Ayvalık Tostu

Pressed flat in a hot press until the cheese leaks out and fries against the plates.

Egg. Not vegetarian — contains a sausage whose meat the source does not name, cheese whose rennet the source does not name, pastırma, which is cured beef.

Ingredients

• 2 long soft bread rolls
• 200 g kaşar or mild hard cheese, sliced
• 100 g sucuk, thinly sliced
• 60 g pastırma, thinly sliced
• 4 pickled gherkins, sliced lengthways
• 2 tablespoons Russian salad or mayonnaise
• 1 tablespoon ketchup
• 1 teaspoon hot pepper paste
• 2 tablespoons butter, softened

to serve

• pickled chillies

Method

1. IT IS PRESSED FLAT IN A HOT PRESS UNTIL THE CHEESE LEAKS OUT AND FRIES AGAINST THE PLATES. Not toasted and then assembled -- pressed hard, from a roll three or four centimetres thick down to perhaps one and a half, for five or six minutes, until cheese has escaped at the edges and caught on the hot metal into brittle brown lace. Those fried cheese edges are the best part of it and they only happen under real pressure with the press properly hot. A gently closed sandwich toaster warms the filling and leaves the roll puffy, and the thing is ordinary.
2. THE CHEESE GOES AGAINST BOTH CUT FACES, WITH EVERYTHING ELSE IN THE MIDDLE. Sliced cheese laid directly on the top and bottom bread, then the meats and pickles between. The cheese melts into the crumb and waterproofs it against the sauces and the pickle juice, and it is also what has to reach the edges to escape and fry.
3. THE SUCUK GOES IN RAW AND COOKS IN THE PRESS. Thinly sliced. It renders its own paprika-red fat into the bread over the five minutes, which is most of why the dish tastes as it does. Pre-fried, that fat is left in the frying pan.
4. THE OUTSIDE OF THE ROLL IS BUTTERED, NOT OILED. Softened butter spread over the top and bottom crust before it goes in. It fries the outside to a crisp golden shell; oil makes it greasy without browning as well.
5. THE PICKLES ARE SLICED LENGTHWAYS AND PATTED DRY. Long strips so they lie flat under pressure instead of rolling out of the sides, and blotted, because pickle brine is the main thing that can make the middle soggy.
6. IT IS LEFT TO SIT ONE MINUTE BEFORE CUTTING. Straight out, the cheese is liquid and runs out of the cut. One minute and it has set enough to stay in.
7. The press heated until genuinely hot.
8. The rolls split lengthways and the outsides spread with SOFTENED BUTTER.
9. Sliced cheese laid directly against BOTH cut faces.
10. The ketchup, pepper paste and Russian salad spread over the bottom cheese layer.
11. The RAW sucuk, pastırma and LENGTHWAYS-SLICED, PATTED-DRY pickles layered in the middle.
12. Closed and put in the press.
13. PRESSED HARD, 5 to 6 MINUTES, until the roll is squashed to about a third of its height and cheese has escaped at the edges and FRIED BROWN against the plates.
14. Left to sit 1 MINUTE.
15. TESTED: there should be brittle fried cheese at the edges and the roll should be flat and crisp. A puffy roll means it was not pressed hard enough.
16. Cut across and eaten hot with pickled chillies.

Our own recipe. This one was written for this site rather than taken from anywhere, so there is no source to point you at. The quantities and the order of the steps are choices, not the only way to do it.

Filed under Turkey · All recipes