Kürt Tatlısı: The Kurdish Pastry That Istanbul Banned by Name

Dala Sarkis
2 hours ago
3 min read

Kürt Tatlısı: The Kurdish Pastry That Istanbul Banned by Name

Kürt tatlısı (Kurdish pastry) is a flour, butter, and oil pastry sprinkled with powdered sugar, created by a Kurdish baker from Bitlis named Billiceli Mehmet Efendi. He originally made oily kömbe pastries for Kurdish workers on ships and sand barges in Kasımpaşa, Istanbul. The pastry became famous across Istanbul under the name Kürt tatlısı — Kurdish pastry. In the 1960s, the governor of Istanbul, Niyazi Akı, banned the sale of this pastry under its Kurdish name. He changed the name to “koç tatlısı” (ram pastry), arguing that the word “Kürt” was discriminatory. A pastry was banned because its name contained the word Kurdish. This is not a soft erasure. It is not a Wikipedia misattribution or a GI certification that excludes Kurds. It is a state official, using state power, to remove the word “Kurdish” from a pastry’s name. Of the forty-four articles in this series, this is the most explicit act of culinary erasure documented.

Key Takeaways

• A flour-butter-oil pastry with powdered sugar, created by Billiceli Mehmet Efendi, a Kurdish baker from Bitlis

• Sold across Istanbul as “Kürt tatlısı” (Kurdish pastry) — then banned by name in the 1960s by the Istanbul governor

• Renamed “koç tatlısı” (ram pastry) by Governor Niyazi Akı — the word “Kürt” was declared discriminatory

• The most explicit act of state culinary erasure documented in this series — a government decree removing the word Kurdish from a food

Quick Facts

Original Name: Kürt Tatlısı (Kurdish Pastry)

Renamed To: Koç Tatlısı (Ram Pastry) by state decree in the 1960s

Creator: Billiceli Mehmet Efendi, a Kurdish baker from Bitlis

Famous Location: Karaköy, Istanbul — originally sold to Kurdish dockworkers in Kasımpaşa

A Baker, a Pastry, and a Ban

Billiceli Mehmet Efendi came from the village of Billice in Kiğı, Bingöl Province — deep in Kurdish Bakur. He migrated to Istanbul and set up in Kasımpaşa, where Kurdish migrant workers laboured on ships and sand barges along the Golden Horn. He sold oily kömbe pastries — simple, rich, filling — to these workers. They called them Kürt tatlısı: Kurdish pastry. The pastries became popular beyond the docks, spreading to shops across Istanbul, especially in Karaköy. The powdered sugar dusting was a later refinement. But the name stayed: Kurdish pastry. It was a Kurdish baker, selling to Kurdish workers, and the pastry carried the word Kurdish in its name across the most cosmopolitan city in Turkey.

In the 1960s, Istanbul Governor Niyazi Akı intervened. He banned the sale of this pastry under its Kurdish name, declaring the word discriminatory. He replaced “Kürt” with “koç” (ram), renaming the pastry koç tatlısı. This was part of a broader policy of suppressing Kurdish identity in Turkey — the same era in which speaking Kurdish in public was banned, Kurdish music was prohibited, and Kurdish village names were replaced with Turkish ones. The pastry ban was not an isolated act. It was part of a systematic campaign to erase the word Kurdish from Turkish public life. A pastry’s name was considered dangerous because it acknowledged that Kurdish people existed and made things.

The Full Spectrum of Erasure

This series has documented every form of Kurdish food erasure. Active rebranding: Qehweya Kezwanê became Menengiç Kahvesi. Geographic laundering: büryan kebab became a dish from “southeastern Turkey.” State absorption: jajî became Van Otlu Peynir. Wikipedia contradictions: tepsî is Kurdish and Iraqi on different pages. GI certification abuse: Büryan registered to “Siirt” with no Kurdish mention. Linguistic erasure: kulicha disappeared behind the Arabic spelling kleicha. Competitive erasure: rihik vanished between Turkish and Armenian claims over pastırma. And now, with kürt tatlısı, the most brazen form of all: a government decree that removed the word Kurdish from a pastry’s name and replaced it with “ram.” This is not cultural drift. This is policy.

Conclusion

A Kurdish man from Bitlis baked pastries in Istanbul. Kurdish workers bought them. They were called Kurdish pastries. The governor banned the name. The pastry survived. The Kurdish name survived. The Kurdish people survived. That is the story of kürt tatlısı and it is the story of every food in this series. You can rename the pastry. You can rename the kebab. You can rename the coffee. You can file the stew under Iraq, the cheese under Armenia, the yogurt under Greece. But the baker was Kurdish. The recipe is Kurdish. The hands that shaped the dough were Kurdish. And no decree, no governor, no filing system changes that. Forty-four articles in, this is the clearest proof that Kurdish food erasure is not an accident. It was a policy. And the food survived anyway.