The TCF Culinary Arts Center-YESAM is organizing a culinary cultural tour to the city of Safranbolu, Turkey, a UNESCO World Heritage site. The tour is timed with the saffron harvest in this region and will take place on October 24-25. It will be led by İbrahim Canbulat, architect and regional cuisine expert. For more information, please click here.

TCF provided a grant to the Turkish American Association of California in support of the 18th Annual California Turkish Festival in Monterey, California. The festival took place on August 22-23, and featured cultural performances, music, and culinary events.

TCF awarded a grant to the Glass Furnace Foundation in İstanbul to provide scholarships to three aspiring glass artists and enable their participation in the Foundation’s international ateliers with world-renowned glass artists. Deniz Küçükballılar of Mimar Sinan Fine Arts University’s Ceramic and Glass Design Department will participate in a workshop with Claudia Pagel; Birnur Derya Geylani of Mimar Sinan Fine Arts University’s Ceramic and Glass Design Department will work with Carmen Lozar; and Ecem Yılmaz of Marmara University’s Fine Arts Faculty Ceramic and Glass Designs Department will attend a workshop with Carol Milne.

Two groups of a total of 48 American middle and high school teachers visited Turkey last month as part of the TCF Teacher Study Tours. The teachers were selected from among participants in the Teacher Workshops on Turkey organized under the Spotlight on Turkey 2015 program by 12 local chapters of the World Affairs Councils of America (WACA) and supported by a major TCF grant. On the tour, the teachers had the chance to visit world-famous cultural and archaeological sites of Turkey and met with diplomats, policy experts, and representatives of Turkish civil society. So far, 575 American teachers have participated in this program. You can read more about the teachers' journey on the TCF Study Tour Blog and on Facebook and Twitter.

Banu Özden, YESAM Project Executive,  gave a lecture on “Exploring Turkey’s Culinary Heritage” to an international group of Ph.D. students, who were visiting Turkey.

Turkish cooking traditions are highlighted every month with the YESAM Recipe of the Month, which features a regional dish of “Beef and Lamb Kebabs with Mashed Tomatoes,” a popular summer dish from Gaziantep region that is made from season’s best flavored tomatoes.

The work "The Blue Typhoon," composed by Dr. Mehmet Ali Sanlıkol (TCF Academic Fellow-2013), was performed at the "A Distant Mirror" concert by Yo-Yo-Ma with Mike Block, Monika Leskovar and Giovanni Sollima, and the Boston Cello Quartet at the Ozawa Hall at Tanglewood in Lenox, MA on August 13.

Gizem Aksu (TCF Cultural Exchange Fellow-2015), dancer and choreographer, attended the residency program of DanceWEB within the framework of ImPulsTanz-Vienna International Dance Festival from July 15-August 19.

Mehveş Lelic (TCF Cultural Exchange Fellow-2015), a photographer, attended the residency program at Ateliers Fourwinds, Aureille, France from July 29-August 13 to complete her photography project and finalize it for exhibition.

Seval Şener (TCF Cultural Exchange Fellow-2015), a painter and academician, is attending the residency program of the Project Space "Circa...dit", Arnhem, Netherlands from August 17-September 6 to realize her two solo exhibitions and presentation on Contemporary Turkish Art.