In the last 20 years, historians have significantly advanced our understanding of African slavery in the Ottoman Empire and its legacies for the descendants of African slaves in Turkey, known as Afro-Turks. However, little is known and about their unique foodways, that is, the culture, traditions, and history of the food of the approximately 1.3 million Africans taken to Ottoman lands in the nineteenth century. Enslaved Africans the world over brought their dietary preferences with them. Whenever possible, these traditions were maintained, as food acts as symbolic link to a homeland left or lost, and past to present (Carney and Rosomoff 2009). This paper examines the foodways of Africans in the late Ottoman Empire with particular reference to those of Izmir. It focuses on their annual festival, known as the Calf Festival, which involved spirit possession, dancing, and a large feast. After detailing the myriad of festive foods, this paper examines one soup, bazine, which is described as a dish attributed solely to the Africans of Izmir in local newspapers and memoirs from late nineteenth century, as well as in recordered interviews with Afro-Turks conducted in 2008 by the Turkish Historical Foundation (Tarih Vakfi) to which I have been given unprecedented access. As Afro-Turks are in the midst of (re)discovering and their unique history, this soup thus acts as a distinct cultural marker: knowledge of its preparation demonstrates one’s importance as a conduit of community history. This paper contributes to the growing body of evidence which shows that African women, as both cooks and religious leaders, were central to maintaining African identity in Ottoman lands. Likewise, it adds to the literature on the food history of Izmir which focuses on the Greek (Cretan) and Sephardic influences in local cuisine. It also expands our understanding of the African foodways north across the Sahara, and demonstrates that food migration is not simply unidirectional out of the Middle East, but into as well.