Kutahya and Teapots Galore

Went to Kutahya on one of the weekends.Kutahya is especially famous for its porcelains! They make decorative items - like vases, bowls etc as well as crockery - and there's all grades and colours..



It's abt 4 hrs from Ankara so we decided to start early - at 7am and just make a day trip of it .So - went with with two other families for a shopping spree wheeeeeeee! 

We had VERY early break fast (6 am) so by abt 9am we were hungry again! Stopped by a small restaurant by the highway and took out our bekal - sedapnya: ada mee hoon, curry puffs and egg sandwich and someone was good enough to even bring teh tarik !!!

Reached the place in good time and were about  the first customers at 11am. Took a look around first - kinda window shopping before buying anything - and there were a LOT of stuff and choices!!!

Actually I wanted to show you the tea-pots. Well, Ati since you asked  about the tea-pots - get a load of these...

As you can see there are some usual pretty floral one.... the silve/gold ones are rather unusual too..
then some others with rather unusual shape and designs

I kinda like the bright orange teapot you see below and you can tell its the 'higher-end quality and very well-made ( about RM120 or so)

 and then there how about  also those with the more traditional Turkish designs

Anyway, we spent maybe five hours browsing and buying...I didn't get a teapot tho - thought there's still plenty of time and so many places I have yet to visit. Where do I put everything...I don't have shelves or cupboards to display them. So in the end I got one decorative dish in a rich gold hue, a vase and matching plate and then a set of dishes to use for everyday. 

We had a rather late lunch - too excited shopping and browsing- made up of some of our own yummy bekal to add to some great local Turkish dishes ( I brought nasi empit with beef rendang)

Then , we stuffed our loot in the car boot....

Then made our way back and  stopped at some pretty interesting places....

All in all it was a great day !!! Next trip - ANTALYA....yayyayyy!!!!!

Huh...what's the name of the fish again?

Turkey is surrounded by sea but don't let that fool you - fish is certainly NOT cheap here! Also it is seasonal - so you get different types of fish at different times of the year. Of course 'cultured fish' is available all year round but I would advise against it- I tried frying the Levrek - it was hanyir (urgh!)  and it ended up in the garbage instead cos nobody would eat it after having the first bite!

The fish are different over here, so cooking Malay dishes here can be a challenge - like cooking our asam pedas, asam rebus etc with the unfamiliar fish found here is mostly hit and miss!! There's a kinda fish here called the cipura which is very good and tastes good even just grilled.

handsome cipura little monsters

Then you have the 'hamsi'. Hamsi is a Black Sea seasonal fish and October is the beginning of the hamsi fishing season right up to December. Now, this fish is something to get excited about - it is REALLLYYYY good! So here I am, frying the hamsi. First you fillet it, then cover it with flour and deep fry it...and squeeze lemon juice over it then eat it with lots of salad and bread.

Anyway, so we had hamsi for dinner with bread -  and then Turkish soup - ezogelin corbashi (spicy lentil and bulgur soup)and salad Mmmm Yummy, yummy.... 

Then there's the  Palamut - good for making asam pedas, lakasa but it is not cheap! It runs from maybe 8TL -12TL in Ulus, more here in Kipa Supermarket in Panora. The fishmongers here are great - they clean the fish any way you want but since communicating in Turkish is still a challenge I usually clean  the fish myself!  Once in Ulus I tried telling them to only gut the fish but got them fillet ed! and the fish head was thrown away - AYA!!! sayang nya!

the Palamut

Other than that there is also Sardalya - sardines - like our ikan kembung, then there's salmon - comparably cheaper here than in Malaysia. There are other types of fish as well but when it runs into 20TL (Rm40) over a kilo
I would rather buy something else.

Fish market at Ulus

The Falling Leaves...

It's Fall...and the air is getting noticeably cooler and windy. My routine (except for weekends ) is to take a brisk  4.5km walk for about an hour, right after the kids leave for school about 7:40am.

Kids waiting for the school van at 7:30 in the morning

 But these days it's getting more and more difficult to go for my walk because it can go as low as 9C in the morning and I can feel the wind blow through my sweatshirt and my thin jogging pants! The afternoons however are really nice - abt 18C and a light jacket is enough to keep you nice and warm. 

The summer sale is over (sigh*) so what you see in most stores are the Fall clothes :

Stores already selling fall line attire

mostly sweaters and jackets etc

They can be PRETTY expensive. Anyway, the children have not bought any Fall clothes yet and needed the proper clothes really bad. They have not been wearing the appropriate clothes and I think that is the principal reason for having caught the flu twice in a month - real bad one pulak tu : fever and cough and etc. So decided to do the much needed shopping and we went to Kizilay  (yes, that's right - the place that was bombed some weeks back!) this morning to shop. There is a better variety there and also cheaper than some of the branded stores in Panora!

Managed to  get Fall/Winter jackets, and sweaters for the kids ( I still have mine from my US trip when I was with MARA) and then also boots...THAT took the whole day - from 10 am to 5 pm! Came back really exhausted....

But at least now I think we're good and ready for Fall and Winter!!!!