Most popular Mersin dish: Tantuni

MERSİN

Mersin is famous for Tantuni, a wrap peculiar to Turkmen tribes. According to stories, tantuni was originally the dish of poorer families and cooked with a small piece of butter and meat combined with a great deal of lungs. Today’s tantuni, however, is cooked with two types of meat. The wrap which only includes meat is called biftek, while the wrap including both meat and tail fat is named tantuni.

Tantuni is served with sumac (a spice unique to the region), onion salad with parsley, tomatoes, and various seasonings. It can be either sandwiched in bread or wrapped in pita.