Melceü't-Tabbâhîn

Melceü't-Tabbâhîn (Ottoman Turkish: ملجأ الطباخين, The Sanctuary of Cooks or The Refuge of Cooks), the first Ottoman Turkish cookbook, was written in 1844 by Hoca Mehmed Kâmil, a lecturer at the Imperial School of Medicine in Galatasaray, Istanbul.[1][2][3] It was the first-ever printed Turkish-language cookbook.[4]

It was translated into English by Turab Efendi in the 19th century as "A Manual of Turkish Cookery",[5] and translated into Arabic in 1887 by Mohammad Sidqi,[6][7] the Arabic translation was printed until 1915 in several editions.[8]

The book was used as a reference text for a chapter on foods in the proceedings of the 1889 International Congress of Orientalists.[9]

Contents

The cookbook contains almost 300 recipes divided into 13 chapters, as follows:

  • Chapter 1: Soups (çorba) - 6 recipes
  • Chapter 2: Kebabs and cutlets - 23 recipes
  • Chapter 3: Stews and köfte - 31 recipes
  • Chapter 4: Dishes cooked in a tava - 11 recipes
  • Chapter 5: Börek and pastry - 21 recipes
  • Chapter 6: Hot desserts (baklavas, halvas, kadayif, revani, and others) - 44 recipes
  • Chapter 7: Cold desserts - 15 recipes
  • Chapter 8: Vegetables (also includes some dishes that contain meat) - 26 recipes
  • Chapter 9: Zeytinyağlı (special category of vegetable dishes prepared with olive oil) - 14 recipes
  • Chapter 10: Pilaf - 13 recipes
  • Chapter 11: Hoşaf - 14 recipes
  • Chapter 12: Syrups and şerbets - 20 recipes
  • Chapter 13: Salads, turşu, tarators and other side dishes - 46 recipes
    • Includes a recipe for cacık (tzatziki), the first written mention of this dish.

See also

References

  1. ^ Kâmil, Mehmet (1997). Melceü't-tabbâhı̂n. UNIPRO.
  2. ^ McWilliams, Mark (2017-06-30). Offal: Rejected and Reclaimed Food: Proceedings of the 2016 Oxford Symposium on Food and Cookery. Oxford Symposium. ISBN 978-1-909248-55-7.
  3. ^ "A Bibliography of Turkish Cookery Books up to 1927". A Bibliography of Turkish Cookery Books up to 1927 (in Turkish). Retrieved 2021-07-07.
  4. ^ Coşkun, Ayla (25 April 2021). "A journey to the past: Iftar from first printed Turkish cookbook". Daily Sabah. Retrieved 6 January 2026.
  5. ^ McWilliams, Mark (30 June 2017). Offal: Rejected and Reclaimed Food: Proceedings of the 2016 Oxford Symposium on Food and Cookery. Oxford Symposium. p. 159. ISBN 978-1-909248-55-7. Retrieved 28 December 2025.
  6. ^ "كتب الطهى تاريخ يروى على نار هادئة!" [Cookbooks are a history told over a low flame!]. Al-Ahram (in Arabic). 2024. Retrieved 6 January 2026.
  7. ^ صدقي, محمد بن احمد (1887). كتاب ملجأ الطباخين: ترجمه من اللغة التركية الى العربية (in Arabic). Retrieved 6 January 2026.
  8. ^ "أكمل الدين إحسان أوغلو: عودة إلى "العثمانية المصرية"" [Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu: A Return to "Egyptian Ottomanism"]. The New Arab (in Arabic). 2021. Retrieved 6 January 2026.
  9. ^ Actes du huitième congrès international des orientalistes tenu en 1889 à Stockholm et à Christiania [Proceedings of the Eighth International Congress of Orientalists held in 1889 in Stockholm and Christiania] (in Arabic and German). Brill. 1891. p. 366. Retrieved 27 Jan 2025.
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