Salep: Turkey’s Winter Drink Made From Orchids

On a cold winter day in Turkey, a café sets down a cup of thick, steaming white drink dusted with cinnamon. To many, it tastes like hot milk turned to velvet. So this is salep, a winter drink with a secret: it is thickened with flour ground from the tubers of wild orchids.

Here is where the drink comes from, how it once conquered London, and why the real thing has become so rare.

Salep, a Flour From Orchid Tubers

Salep is a flour made from the tubers of orchids of the genus Orchis. In turn, these tubers contain a starch called glucomannan, which thickens and binds liquids. Then, mixed with hot milk and sugar, it becomes a creamy drink. In the kitchens of the former Byzantine and Ottoman lands, cooks also use it in desserts.

A name with a wink

The word comes from the Arabic sahlab, which is probably short for a phrase meaning “fox’s testicles”, after the shape of the paired tubers. Fittingly, the ancient Greeks and Romans also drank ground orchid bulbs and considered them a powerful aphrodisiac.

The Story of Salep

An Ottoman winter favorite

Across the Ottoman Empire, it was a popular drink. It even had a reputation as a “fattener” for young women before marriage.

Saloop, the drink of London

Over time, the drink traveled as far as England and Germany before coffee and tea took over. In London, people drank it as saloop. Because it was cheaper than tea and coffee, street stalls sold it with milk and sugar. Later, however, saloop stalls gave way to coffee stalls.

Why Real Salep Is Rare

However, harvesting the flour takes a huge number of plants. It takes a very large number of tubers to make a single kilogram (2.2 pounds) of flour. Consequently, wild orchids have disappeared from parts of Turkey, Greece and Iran.

For this reason, Turkey made it illegal to export true salep. In May 2026, the agriculture minister announced the first two domestic varieties, Bal Yumru and Bol Yumru, so that these orchids can grow in fields. So many instant mixes now use other starches and artificial flavoring, while the region of Kahramanmaraş remains a major producer, famous for its maraş salebi.

From the cup to the ice cream

Besides, the same flour is the secret of Turkish ice cream, dondurma, giving it its famous stretch.

Tips for drinking salep

Which winter drinks go with salep?

Salep is one of several winter drinks worth trying in Turkey. In Istanbul, drink boza at Vefa Bozacısı, which Hacı Sadık Bey, who came from Prizren, opened in 1876, a short walk from the Süleymaniye Mosque. Then, behind the Spice Bazaar, buy freshly ground coffee at Kurukahveci Mehmet Efendi. In Gaziantep, by contrast, the old Tahmis coffee house serves menengiç, a coffee made from wild pistachio. So a winter trip can become a tasting tour.

Drink Salep in Cafés and Pastry Shops

In winter, therefore, look for it in cafés and pastry shops. Then try another winter drink, boza, and read our guides to Turkish coffee and Turkish tea. For a morning at the breakfast tables of Istanbul, join our Turkish breakfast and coffee tour.

Salep and coffee meet again on our Istanbul food tour, which starts at Eminönü and the Spice Bazaar, close to Kurukahveci Mehmet Efendi. Book it for a winter morning, and ask your guide for a cup of salep along the way.