My gastronomical journey through Turkey


Turkish food does have some similarities to the food in UAE since it is in the Arab region, but there are a lot of different dishes, and also the same dishes which taste a bit different made the Turkish way. Hence, I decided to write a post dedicated to just the food there. I have written another post detailing our visit (excluding the food). It includes the hotel, sightseeing, visa process, currency information, and a lot more in detail. You can read it here.

 Since we had taken guided tours on almost all the days, we had lunch included in our tour. These were local restaurants with good food, but not necessarily ones which would have specifically been on my list to try. Although, we did go to different places and explored local food ourselves. Read on to find out.

 Index:


Street snacks:

Let me start with the street snacks there. One of the things I saw very prominently all over Istanbul was the cart selling bread; it is called simit. It looks like a pretzel. It comes in various flavours (savory as well as sweet). You might find it a tad bit dry, but there are options like the one with cream cheese (which I tried). It still was a bit hard, but tasted really good after they put the cream cheese inside. It also had sesame seeds on top.

 The other thing which caught my attention was the cart on which they were roasting something. I asked our guide and he said they are chestnuts. I got a small bag of these (100 gms cost 10 lira). You peel the skin which turns black in colour after roasting it, and have the chestnut. The texture was softer than I imagined, and I really liked the way it tasted.

A sweet that is famous there is the Turkish delights. We saw a shop near the grand bazaar which our guide suggested. We went crazy looking at the variety of offerings in this store. They were of different shapes and textures. We did taste quite a bit of them (and did buy some too). Not just that, but they also had a wide variety of teas as well as soaps. You'll see a lot of these shops in the grand bazaar area where you can buy the Turkish delights.

We had gone there for about a week, and I will mention the eateries in chronological order. (You can click on the names of the restaurants for their location.)

15th March:

Part of our Old Istanbul tour was the lunch in Serbathane. The word Serbat is used in similar form as it is in Hindi / Arabic - a refreshing drink. Serbat has been served traditionally, and that's where the name comes from.
We started with the bulghur (cracked wheat) soup. I saw this at a lot of restaurants in Turkey, so I'm assuming it is a very famous dish. This was mildly spiced and really tasted good.
We then had some cold mezze like hummus, fava beans, Russian salad, and a few more; one of which was a tomato based mezze which tasted a bit like salsa.
For our mains, there were mixed kebabs - chicken and beef. These were more greasy than what I usually have in Dubai, and tasted delicious. They were served with potato wedges and rice.
I had a cup of Turkish cay (tea) at the end.




 We were told that the Karakoy area has some nice pubs, so we ventured out to explore them. We didn't find too many good places, so finally ended up going to a place called Finn which we had seen online. It was a small place, and the indoors were full (only by reservation) so we sat outdoors. It was winter and most of the places there have heaters for outdoors. Coming from Dubai, it was something I found fascinating.
We had a couple of drinks there and the service was good enough. Sadly, it was past 11pm and their kitchen was closed so we couldn't get any food there.

We came near our hotel and decided to go for a bite nearby. We saw Mado cafe; and surprisingly there are a lot of these around the city. We saw a different outlet almost every day that we were there.
The names and descriptions of the dishes were in Turkish. I called for what looked like a meat dish on a bed of fried potato sticks. It tasted just about average.
We also ordered a chicken pizza (which wasn't in the menu but the waiter understood when we told him). This tasted pretty good.
For dessert we had Kazandibi. It is an Ottoman dessert and a popular one in Turkish cuisine. It is a type of caramelized milk pudding, and tasted fantastic. A lot of their desserts use goat milk (which has a sticky consistency) and I think the same was used in this. It does taste really good, and I recommend trying it out.




16th March:

We had gone to the Buyukada island where we ate at a sea-side restaurant called Milano. No, it wasn't Italian. We started with some salad, and for main course I had fish. This did not have too many spices on it, but had a nice flavour by itself.
I also tried a local liqueur - Raki. It is really strong and tastes like absinthe. Personally, I wasn't much of a fan.
In the end, I had a sweet called lokmasi (it is just like the luquaimat that we get in UAE, but a bit crispier).
The good part about dining here was that the seagulls came and sat right outside the window; it was almost as if they were dining with us.





We spotted another Mado around here, and went there for some coffee. I ordered an affogato; I was expecting the usual espresso with a scoop of ice-cream, but this had cream, and chocolate sauce in it too. It did taste really good, although not the affogato that I had in mind.

 That night we decided to explore the Taksim square area. It is quite happening, and the Istiklal road is like a walking street at night. At the beginning of the street we spotted few shawerma places, and I just couldn't resist. We went to the one called Ã‡Ä±lgın Dürüm I had a chicken shawerma and it tasted heavenly. It had more stuffing in it apart form chicken and I really enjoyed having it.

 We were looking for some nightlife, and ended up at 360 Istanbul - a place that I had in mind before going to Turkey, especially for the view. This had good ratings online among the pubs there; surprisingly, kids were allowed too. The music wasn't too loud, and the place had dim lighting. If you're sitting outdoors, you'll get a pretty good view of the city (keep in mind you're in the heart of the city which is quite a crowded area). If you're looking for a place which is at the rooftop and serves drinks, then this is a good option.





17th March:

We landed in Cappadocia in the afternoon and decided to have something at our hotel before our tour. We tried this delicious "omelette". It was actually half-fried eggs along with meat sausages. This was totally mouth watering (I don't remember the name though).
We then had shish tawook served with grilled vegetables and rice. This was flavourful too.

That evening, we had gone for the Turkish night which takes place in a cave restaurant and includes dinner with drinks. We had Turkish chicken stew along with bulghur rice. This had a tomato based gravy and tasted okay. We did enjoy the wine and the Turkish dances though.


18th March:

After the hot air balloon and the red & green tour, we had lunch at a restaurant called Han. They had a buffet but not a very wide variety among mains. It did have a lot of salads and cold appetisers though. One of which was cig kofte - it is a Turkish speciality made from bulghur. I personally loved it and would recommend trying it out in Turkey, although given its texture and the fact that it is cold and a bit spicy, might take some time to get accustomed to for your taste-buds.
The salads were really good. The mains were average though. I had it along with bulghur rice to which I had taken a fond liking while in Turkey.
The restaurant which I had heard a lot about and really wanted to try in Cappadocia was Dibek. It has a cave like feel to it, and as soon as you enter, you get a cozy vibe. They have majlis style seating. A speciality of Cappadocia is the pottery kebab (testi kebab in Turkish). They make the dish in an earthern pot and break it open in front of you. We ordered for the chicken one; it was made with a tomato base, and tasted delicious. The meat was soft and had a smokey flavour to it. Definitely check it out if you're going there. For all you non-meat eaters, there is also have a vegetarian version of the testi kebabs that is available.
We also had Borek which is a local savory pastry. The "dibek pastry" had a stuffing of yellow cheese, carrot, cabbage and onion with olive oil and lemon dressing. We loved this so much that we ordered another portion of this.
Another dish that we had was the bamya yemegi which is okra cooked with tomatoes, peppers and onions; i liked this one too.
For dessert, we had Aside which is a local dessert made from flour and grape molasses. It had the texture of halwa and tasted superb.







19th March:

We were on our jeep safari in Cappadocia when we stopped at a beautiful spot for some Turkish tea. It wasn't the tea but the lovely view of the town that we got from here which makes the place worth it. They also make Turkish coffee in the hot furnace here.


 For lunch, we went to Organic Cave Kitchen. This restaurant serves delicious organic Turkish style cuisine. It has seating on multiple levels (indoor as well as outdoor) and has a lovely ambience that feels earthy.
For appetisers we had the Turkish stuffed crepes which were stuffed with cheese. We really liked these a lot.
They have some nice combos. I had the meatball combo served along with lentil soup, rice, salad, and an apricot dessert. The meatballs were really delicious. Less of spices but I could get the nice meaty flavour. The apricot dessert was an whole apricot that was caramelized. It was something interesting.
The other dish was the chicken with thyme and this one was flavourful too.
The spaghetti bolognese was a bit dry and tasted just alright.








In the evening, we were looking for some chai, and found an Indian restaurant called Namaste India. The chai was really good for Turkish standards, and we were having the milk tea after a long time. This was another thing in Turkey... I did not find the Indian chai very easily. Since we were already at the restaurant we decided to have some samosas and pakodas too. Being the foodies that we are, we ended up having a full meal after that.

20th March:

On our last day in Istanbul, we visited the galata tower. The view was so good that we just had to have a cup of coffee here. I would highly recommend that you visit this tower with enough time on your hands, so that you can enjoy the view of the city from here.

 We stopped for lunch at Saray Muhallebicisi which is a well-known restaurant for local food. We had the ezme salad with walnuts and cheese which had a burst of flavours to it. I then had a durum wrap (something similar to a shawerma) which tasted nice. In Turkey, I noticed that the wraps have more stuffing apart from the meat; also, the bread that they use to wrap it is a bit thicker than the ones in Dubai.
We had some meatballs with mushroom sauce which also tasted quite good.
We had a chicken pizza too and it was just average.
For dessert, we had the muhallabia. It was topped with a tangy berry sauce which was a bit of a shock for me. The muhallabia tasted really good, and was a bit sticky due to the goat milk used.







At night, while we had some time to kill before our flight, we decided to grab a shawerma from the nearby roadside stall. The weather was really chilly, and I was too hungry to even take a picture, but of-course the shawerma felt comforting.

Conclusion:

Do try the various kebabs as well as the shawermas around Turkey. Turkish tea and Turkish coffee is offered just about everywhere. Dine at a sea-side restaurant watching the birds either in mainland Istanbul or one of the Prince islands. Go to one of the cafes with a view (like the galata tower or Pier Loti) and sit there sipping on some coffee or snacks. Try the pottery kebabs which are a speciality of Cappadocia. There are plenty of Turkish desserts, so plan to satisfy your sweet tooth to the fullest when in Turkey.

 Do let me know your thoughts in the comment section below. 

 Know about great places and food around Dubai on my Instagram .

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