A while ago I wrote about a vegetarian kebab at Kebabçi Iskender in Kadıköy. The post was not only received well by vegetarian eaters but also created an unexpected side effect: my low-carb eating friend said that now she’s ordering her inskenders on the bed of roasted eggplants rather than flat bread. A trick worth knowing for those eating gluten-free in Istanbul! So let’s continue talking about the kebabs sensitively prepared for the non-conventional foodies in Istanbul. Here comes another trip to the Asia side of the city where you will be heading out to Çiya, a little restaurant empire of Musa Dağdeviren sprawled around the Kadıköy market.
The restaurant has two large sections: kebabs (Çiya Kebab) and Turkish home cooking (Çiya Sofrası). Kebabs is a native domain for Musa, Çiya’s owner and chef: when a young boy he worked as an apprentice to a kebab maker in the South-East of Turkey, the region where all great kebabs are hailing from. Probably that’s why Çiya’s kebabs are rather legendary: instead of the typical trinity of şiş, Urfa and döner Çiya boasts about 100 kebabs in their repertoire, some of which - like their kebab with desert truffles - is seasonally offered only a few weeks a year. While anticipating the arrival of the ordered kebab you will be snacking on the complimentary bubbled tandır bread dipped into the olive-oil loaded spicy young cheese sürk, Antakyan style.
Çiya Sofrası, Turkish home cooking section of the restaurant came later as a result of Musa’s enthusiasm in preserving Turkish home cooking traditions that sadly disappear day by day. Food traditionally prepared in the Turkish houses is not just an exciting chapter of the Turkish cooking as a whole; it is an epic showing how the skill and maternal love can transform the most humble ingredients into the feasts that bring comfort and belonging.
Musa’s own quest for bringing traditions back to the plates of the Istanbul eaters started with a meal cooked by one of the younger women in the family after the death of his mother. Following a long-standing custom, the young bride was most likely vigorously trained by the elderly women in the family and was supposed to adopt their cooking style. Musa said that after tasting the food prepared by the young bride he realized that his mother was dead, and he would never eat her food again. That episode set him on the ongoing journey to the origins of the Turkish regional home cooking that is showcased in the ever-changing menu of Çiya. And if some Istanbul chefs use traditions as inspiration Musa Dağdeviren strives to re-recreate them very close to the original.
The concept has appealed to everybody. Istanbul city dwellers appreciated the chance to eat the food they ate in their childhood: vast majority of Istanbullus come from smaller towns of Turkey and crave for the food they grow up with but not necessarily have time and knowledge to cook it often. The other day I witnessed a keşkek madness at Çiya when many Turkish diners had on their plates the stew of wheat berries, chickpeas and chunks of lamb sealed in a clay pot and cooked for a few hours in the stone oven. It was a little moment of gratitude for me when I realized how blessed we were to eat keşkek and other dishes regularly cooked by our mother.
Also, Çiya has a huge appeal to the foreign travelers to Istanbul who rarely have a chance to sample authentic Turkish home cooking, let alone its regional varieties. Musa’s pursuit made the headlines of the most international publications and got featured on the endless number of TV travel shows and guidebooks. I see many travelers to Istanbul who take a boat to cross to the Asia side just to eat at Çiya.
Getting back to Çiya’s vegetarian kebab I love that this dish is made at the intersections of the Turkish grilling tradition and home cooking. What makes it a kebab is the shape typical for Urfa or Adana: a ball of seasoned minced meat is put on a wide flat skewer, then slowly squeezed and pushed down to hug most of the skewer until it finally turns into a long flattened sausage. Also, Çiya’s vegetarian kebab is grilled and comes accompanied by the characteristic charred smell. Finally, it is served with traditional kebab armory: covered with tomato sauce and melted butter and accompanied by the grilled green banana peppers and tomato, sumac-seasoned sliced onions, a generous dollop of buffalo milk yoghurt and thin saç-baked bread of lavaş - all the required material to make your own wraps pinching a little bit of kebab and then complementing it with the sides to your liking.
What makes Çiya’s vegetarian kebab such a home cooked meal on the other hand is the bulgur. I have sung many odes to bulgur, the grain I favor anything else (unless anything else is buckwheat) and here is another occasion. Very fine version of bulgur used for this kebab is knead well with tomato paste, onion, finely chopped mushrooms, olive oil and dry mint. Çiya’s vegetarian kebab may seem like a great innovation if it was not deeply rooted in the Turkish culinary tradition: the preparation of this kebab echoes the dishes commonly found in the South-East of Turkey - stuffed meatballs of içli köfte, yapma patties and gnocchi-like yuvarlama. The resulting texture, wholesomeness and fantastic vegetable sides make this kebab a must-eat for any vegetarian traveling to Istanbul.
Çiya Kebab and Çiya Sofrası. Address: Caferaga Mah. Güneslibahce Sk. 43,44 and 48/B Kadiköy. Phone: (216) 336 30 13 or (216) 330 31 9.
