Must try in Turkey

Menemen.

Name: Menemen (Turkish Scrambled Eggs with Tomato and Peppers)
Prep time: 10 min
Cook time: 15 min
Total time: 25 min
Yield: 2 servings
Cuisine: Turkey
Ingredients: 2 tbsp butter; 1 tbsp olive oil; 3 long thin green peppers (sivri biber), finely sliced; 4 ripe tomatoes, halved and grated, skins discarded; 4 eggs; to taste fine salt; ½ tsp pul biber (Aleppo-style pepper flakes); 1 small onion, finely chopped; 50 g white cheese (beyaz peynir or feta), crumbled

Turkish Scrambled Eggs with Tomato and Peppers

Menemen · say it: meh-neh-MEN

Menemen is soft-scrambled eggs cooked into a base of slow-melted tomatoes and green peppers, made in a small two-handled pan and eaten from that same pan with hunks of bread. It tastes of sweet concentrated tomato, gentle pepper, butter and barely set egg — comfort food with almost no technique barrier, ready in fifteen minutes. The whole trick is patience with the tomatoes: cook them down until jammy before any egg goes in, then take the eggs off the heat while they still look slightly underdone. Get those two moments right and a weekday pan of menemen matches anything a Turkish breakfast salon serves.

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Turkish Scrambled Eggs with Tomato and Peppers

Gate: Turkey
Prep: 10 min
Cook: 15 min
Total time: 25 min
Serves: 2
Status: Easy
Nutrition / serving · estimated: Calories 340 kcal; Protein 15 g; Carbs 12 g; Fat 26 g; Fiber 3 g

Why this recipe works.

The tomatoes are grated and properly reduced first, so the base is jammy instead of watery — the single step that separates good menemen from wet eggs.
Eggs come off the heat just before they look done, keeping the signature soft, spoonable texture.
The onion question is handled honestly: classic soğansız as written, with the soğanlı option built in.
One pan, six core ingredients, fifteen minutes — true to how it is actually cooked in Turkey.

Ingredients.

9 items

Servings

2 tbsp butter
1 tbsp olive oil
3 long thin green peppers (sivri biber), finely slicedor 1 green bell pepper, finely diced, plus a pinch of pul biber
4 ripe tomatoes, halved and grated, skins discarded
4 eggs
to taste fine salt
½ tsp pul biber (Aleppo-style pepper flakes) (optional)
1 small onion, finely chopped (optional)only if you're team soğanlı — see the story
50 g white cheese (beyaz peynir or feta), crumbled (optional)

Equipment

Small frying pan or a Turkish two-handled sahan (18–20 cm)
Box grater
Wooden spoon or silicone spatula

Instructions.

Soften the peppers
Melt the butter with the olive oil in a small pan over medium heat until it foams. Add the peppers (and the onion, if using) and cook, stirring now and then, until they are fully soft and sweet-smelling with no raw green bite — about 4–5 minutes.
Cook down the tomatoes
Add 4 of grated tomato pulp and a good pinch of salt. Simmer, stirring occasionally, until the mixture thickens to a jammy sauce and the butter pools back out at the edges — 6–8 minutes. A spoon dragged through it should leave a trail that fills in slowly.
Tip This reduction is the whole dish. If in doubt, give it two more minutes before the eggs go in.
Add the eggs
Turn the heat to low. Crack 4 directly into the pan, let them sit for 20–30 seconds until the whites begin to turn opaque at the edges, then fold lazily through the tomato base so ribbons of white and yolk streak the sauce.
Tip Some cooks beat the eggs first for a uniform texture; cracking them in whole gives the classic streaky curds.
Stop while it's soft
Keep folding gently just until the eggs are barely set — glossy, creamy and still trembling, about 1–2 minutes. Pull the pan off the heat while the mixture still looks a shade underdone; it will finish from residual heat on the way to the table.
Finish and serve
Scatter over the pul biber and the crumbled cheese, if using. Serve immediately, straight from the pan, with plenty of bread for scooping and hot tea alongside.

Tips from our kitchen.

Grate the tomatoes on a box grater and discard the skins — you get instant pulp that cooks down fast and smooth. Out of season, use good canned tomatoes rather than sad fresh ones.
Use the thin, pale-green Turkish sivri peppers if you can find them; a green bell pepper with a pinch of pul biber is the honest stand-in.
Cook the tomato base until you see butter pooling back out at the edges. If liquid still runs when you drag a spoon through, keep reducing before adding eggs.
Kill the heat early. Menemen finishes cooking in the hot pan on the table; eggs that look perfect on the stove arrive overcooked.
Stir lazily, not constantly — you want soft ribbons of egg through tomato, not a uniform orange scramble.
Serve it in the cooking pan with plenty of crusty bread. Menemen is eaten by mopping, not by fork alone.

Substitutions.

Fresh tomatoes → 400 g canned chopped or crushed tomatoes: Better than out-of-season fresh. Drain excess liquid and expect a slightly deeper, cooked flavor.
Sivri (Turkish long green) peppers → 1 green bell pepper + a pinch of pul biber or mild chile flakes: Bell pepper is sweeter and thicker-fleshed; dice it small so it softens fully.
Butter → Olive oil only: Common in Aegean kitchens and makes the dish vegan-adjacent, but you lose the rich finish butter gives the eggs.

Variations.

Soğanlı menemen: The onion version: sweat a finely chopped onion in the butter until translucent before the peppers go in. Sweeter, rounder, and — depending on who you ask — either the only real menemen or a crime.
Peynirli menemen: Crumble salty white cheese (beyaz peynir or feta) over the eggs in the last minute so it half-melts into the curds. A breakfast-salon standard.
Sucuklu menemen: Fry sliced sucuk (spiced Turkish beef sausage) in the pan first and cook the menemen in its paprika-stained fat. No longer vegetarian, entirely worth it.

Storage & reheating.

Menemen is at its best the moment it leaves the stove and does not really keep — the eggs firm up and weep on standing. If you must, refrigerate leftovers up to 1 day and reheat very gently in a pan with a knob of butter, stopping while still moist. A better plan: cook the tomato-pepper base ahead (it keeps 3 days refrigerated and freezes well), then reheat it and add fresh eggs to order.

Serve with

Fresh crusty bread or simit, olives, white cheese and endless glasses of Turkish tea — the kahvaltı way.

The story behind Menemen.

Menemen belongs to kahvaltı, the sprawling Turkish breakfast, but it also stands alone: a dish of student kitchens, roadside lokantas and dedicated menemenciler — restaurants that make nothing else and slide the bubbling pan straight onto the table. The name matches a town in İzmir province, and the dish is popularly linked to it, though like most origin claims of this kind the connection is told more confidently than it is documented. What is certain is that eggs, tomatoes and peppers met in Anatolian pans generations ago and never separated.

Menemen is often compared to shakshuka, and the two are clearly kin, but they differ in the detail that matters: in shakshuka the eggs poach whole in the sauce, while in menemen they are stirred through it, loosely scrambled, so egg and tomato become one soft mass. (Confusingly, the Turkish dish called şakşuka is something else entirely — a fried eggplant meze.)

And then there is the debate. Whether menemen should contain onion — soğanlı or soğansız — is a genuine national argument, waged in families, restaurant kitchens and online with complete sincerity. A viral 2019 poll on Turkish social media drew hundreds of thousands of votes, with the no-onion side claiming a narrow victory, which settled precisely nothing. The onion camp argues that sweated onion gives the base sweetness and body; the purists answer that onion muscles out the clean taste of tomato and egg, and that real menemen needs only three vegetables' worth of restraint. This recipe takes the diplomatic position: the classic version is written onion-free, and the onion is right there in the ingredient list, marked optional, for the other half of the country. Both are authentic. Choose your side and defend it loudly — that, too, is part of the dish.

Questions, answered.

Does authentic menemen have onion in it?

Both versions are authentic, and Turks argue about it constantly — soğanlı (with onion) versus soğansız (without) is a famous national debate that a viral 2019 poll, drawing hundreds of thousands of votes, failed to settle. Home cooks often add onion; many menemen-only restaurants leave it out. Cook it however you like and expect someone to object.

What is the difference between menemen and shakshuka?

In shakshuka, whole eggs are poached sunny-side-up in a spiced tomato-pepper sauce and stay intact. In Turkish menemen, the eggs are stirred through the tomato base and loosely scrambled, so the finished dish is a soft, unified mixture rather than sauce with whole eggs sitting in it. The base flavors are similar; the egg technique defines each dish.

Why did my menemen come out watery?

Almost always because the tomatoes were not reduced enough before the eggs went in. Grated fresh tomatoes release a lot of liquid, and it must cook off until the mixture is thick and jammy, with the fat separating at the edges. Adding eggs to a wet base gives you soup-like menemen; adding them to a reduced base gives you the proper creamy texture.

Is menemen eaten only for breakfast in Turkey?

Breakfast is its home turf — it is a fixture of the Turkish kahvaltı table and of dedicated menemen restaurants — but in practice it works at any hour. Students and home cooks treat it as a fast, cheap dinner, and lokantas serve it at lunch. Eggs, tomatoes and bread make a complete meal whenever you need one.

Can I make menemen for one person?

Yes — it may be the world's best single-serving dish. Halve everything (one small tomato, one small pepper, two eggs) and use the smallest pan you own; a small pan keeps the layer deep enough to stay creamy. Cooking time barely changes, and you eat it straight from the pan, which is traditional anyway.

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