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EveryCow

Milk drinks

Ayran

Yoghurt whisked with cold water and salt into a frothy drink, served with kebabs, pide and summer lunches.

Ayran is yoghurt beaten with cold water and a pinch of salt until it foams. It is the most common drink with food in Turkey, served with kebabs, lahmacun, pide and börek, and is also drunk across the Balkans, the Caucasus and Central Asia. Sold in sealed cups at every kiosk, it is also made fresh in restaurants and homes.

What goes in

Yoghurt: 50%50%Cold water: 42%42%Salt: 8%3parts
  • Yoghurt650%, Whole milk, set thick.
  • Cold water542%, About the same amount again.
  • Salt18%, A pinch.

Rough parts by weight. The ring shows each input's share of the product.

Made step by step

Each drawing shows the operation for that step. Quantities and timings differ from house to house and herd to herd; this is one traditional way, in outline.

  1. Step 1: Ferment Set whole milk as yoghurt and chill it.
  2. Step 2: Churn Whisk the yoghurt with cold water and salt until smooth.
  3. Step 3: Churn Beat hard until a thick foam forms on top.
  4. Step 4: Serve Pour into cups and serve cold with food.
  5. Yoghurt: 50%50%Cold water: 42%42%Salt: 8%
    Finished Ayran, by share.

A herders' drink

The Turkic nomads who moved west across Central Asia diluted their sour milk with water, and ayran comes from that habit. In Anatolia it became a village staple for haymaking and harvest. The town of Susurluk in Balıkesir is known across Turkey for its especially foamy ayran. It remains the drink most Turkish families set out with a summer lunch.

With food

Ayran is the usual drink with doner and grilled meats, and some kebab houses beat it fresh in large basins. Its salt and sourness cut through fat. Iran's doogh, often with dried mint and sometimes carbonated, is a close relation, as is the dhallë of Albania. In summer it is also the base of cold yoghurt soups.

Where it is used

With kebabsSummer lunchHarvest fields

The breeds behind it

Holstein FriesianMost of Turkey's dairy milk today.Brown SwissWidely kept in eastern Anatolia.SimmentalDual-purpose breed common on Turkish farms.

Also part of it, and being written: Anatolian Black (Native Turkish cattle of small farms.).

More on EveryCow

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Sources and further reading

About this page

Original text and drawings by the EveryCow desk, written with AI assistance and checked against the sources above. The shares are a rough, illustrative ratio, not a recipe: every family and dairy makes it differently. If we have something wrong, tell us.

Photo credits on this page

The small pictures above come from Wikimedia Commons under free licences. Some are cropped to fit.

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