Pilaki — dried beans or fish (particularly lakerda, salt-cured bonito) braised in olive oil with onion, tomato, carrot, and garlic — is the Turkish zeytinyağlı principle applied to legumes and cured fish. The beans absorb the olive oil-vegetable cooking liquid over a long braise, producing a preparation where the bean and the olive oil have become a unified flavour rather than separate components. Served cold or at room temperature.
**White bean pilaki (fasulye pilaki):** - Dried white beans soaked overnight, cooked separately until just tender (not completely soft — they finish in the sauce) - The sauce: onion, tomato, carrot, celery root sautéed in generous olive oil - The beans finish in the sauce — 30 minutes over low heat, absorbing the vegetable-olive oil flavour - Room temperature service — olive oil's aromatic compounds at their fullest at room temperature **Lakerda (salt-cured bonito):** - Thick slices of salt-cured bonito, soaked to reduce saltiness, dressed with olive oil, lemon, onion - Not cooked further after curing — the curing has already transformed the protein - [VERIFY] Dagdeviren's lakerda technique
The Turkish Cookbook