Delicious Turkish Groceries: The "Best Products" List

My five year old daughter says that her favourite activities in life are packing suitcases, organising closets and grocery shopping. Yes, it appears that I am raising a mini-me.  I took over grocery shopping duties for my family at age 18 when I got my driver's license in Canada. I must confess that up until very recently grocery shopping in North America or parts of Europe was much, much more pleasurable than market shopping in Istanbul. All the big players in Turkey were greatly lagging behind in the game in terms of the ritzy, glitzy, enticing, beguiling grocery-store models we were used to from our international experiences...and the products themselves were a mess in terms of packaging, labelling and product variety/options. 

More recently quality food products that are pleasantly packaged have started popping up all over the place. Here are my favourite products...I have tried them all but these are by far the best. See which products made my list...

I often get confused when there is too much choice but also get dismayed when there isn't enough variety in a grocery store. I am sure that you are well aware that thousands of pages have been written about how we make purchasing decisions in grocery stores/supermarkets. It really is a wild science this business of buying groceries...

I shop at Carrefour, Macrocenter and Migros as they are the stores which happen to be close by. I have also shopped at Tansas, Sariyer Market, Real, Ozdilek and Kipa in the past. I buy my "fancy" foods from Gourmet Garage or Eataly and have discovered a whole slew of online gourmet shops which deliver right to your door. I try when I can to buy all of my fruits and vegetables from the fresh "farmers" market and like fresh bakery baked bread. Ortakoy has the most amazing little bakeries by the way...

So here is my shopping list below (in no particular order)...of course it is not a complete list but these products end up in my cart 8/10 times so I have included them in this TOP Products list. Also...these are all Turkish brands!!!!

What are some of your favourites?

TOP PRODUCTS:

1. All Efsina Salts and Spices
2. Taris Organic and Taris First Harvest Olive Oil...for salads and bread dipping
3. Koska Organic Jams and Jellies (No Sugar Added)
4. All NarGourmet Olive Oils (especially the flavoured ones)...for entertaining and special salads
5. Komili "Cold Flavours" and "Hot Flavours" Oils for cooking
6. City Farm Organic Rice, Tomato Puree and Sesame Seeds
7. Noba Easy Cook Brown Rice and Bulgur Rice
8. All Peyman Bahçeden Nuts and Dried Fruits Products
9. All Orvital Products...especially the organic beef hotdogs
10. Pinar Organic Milk and Organic Yogurt
11. Eker Ayran Drink
12. Elta Ada Organic Butter
13. Sutas HupTrik Fruit Yogurt (best served frozen as yogurt popsicle)
14. Dogruluk Truva Ezine - Goat Feta Cheese
15. Kasikla Manti- Meat Ravioli
16. Palivor Ciftligi Kasar Cheese and Cow's Milk Feta Cheese
17. Uludag Mineral Water/Soda, Light Soda (Gazoz...tastes better than Sprite), Lemonade
18. Dogadan Green Tea Mint Lemon Iced Tea
19. Sirma Water and Mineral Water (especially for the packaging)
20. Sohitto Sugar Free Lime and Mint soda (great with Hendricks Gin)
21. Erikli Water (especially the child-friendly small bottles)
22. Sevilen ISA Bey Sauvignon Blanc
23. Selendi Gulpembe Rose
24. Sevilen Majestik Red
25. Kavaklıdere Egeo White and Red
26. Balparmak Squeezable Honey
27. Eti Karam Bitter Chocolates
28. Dogus Karadeniz-Black Sea Region Tea