Sweet Türkiye: sugar in the country’s drinks, dishes and confectionery

On the next stop on our sugar around the world tour, we arrive in Türkiye. The country is a major producer of sugar beet, ranking fourth in Europe for sugar production, producing 2.850 million tonnes annually.

Sugar consumption in Türkiye is growing. The government has increased the sugar production quota for 2023/24 by around 6% to 3 million metric tonnes. Beet sugar makes up the lion’s share of the quota. Around 200,000 tonnes of cane sugar is imported. This is duty free if it is used in the making of goods and confectionary for export. The Turkish government retains some control over domestic sugar prices, and the state-owned Turkseker, which accounts for a third of domestic sugar production, sets retail sugar prices. 

As with most world cuisines, sugar, or ‘şeker’ in Turkish, plays an important role in this nation’s dishes and drinks. Known for the diversity of its cuisine, sugar is used to sweeten, flavour and bring balance to a variety of foods and beverages, including Turkish coffee. 

We often associate Eastern Mediterranean cuisine with dishes of vegetables stuffed with rice, nuts or meat. The word ‘dolma’ means stuffed, and one example of a stuffed vegetable dish is zeytinyağlı biber dolma. Here, bell peppers are stuffed with spices, nuts, rice and dried fruits like currants or raisins. A little sugar is often added to the rice and to the sauce the bell peppers are served with. The addition of sugar balances out the spices, the savoury quality of the rice and the strength of the onions while enhancing the natural sweetness of the peppers.

Sugar is used in much the same way in ‘Turkish pizza’, a popular street food. Called lahmacun, these flatbreads are thin and crisp and topped with a spiced, ground meat mixture. A little sugar is often used in the making of the dough for a touch of sweetness and to bring a rounder flavour to the flatbread. As the topping is savoury, this subtle sweetness enhances and brings balance to the dish.

When it comes to Turkish sweet treats and confectionery, baklava is a good place to start. Made from phyllo dough, pistachios, oil or butter, and a syrup made from sugar, lemon juice and water, baklava is exported far and wide and is known for its characteristic sticky quality created by the thick syrup. For the syrup, demerara sugar is used in many recipes, as it helps to give a thicker texture to the syrup, but light cane muscovado sugar is also used for depth of flavour, colour and to give the syrup a certain bulk.

Turkish baklava is distinct from Greek baklava in that the Turkish version uses a liquid sugar syrup that does not contain honey, only sugar, water and a scented flavouring like lemon or orange – the syrup for Greek baklava is a honey syrup. While Turkish baklava is usually made with a flavourless oil and pistachios, Greek baklava will comprise butter and walnuts or almonds. 

A staple of Türkiye’s sweet cuisine is lokum, or Turkish Delight, first created by the master confectioner Haci Bekir in the 18th Century for the Ottoman Palace. To make this confectionery, water, starch and sugar are boiled together into a soft, gooey nougat that is flavoured with anything from rosewater to lemon to pistachio. The sugar is important to create a gel-like texture that, once set, helps to impart a soft, chewy texture and intense sweetness. Some recipes use granulated sugar but demerara sugar can be used in place of this, adding extra flavour. Once the lokum is set and sliced into bite-sized squares, it is dusted with confectioner’s sugar for additional sweetness and to enhance appearance.

Another confectionery, popular in Türkiye but with its origins in Iran, is halva. Recipes vary, as does the consistency, but in Türkiye it may be made from wheat semolina, water, butter, sugar and nuts. A crunchy crystalline is often used and demerara sugar can work well here as it dissolves easily and imparts a mellow flavour that sets of the nuts perfectly and a deeper colour.

In Türkiye, biscuits are often served with tea and coffee (more on these beverages below). A traditional sweet treat is acıbadem kurabiyesi, meaning ‘bitter almond biscuit’ as bitter almonds were traditionally a key ingredient. For sweetness, sugar is also included in the recipe. As the sugar is heated and dissolved, demerara sugar can work well. The biscuits contain ground almonds, which helps to keep them moist, but the addition of soft brown light sugar or one of the muscovado sugars will further help them retain moisture, extending shelf life.

Sweet, scented syrups are used in many Turkish desserts, including lokma. First made for the sultans during the Ottoman Empire, these fried balls are made from yeast-leavened dough. As soon as the dough balls are fried, they are soaked in a cold simple syrup of liquid sugar, water and lemon juice. This allows the dough balls to absorb the syrup and take on its full flavour.

Tea drinking is an important part of Turkish culture and hospitality, and tea is the nation’s most popular hot drink. It is consumed at home, in tea shops, and traditionally among men at a ‘kıraathane’ or ‘coffee house’.

Tea preparation consists of pouring hot water over dried or fresh scented leaves and allowing it to steep before sugar cubes of beet sugar are added for sweetness. Ingredients like milk or lemon are generally not added, but sugar remains an important part of tea drinking in Türkiye.

Turkish coffee, a traditional beverage, is strong, unfiltered and typically served in an espresso-like cup. Finely ground coffee and water are placed in a pot called a cezve and sugar is added at the boiling stage if a level of sweetness is desired. Sweetness levels will vary depending on personal preference.

If a Turkish coffee is ‘sade’, this means it is made without sugar. ‘Orta’ is medium sweet, which is usually one teaspoon or a cube of sugar, while ‘şekerli’ is more intensely sweet, with two teaspoons or cubes added. A sugar like soft brown light sugar or demerara sugar, which dissolve easily, can be used to sweeten Turkish coffee. However, a white sugar is sometimes preferred as it gives the final drink a frothy quality that many enjoy.

Often consumed during winter, another popular hot beverage in Türkiye is salep. The drink is named after its primary ingredient. Salep is made from the tubers of wild orchids and ground to a starch-rich powder. This powder, salep, is mixed with milk and sugar and heated until it has thickened. It is common to sprinkle cinnamon powder on the top to enhance the colour and flavour.

Sugar is prevalent in Turkish cooking and cuisine, especially in drinks like coffee and tea which are consumed daily, and in desserts and confectionery. As we have seen, sugar is mainly used to sweeten, but it also adds flavour, colour, moisture and bulk to recipes. Ragus manufactures functional pure sugar ingredients for use in industrial food and beverage applications in all the world’s cuisines, enhancing flavour, texture and appearance. To learn more, contact our Customer Services Team. For more sugar news and updates, continue browsing SUGARTALK and follow Ragus on LinkedIn.