 Muslim culture, after all, developed from a base of eastern Hellenism.Thus, when we see a general similarity between dishes served in both East and West we need to show that they do not have a common, parallel origin in Graeco-Roman cooking before we adduce any oriental influence.As with the earlier Byzantine cuisine, the center of Ottoman cuisine was in Constantinople, the capital, where the imperial courts and the metropolitan elites had established a refined culinary tradition bringing together elements of regional cuisines from across the empires