Portakal suyu is the Turkish translation for fresh squeezed orange juice. During the Pat and Pam Barry family trip to Turkey in 1993, we saw portkal suyu vendors on practically every street corner. If I remember correctly, we returned from that trip with an authentic Turkish orange juicer, the kind with a huge lever, and portakal suyu became a common treat in our household.
Freddy's great aunt Edna lives in Bradenton, FL and has an orange tree right in her backyard. Last year she gave us a huge bag of oranges, perfect for juicing. Freddy went out and bought the cheapest orange juicer he could find, the plastic kind that you have to twist the orange halves on with all your might, not nearly as well engineered as the Turkish variety. After his arm felt like it was going to fall off, we had a wonderful pitcher of fresh squeezed orange juice.
This year for Christmas, my parents bought us an electric citrus juicer, which works wonderfully. Good thing, because this year, Edna gave us about 3 times the amount of oranges. We gathered up whatever containers we could find, like this 1-gallon canola oil jug below, and Freddy went to work juicing. We ended up with about 3 gallons of orange juice, and are currently storing two in the freezer. I've personally never been a big juice drinker, but with the 'food pressure' these oranges are causing, I've been enjoying a glass of portakal suyu every morning.
2 comments:
Food pressure not only saves money, but keeps you healthy.
Thanks for the trip down memory lane, Janet. I can't believe that trip was 14 years ago. I still remember clearly the orange juice seller in the Grand Bazaar who differentiated himself by keeping his oranges on ice: "portakal suyu sojuk!" (cold!)
I'll let you in on a little secret from those trips. The daily glasses of portakal suyu, you see, served as an organizing vehicle for the journeys onto the street each day. Between the orange juice and running into one of those sword-wielding ice-cream sellers, and bantering with a dozen or so carpet sellers, we didn't have to actually DO anything like visit a famous museum. Which would have been boring for us parents and even worse for you kids. That's why we liked portakal suyu so much.
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