Last Sunday I attended the biggest and the most lavish buffet of the town: piles of fresh oysters accompanied by sparking wine, chocolate fountains and Turkish delight mountains, trays of exquisite small bites aka meze, boxes of Asian fixes, slices of freshly baked pizza, artisanal and not so artisanal coffee, ice-cream of every imaginable flavor, assorted grilled meats and rivers of booze. Pair this menu with a Bosphorus view, top notch location by the water and good weather, and here is your recipe for a successful Istanbul party. And the Timeout folks know how to throw one: that’s why they have chosen this setup for their food festival 101 Istanbul Lezzeti / 101 Flavors of Istanbul.
After rubbing my back with other eaters the whole Sunday I thought it would be fair to say that the food establishments that participated in the event and the offering they created for the day is a good indication of what Istanbul eats. “Parayı veren düdüğü çalar / He who pays the piper calls the tune,” as a Turkish saying goes meaning that the young and solvent folks such as those who joined the party create demand and ultimately shape the current offering of the Istanbul restaurants. And if so, here is a snapshot of what Istanbul eats.
Note: If you follow me on Facebook or Instagram you know that I have mentioned many worthwhile eateries that participated in the festival. No name dropping here.
1. Anything goes as long as it’s a charcoal-grilled meat
Seeing the longest queues at the food festival enveloped in the grill smoke I thought of my husband who enthusiastically explains his preference for one burger chain over another. “They grill rather than fry their beef patty. Your fingers smell smoke hours after the meal,” he swears.
I don’t know if it’s the nomadic past of the Central Asian Turks, the warm climate that favors open-fire cooking or any other reason, but Turks do like their grilled meat. And Istanbullites want a kebab, but at the same time they don’t want to look so Anatolian. No wonder that Istanbul these days is all about steak houses and high-end burger shops opening one after another, next door to the competition, same month. They was a few of them at the festival versus only two kebab stands, one featuring humongous döner. No one seemed to care that the döner was shaved off into a square rather than kept round as it should be, and the whole deal was gone by the afternoon. With our newly found love for burgers we will soon forget how a good döner should look.
2. Who cares about eating with the seasons
And still Istanbulites are not such terrible carnivores: the meat comes sandwiched in a bun or piled over a generous serving of pilaf. And if there is no meat, we can survive too. As long as we don’t run out of mantı, little tortellini filled with minced meat. The union of meat and wheat is such a cornerstone of the Turkish cooking, and a huge part of the Istanbul food offering. Everything that’s not a meat joint, is a pastane (bakery) or a börek house.
At the festival I have not seen many vegetables apart from a huge basket of artichokes decorating a stand. I heard them crying, “It’s spring! It’s spring!“, but their voice was weak. Characteristically, that stand did not offer anything made of artichokes. That reflects how hard it is to find a decent canteen that serves seasonal vegetable dishes in Istanbul. Last time after touring a weekly neighborhood market and marveling all the spring greens, beans, artichokes and alike offered at the rock bottom prices, I stopped by a local canteen right on the market street. What did they have on the menu? Eggplant, tomato and red peppers.
3. We don’t have fish in Istanbul, not any more
At the festival there was no shortage of farmed sea bass, and as if by a silent agreement almost every single stand served it ceviche-style. There was farmed Norwegian salmon, occasionally smoked. There were fresh oysters shipped by plane from France. I even spotted some Karelian caviar someplace. So, what has happened to the fish from the Bosphorus, Black Sea, Marmara, Aegean and Mediterranean? Can their absence be an official confession that it’s rare, expensive and hence impractical for an Istanbul restaurant to use that product?
4. We like chocolate, but have never tasted the real deal
A huge dessert section at the festival was 80% chocolate: I never knew so much chocolate existed in Istanbul. Chocolate fountains to dip the strawberries in, chocolate bars, chocolate cakes, chocolate chip cookies, chocolate this and chocolate that. 99% of that chocolate was inedible. Turkish chocolate is pretty much like Turkish coffee: a five-star hotel and a hole in the wall serve you exactly the same quality because everyone uses the same raw material. There was just one stall featuring small batch chocolate, and when I asked if they used a Turkish product, a lady decidedly shook her head, “Only French and Belgium”. Not quite surprisingly.
The chocolate making tradition has not been strong in Istanbul, and it’s fine. The city offers plenty for a sweet tooth: decadent baklava, silky milk puddings, candied fruits. I wonder why there were none at the festival, and why we insist on chocolate if we don’t even know what it is.
5. Every good meal should be accompanied by a drink
No, there was no sight of ayran at the festival. Instead, Turkish alcoholic beverage producers who have limited opportunities to advertise and promote their products otherwise stocked their bars well. The crowed enjoyed their beer, raki, wine, shots and combination of the above like there is no tomorrow. Many Istanbullites appreciate a drink, or two, or more as they enjoy a thoughtfully put together feast and a conversation with dear friends.
Apart from rakı I was happy to see some decent Turkish wine at the festival. The largest producers had the largest stands just like they dominate the shelf space at the Istanbul supermarkets. And while it was harder to spot the smaller vineyards in this huge crowd, if you did, you were rewarded with a glass of something decent and a chat with somebody who knows where their grape is coming from and how it is fermented.
6. Pizza is an Istanbullite’s idea of ethnic food
I was examining a rather exotic offering at the stand of an Iranian restaurant. I was not the only one bewildered. “This is meat stewed with walnuts and pomegranate molasses,” a lady at the stall pointed to a brown sauce covered by the film of oil. “It cooks for so long that the walnut releases a lot of its oil.” “Hm, it would be cool to have it over pilaf,” a young man referred to a common way of serving stews and gravies on top of pilaf to soak the grains in the delicious juices. “Here you’ve got two to choose from,” I tried to encourage him. Both were made with long-grain rice we don’t use in Turkey; one included fresh fava beans and dill, the other one had barberries and was perfumed with saffron, your typical Ottoman fix. “A normal pilaf, I mean,” the young sighed and left the stand with a plate of plain stew, his first and probably last experience of the Iranian food.
And Iran is not so far from Turkey. What about more distant countries and more exotic cuisines? Yes, there is some Asian food in town, but in Istanbul we still think that it’s normal to include Korean BBQ chicken, sushi and a stir-fry in the same menu. After all, is it surprising that our comfortable idea of ethnic food is Italian which includes close to the Turkish heart and stomach pizza (aka pide) and pasta (aka makarna)?
7. An Istanbul meal averages 125 TL / US$60 per person
This was the prices of the entrance ticker to the festival grounds entitling you to the unlimited samplings of food and booze throughout the day. Given that you could theoretically have a few starters, a main, a dessert and unlimited drinks, it was a most reasonable deal.
You can expect to pay the same for a fixed menu at a decent Istanbul restaurant; and if you are going for a tasting set at one of the fine dining restaurants of the city, the price will go up twice. Istanbul is not your low-cost destination any more, and if you want to dine in Istanbul like a local, by the Bosphorus and all, prepare your sunglasses and the wallet.
Great post! I love reading your take down of the local food culture. Thanks!