Mehmet Demirci kindly made ‘mulhama’ for us when we stayed at his eco-lodge. Mehmet and his wife Kadar are Hemşin, that is to say mountain people of the Kaçkar mountains in northeast Turkey, originally of Armenian descent. There are several traditional dishes typical of the Hemşin, of which mulhama, a hearty cheese fondue, is perhaps the most well known.
We’d spent the afternoon walking in the foothills getting soaked by the perpetual mist and rain (this is the wettest part of Turkey), so the warm, gooey fondue could not have been more perfect for our meal that night. Mehmet cooked it for us on a wood-burning stove in his little patch of paradise on the mountainside. So the power cut didn’t deter us - we just needed to walk back through the wood to the car to retrieve our torch. We felt very self-sufficient.
We’d spent the afternoon walking in the foothills getting soaked by the perpetual mist and rain (this is the wettest part of Turkey), so the warm, gooey fondue could not have been more perfect for our meal that night. Mehmet cooked it for us on a wood-burning stove in his little patch of paradise on the mountainside. So the power cut didn’t deter us - we just needed to walk back through the wood to the car to retrieve our torch. We felt very self-sufficient.
Continue reading Hemşin fondue.
