about Kumru in another video we prepared earlier.
Ali Usta looks like a place where we can find all the popular street food together.
