A content analysis on Gaziantep dishes

Food is a physiological requirement for the human being. While the dining is purely nutritionally based, the meanings of dining over time have changed. Today, food is an important part of the culture, a socialization tool, a communication style and a motivation for travel. Development of gastronomic tourism constitutes an important travel motivation to many unique and rich destinations in terms of local food culture and attracts gastronomic tourists to destinations. Due to its gastronomic features, Gaziantep is the most popular gastronomic destination of Turkey. Gaziantep cuisine is a rich cuisine with a long history and a wide variety of dishes. Having a unique food culture, Gaziantep cuisine, where the use of local products is high, was granted as "City of Gastronomy" of The Creative Cities Network in 2015 by UNESCO. This title has led to an increase in food-motivated travel to the city. Besides, the unique culinary culture of Gaziantep constitutes an important research topic for the related literature and the studies on Gaziantep cuisine have shown a rapid increase. In this study, Gaziantep cuisine and Gaziantep dishes were examined profoundly and the ingredients of the dishes and the frequency of the ingredients were analyzed by content analysis method. The main aim of the study is; to analyze the ingredients of soups, main dishes and desserts and to determine the frequencies of these ingredients. Thus, basic ingredients used in the Gaziantep cuisine and the types of ingredients will be determined. The study also examines the distribution of ingredients by food groups. The variety of ingredients shows the richness of Gaziantep cuisine in terms of gastronomy. The literature shows that food groups can be classified in different groups. However, it is determined that food groups can be classified in nine categories as milk and dairy products, meat and meat products, eggs, legumes, nuts and oilseeds, bread and other grains, vegetables and fruits, oils, sugar and sweets and others. On the other hand, in this study, food groups were classified in 10 groups by adding spices as spices are frequently used in Gaziantep cuisine. This study consists of four parts. While the first part includes topics such as the main field, objectives, importance and methodology of the study, the second part examines the concept of gastronomy, the development of gastronomy, the relationship between gastronomy and other disciplines and also basic information about food groups. In the third part, general information about Gaziantep is given and general characteristics of Gaziantep cuisine and dishes have been examined in detail. In the fourth chapter, the findings obtained from the content analysis are presented. Within the scope of the study, 13 cookbooks about Gaziantep cuisine were examined and a standard list of ingredients used in food production for each meal and dessert was created. The Spss program was used to standardize the ingredents and the ingredents were analyzed by frequency analysis. Percentage distributions of ingredients used in 38 soups (323 ingredients), 298 main dishes (2824 ingredients in total) and 61 desserts (345 ingredients in total) were determined according to 10 food groups. The frequencies of the ingredients were also obtained according to the food groups and these distributions are shown graphically for each food group. It is expected that the results obtained from this study will contribute to the development of Gaziantep gastronomy and will be useful for future studies.