Easy Turkish Sumac Onions Recipe (Turkish Onion Salad) (2024)

FAQs

What are sumac onions? ›

Sumac onions, also known as Turkish onions, are thinly sliced onions that are mixed with sumac and parsley and then pickled in lemon juice with a hint of oil. It is an extremely easy dish to make and is commonly used to accompany main protein dishes. Sumac is made by grinding down the dried berries of a sumac plant.

Red Onions: The salad onion. While you can cook with it, it's less overpowering than white or yellow onions, making it ideal for uses that require raw onion. The colour fades as you cook them. Great for Greek salad, on burgers, etc.

Just peel and slice the red onion as called for in your recipe, then submerge them in a bowl of cold or ice water. Let them sit for at least ten minutes, stirring once or twice, before draining and using them in your recipe. For added flavor, you can also soak the onions in lime juice, lemon juice, or vinegar.

Ground sumac is most often used in Turkish seasoning and Arabic spices, ground sumac spice is simply the tangy, citrusy powder from the fruit of the sumac shrub. It is preferred to lemon, tamarind and vinegar for its fresh, zesty flavor.

What does sumac taste like? It tastes somewhat like fresh lemon juice – a bit sour and astringent! But it's much more complex and nuanced in flavor. Sumac is tangy and deep with a hint of earthy sweetness and floral citrus notes.

Tomatoes, eggplants, onions, zucchini, cucumber and garlic are the main vegetables found in Turkish cooking. They're used in everything from dips and salads to fritters and casseroles.

Both the Greeks and the Turks make tasty salads from a variety of raw fresh vegetables; the Greeks may add Feta cheese, while the Turks may spice it up with peppers. Both the Greeks and the Turks prepare stuffed vine leaves.

Kokoretsi or kokoreç is a dish of the Balkans and Anatolia (Asia Minor), consisting of lamb or goat intestines wrapped around seasoned offal, including sweetbreads, hearts, lungs, or kidneys, and typically grilled; a variant consists of chopped innards cooked on a griddle.

Yellow onions are your go-to cooking onions. This onion has yellow skin and a strong flavor due to its high sulphur content, which mellows out during cooking, becoming sweet and flavorful. Its ability to hold up to heat makes it great for caramelizing and roasting.

Then you just have to wait long enough for the vinegar to do its job, rinsing away the harsh sulfurous compounds, softening the onion, and giving it a pleasantly tart pop of flavor. If you use red wine vinegar, my personal favorite, the onions also turn an amazing hot-pink color.

Can you eat raw onions in salad? ›

Raw onions can add a nice bite to salads, from a green onion sliced and added to a simple green salad to easy creations based almost entirely on the sweetness of Vidalia onions.

Onions - soaking in cold water to soften the flavor

When preparing raw onions, soak in cold water before hand to remove some of the pungency and soften the flavor. However since soaking too long will dilute the flavor, soaking in cold water for 5 to 10 minutes is recommended. Squeeze out excess water before using.

What is sumac? This wine-coloured ground spice is one of the most useful but least known and most underappreciated. Made from dried berries, it has an appealing lemon-lime tartness that can be widely used. In Iran, they use it as a condiment, putting it onto the table with salt and pepper.

Rhus aromatica, or “fragrant sumac,” is the rarest of the three North American varieties. Known for releasing a strong lemon scent when its leaves and twigs are bruised, its tart berries are also commonly used to create beverages and were a common source of dye and tobacco flavoring for the Cheyenne people.

The fruit of the sumac plant is a red berry that is dried and ground into the spice. The plant is native to Iran and has historically grown all over the Arabian peninsula, Turkey and most of the Mediterranean. The plant can also be found in parts of Africa, Asia and North America.

Is sumac spicy? Sumac isn't spicy like a chilli powder or hot paprika. It has a sour, floral tang that's a bit like lemon or limes but isn't quite as astringent.