Owners rebrand Riders Donair as Turkish Express, taking pride in Istanbul roots

This story was originally published on Nov. 2, 2022. It has since been updated.

In 2004, Murat Tercan was running a pizza joint in Montreal when a friend reached out with a problem and a plea: there was no authentic Turkish cuisine in Regina.

"Please come here and open a place and you're gonna serve the Regina people," Tercan recalls him saying.

The people of Regina, though, would have to wait. It took 10 years before Tercan and his wife moved across the country. When they finally did, they started a flooring business, not a restaurant.

Finally, in November 2021, the Tercans opened Turkish Express at 1629 Park St., in the industrial area north of Victoria Avenue.

It was originally named Riders Donair to appeal to Rider Nation, of course but the Tercans have recently rebranded it to make their offerings clearer to first-time visitors.

Before coming to Canada, the Tercans operated two restaurants in Istanbul: one was a sit-down restaurant; the other was a "lokanta," or tradesperson's restaurant, serving home style cooking in a casual, lunch counter setting.

They have maintained that focus on home style cooking at Turkish Express.

"Dessert, rice, soup, kebab, donair, sauce everything is made from scratch," said Tercan.

None of the meat they use is pre-sliced or pre-marinated. Same goes for the bread: the lahmacun (thin flatbreads topped with ground meat and seasonings), pides (thicker pizza-like flatbreads topped with sauce, cheese, and meat or veggies) and bread for the donair and kebab wraps are all made in-house.

Given it's a transcontinental country, I asked Tercan what distinguishes Turkish flavours from those ofMediterranean nations and the Middle East.

"We use similar spices, but in general, less garlic and more oregano, paprika, tomato paste and red pepper paste," said Tercan.

Certain ingredients and dishes have remained consistent over Turkey's long history, but the country's location at a cultural crossroads has led to its cuisine taking on many other influences, Tercan said. There are Turkish dishes that reflect Balkan styles, for example, and cuisine inspired by former Soviet nations surrounding the Black Sea.

In Regina, you can now find several donair shops (cooking meat on a vertical rotisserie) representing a few countries of origin. Typically, Turkish donair meat is seasoned one way, a Greek gyro another, and an Arab shawarma in yet another style. Mexicans also roast the meat for tacos al pastor in the same manner, having inherited the practice from Lebanese immigrants.

Murat called it, "the same thing, but in different languages."

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The Turkish community in Saskatchewan is small only 860 people, according to the last census but the restaurant is also attracting customers from India, Pakistan and Bangladesh, said Tercan.

"We're proud of what we're doing and the local Turkish families support us. We appreciate it. And Canadian people support us," he said.

In late 2023, Tercan opened another location at 4606 Albert St.

He is planning to bring a couple of chefs from his home country to consult on Turkish patisserie and ice cream another gap he's hoping to fill in the Regina food scene.