EatingAsia

In Istanbul, a Slurp to Chase Winter Chills

It's snowing! In Istanbul!

And with big fluffy flakes drifting down outside our window, now seems the perfect time to tell you about boza.

Thought to have been invented in the 10th century or thereabouts by central Asian Turks, boza is a fermented drink made from corn, wheat, or millet. We sampled the beverage at Vefa Bozacisi, an old-timey shop not far from Suleymaniye Mosque. Vefa is certainly not a "find" -- it's in every guide book and probably on every walking tour, but it's not just for visitors; Istanbullu frequent Vefa too. 

The shop has a long history. By the 1600s there were boza shops all over Istanbul selling a thin, sour, rather alcoholic version, until Sultan Mehmend IV closed them down as part of a genearl ban on alcohol. During this period a sweetish, hardly alcholic version is said to have been favored by the Janissaries who guarded Topkapi Palace. Given the Sultan's ban on booze it became popular outside the palace walls as well.

In the late 1800s -- or so the story on the Vefa website goes -- Vefa founder Hadji Sadik Bey immigrated to Istanbul from Albania and "started to make Vefa Boza of a different flavour and taste, with thick consistency and having a less sour taste, just as it is flavoured and enjoyed today."

Boza is a winter beverage meant to be drunk warm. Long ago it was sold by itinerant vendors who pushed their carts up and down Istanbul's slippery wintertime hills shouting "Boooza! Booooza!" Now you can buy the stuff in a bottle, but for pure nostalgia value it's hard to beat the Vefa experience.

The shop is all mirrors, blue-and-white tiles, and timber. Orders of boza are ladled up to order from a big marble tub on the bar that runs along one side of the shop.

We sampled our boza off-season (as you might deduce by the short sleeves in these photos). Such a hearty drink would probably have gone down easier in the dead of winter but even in June boza cast its spell on me.

It's quite viscous -- thick and slurpy. Some may find this repellent, but living in Asia has pretty much inured me to gloppiness in any dish or beverage. I loved the boza's's mildly sweet-tanginess, which is nicely complemented by the generous sprinkle of cinnamon with which the boza server annoints each glass.

Right across the street from Vefa is a leblebici (roasted chickpea seller). This is not a coincidence. Some boza drinkers sprinkle the roasted legumes on top of their boza before each sip/slurp.

On that summer day, as we sat in Vefa sipping/slurping our boza, our friend Evren (he of the healthy obsession with deliciousness and the memorable brunch near Rumeli Castle) explained the custom such: "Imagine buying a bag of just-roasted leblebi from the leblebici, then rushing over to Vefa to eat them while they're still hot, with a warm glass of boza."

That I can imagine, on a wintry day like this.

(Want to try making boza at home? This recipe uses bulgur. Want more winter? Dave shot these images earlier this week in Sivas and Malatya, central Turkey -- and on the open road in between.)

The Ambar

We began noticing them on the drive from Inebolu to Sinop: single-story timber structures raised from the ground, supported by what look like rough-hewn cocktail tables of the sort you might find in a Wild West-themed cowboy bar.. Storage facilities of some sort, we reasoned, something along the lines of the rice barns that dot the landscape in Thailand and Indonesia.

Turkey's Black Sea coast is corn country (though plenty of wheat is grown there too). In autumn almost every rural house is festooned with bunches and garlands of drying cobs. These "corn barns", which we later learned are called ambar in Turkish (a generic term for "storehouse"), were used by farmers to dry and store their harvests of corn (and other crops) while waiting for their turn at the village mill. Set up high above the ground, their crops were safely out of the reach of the wild boar and other  animals that roam the Black Sea's pine-carpeted hills. Now most of them sit empty.

We were bug-eyed after days of gray skies,confined by unceasing rain to our hotel room or one or another of Sinop's harborside teahouses. When we finally woke to a weak, tentative sun we dressed and hurriedly breakfasted, jumped in the car and hit the road.

We drove inland, away from the sea we'd been staring at for the better part of a week, and traced a two-lane blacktop deep into a bucolic valley. Here and there were the tiniest of villages comprising a single bufe (always well-stocked with freshly baked bread) and a handful of cottages. Plumes of smoke rose from roadside gardens, signalling pekmez in process. We pulled off the road not once but four times, to find mothers and grandmothers hovering over mammoth metal kazan (cauldrons), cooking down kilos and kilos of apples, pears, mulberries, figs and grapes into liters and liters of fruit molasses over wood fires.

Alongside a river slicing through a not-quite mountainous range trees were hinting at autumn, flashing bare limbs and spots of saffron and yellow. We breezed by a mid-sized town and kept on, beyond the point at which the road became a pitted dirt track. Lured by the vista around the next corner and the next we climbed and climbed, cautiously negotiating hairpin turns, always on the lookout for heedless Turkish drivers.

There were ambar, plenty of them, and we slowed and gawked at each one; by now we were a bit obsessed with these structures. When the road narrowed to nearly impassable we stopped at the base of a hill crowned by an especially handsome specimen and got out of our car to take photos.

While Dave was shooting a window on the facade of what we'd taken to be an abandoned farmhouse opposite the ambar a shutter banged open and a red kerchiefed head popped out. We were assaulted with a half-growl, half-shout: Kimler? Kimler? Ne yapsiniz? "Who's there? What are you doing?"

I shouted back that we were just taking photographs of her ambar. She looked dubious and slammed the window shut. A few moments later she popped out the farmhouse's entrance and, puffing loudly with arms swinging, toddled over to the gate.

"It's gorgeous! He's a photographer," I said, indicating my husband and the corn barn, trying to explain why we'd hiked up a hill and onto her property. She glared at me from beneath thick formidable brows, scaring me a little. My Turkish is no match for an angry teyze. But then suddenly the clouds parted. Her face didn't soften, exactly, but she invited us in for tea.

She invited us into her beautiful beautiful wooden house. Later her husband told us it was built of beechwood by his father, over 60 years ago. We entered from the dim ground floor layed with stone, a storage area for tools and bags of recently harvested walnuts and hazelnuts and, long ago, cattle and sheep and chickens.

Ladder stairs -- the steps, made of 2-inch thick boards, so solid underfoot -- led to an entry area. To the left was a curtained kitchen nook recently updated by the woman's son, with a marble countertop, new sink and taps and a handcarved wooden bench. Two bedrooms lay straight ahead. One was empty save for a cloth spread over the floor covered with drying corn kernals. The timber walls were hung with old kilim and thick cotton cloth.

Habiba -- after a while I gained the courage to ask her name -- led us into a sitting room brightened by two windows -- one with a fine view down the hill up which our car had just snaked -- and directed us to a low cushioned banquette running along one wall. Outside it was cold enough for gloves and a hat and heavy wool socks. Inside, the room was toasty warm from a wood-fired stove set within a five foot-high blackened hearth. She left us there to admire the timber walls, gleaming from age and smoke, and returned with a metal canister of water and a container of tea leaves.

Habiba told us about her family, three sons and a daughter, all grown and married and living in Istanbul. Grandkids too, and they all converge on the village every summer to take in the fresh air and cool temperatures. As she talked Habiba loosened up a bit. She was 64 or 65, she said, she couldn't be sure. She'd grown up in the area, she loved these hills: "Allah allah, you should see it in springtime!" 

We must eat something, she insisted, even though it was past lunchtime. We danced the dance of Turkish hospitality, declining while she insisted, and finally giving in. While Habiba was in the kitchen her husband Kazim returned home. Opening the door to find two yabanci drinking tea in his sitting room he stopped short, then graciously and quickly regained his composure. He offered us more tea.

Kazim and Habiba set up a low folding table in front of us, laid it with a flowered cloth and set it with plates of food. Kazim ate with us (Habiba demurred, saying she'd already eaten): tomatoes, long green mild chilies, fresh cheese and gently pickled romano beans that Habiba warmed in oil over a burner on the wood stove. Tea for Kazim, orange Fanta for Dave and me.

As the three of us ate Habiba pulled hunks of bread from a big loaf she kept in a plastic bag on a shelf near the door. She carefully peeled warm hard-boiled eggs and placed them on our plates.

Kazim told us about growing up in the house, how he was seven years old when his father built it with his own hands. He described a village more populous than it is now, the mosque just minutes from their door crowded with the faithful every Friday afternoon; it's closed now. He described the mill down by the river where his father and the village's other farmers took their corn to be ground into grits and flour. How his mother made meals in the hearth that now houses the modern wood-fired stove, and how as a boy he listened to the family's cows and the sheep and chickens moving beneath the floorboards as he drifted off to sleep. Every autumn, he said, the ambar was stacked to its rafters with corn and other fruits of the harvest.

He and Habiba adore each other. It's lovely to see. When she checked his watch and pulled a sack of pills from beneath her sweater -- ''I was in the hospital last month, for few days," she murmured -- Kazim watched her worriedly. When we heard the clank of a jerryrigged oil can bell, hung just outside the house to scare animals away from the garden, Habiba shook her head, smiling sideways at Kazim, and said "That's his work." He shrugged his shoulders, hung his head, then smiled and winked at her. They both laughed.

Every year in late autumn the Habiba and Kazim slaughter their few chickens, pack the carcasse up along with bushels of hazelnuts and walnuts from their own trees and board an overnight bus to Istanbul. There they stay for the winter, shuffling between their children's houses. Not willingly -- when they were younger, Kazim told us, they stuck out the cold and snow in the old house. But it's impossible now. "There's no taxi, no bus to go into town. Sometimes no electricity. It's too isolated. We enjoy Istanbul but ...."

After finishing our lunch we stayed for two more glasses of tea. Habiba looked tired and Kazim began clucking after her; it was time to leave. The couple walked us downstairs, Kazim taking quiet but obvious pride in the fact that Dave stopped every step to photograph his house's wooden beams and planks and its storage area, where the baskets Kazim and Habiba use to collect walnuts and apples hung on hooks jutting from the walls. He understood why we'd been drawn to the ambar. "Yes, it's beautiful," he agreed.

Neither Kazim nor Habiba wanted their photograph taken. "We're too old and too ugly!" she cried, shooing Dave away but laughing when he tried to convince her otherwise.

"Come back in the spring, in May, after we return from Istanbul," Habiba said us as she urged a bulging bag of black walnuts into my hands."This place in the springtime, oh! You can't imagine how wonderful. Like heaven on earth."

Datli Maya: Tradition With a Twist in Istanbul

The Istanbul-bound flight out of Singapore arrives in the wee hours. Even after we've hit up airport Duty Free, fought the traffic to Beyoglu and dropped our bags in our usual stay in Cihangir it's still early. We know a long nap will assert itself eventually but on a morning like this -- turquoise skies, birds chirping, a light breeze -- going straight to bed is out of the question.

So we walk a little, poking around the neighborhood, tallying the changes since our last visit: a few sleek restaurants, a new bar or two, a couple boutiques. Cihangir doesn't have Galata's dramatic architecture or its historic charm, but its hipster factor has risen dramatically. We're happy to see Mucver is still there; we know it even before we climb the hill outside our door to the corner because we can smell lunch being prepared in the garden-level kitchen just a few doors away.

But wait ... the postage stamp-sized wood-fired bakery where we always buy simit from a sometimes friendly, sometimes grumpy hoca, we see as we approach, has been re-painted. He is gone and -- we roll our eyes -- the place is now a cute cafe called Datli Maya. There is cheesecake in the window.

Oh dear. There goes the neighborhood.

Still, it's open, we're hungry, and jetlag is closing in. We step inside and find that the wood-fired oven is still in use and simit are still for sale. And when we inquire about the hoca the new owner tells us that he taught her to use the wood-fired oven, and the simit recipe is his, and he lives upstairs on the third floor. We feel better.

The cafe is in early days, she says. They're still testing, getting a feel for the fire. Would we like to try a dish of lor (ricotta-reminiscent fresh cheese) and Spanish quince paste warmed in the oven? We would, so we head upstairs, through the teeny-tiny kitchen, and take a seat at one of three tables in the even smaller dining space. In the corner by the door there's help-yourself tea in a big old-fashioned samovar. The wall shelves by our table hold jars of dried herbs, a few books, some knick-knacks. The chairs and tables are mismatched but the place feels comfortable, not twee. Personal, not self-consciously shabby chic.

The cheese and fruit paste arrives at our table drizzled with good olive oil and garnished with two black olives. The lor is unsalted and uber milky, nicely balanced by the sharp olives and sweet quince paste. As we're fighting over the last bite the cafe's energetic owner pops upstairs and, plucking twigs and leaves from the jars on the shelf, offers us herbal tea.

As we drink  I read a framed newspaper clipping hanging on the wall. It turns out that our friendly host is Dilara Erbay, a not unknown quantity in Istanbul's culinary world. (Read more about her career, and Datli Maya, in a typically authoritative Istanbul Eats write-up here.)

Dilara was last associated with Abracadabra, a big beautiful restaurant with a view in Arnavutkoy. One Sunday morning last January we and a couple chef friends went to Abracadabra for what is yet one of the best breakfasts we've eaten in Turkey. Dilara wasn't around, but her commitment to sourcing the absolute best regional ingredients was evident in the kaymak, honeycomb, eggs, butter and cheeses on our table. Yet despite the deliciousness and the welcome given by the Abracadabra staff we knew we wouldn't return; the vibe was a little preening, a bit too see-and-be-seen.

What a lovely surprise then to find that a not-new talent, but a new-to-us talent, was working magic in a place without attitude, a cafe we'd be eager to return to. Three weeks later, after a spell on the Black Sea and inland, we did. It was all good.

The traditionalist in me sniffs at a menu that puts lahmacun side-by-side with cheesecake. But why not, if both are done well? Datli Maya's lahmacun hoca brings his talent for taming the wood fire all the way from the southeast;, our thin-crusted pekmez specimen was memorable, our garlicky sausage and cheese pide delicious. Dilara knows a thing or two about baking; the cheesecake is seven-spiced and lovely, a cross between hefty New York-style and fluffier versions.

Turkey boasts amazing regional ingredients that should be getting more play outside traditional kitchens. Our kudos Datli Maya for going there in a way that feels honest, not gimmicky.

And as a curious cook who enjoys talking with other cooks I like the idea of a place where I can walk through the kitchen and see what the staff is cooking up for the lunch special. On our last morning in Istanbul we found Dilara and her colleagues wrist-deep in wild mushroom and bulgur pilav. Are those dates? I asked, and Dilara pulled a package of floury red Chinese dates from the counter. "A friend gave them to me," she said. "I think they're Vietnamese. But we're using them in this pilaf. Why not?"

Indeed.

Datli Maya, 59/A Türkgücü Caddesi, Cihangir (across from the mosque). Daily 8am-midnight.

On the Turkey's Black Sea Coast, Autumn's Bounty

No doubt about it, we are very, very behind. Behind in posting from our autumnal travels in Turkey and from our rainy season time in Chiang Mai. And in posting from Hanoi, and Kelantan before that, and from Taiwan before that.

Where have the last five and a half months gone?

It's almost Thanksgiving (we'll be spending it in Chiang Mai, where we find ourselves once again). To make up for our absence, we're offering a great recipe for Turkey Day leftovers, and a story and slideshow to go along with it. Autumn's abundance on show in markets on Turkey's eastern Black Sea coast, and comfort food from Sinop: islama, an over-the-top dish of butter and broth-soaked lavash (or yufka) topped with turkey (or chicken) and crushed walnuts.

Jump to the story and slideshow, our latest for food and wine website Zester Daily, here.

(And it's still a great dish, even if Thanksgiving isn't in your near future.)

Kastamonu: Here's the Beef

Last January, en route from hamsi (anchovy) node Sinop to Ankara we made an 18-hour pitstop in Kastamonu, capital of the Turkish province of the same name. The sky was dull gray and the sub-zero wind unrelenting; by necessity our explorations were punctuated with stops in tea houses where we could thaw our frozen feet. Coal smoke hung in the air and soot coated buildings. Early Sunday morning, when we ventured out in search of caffeine, the streets were all but empty.

Still, there was something about Kastamonu that made us know we'd be back. Maybe it was the city's trove of crumbling old konak, or mansions, or its romantic situation on the slopes of two hills separated by a river, one hill crowned by the ruins of an 11th-century castle and the other by a late 1800s tower with a still chiming clock.

Perhaps it was the chorus of calls to prayer that we heard at dusk fas we watched a nearly full moon rise from the the courtyard of Ismail Bey mosque, high up one of Kastamonu's slopes. Or the thousands of starlings that appeared in the sky over the crest of the opposite hill right after, swooping and diving in wildly shifting formations.

It could have been dinner: superb kebabs that in their charred glory tasted all the better for being our first bites of meat after more than a week of eating primarily fish.

At any rate, we did return to Kastamonu last month, driving straight from Ankara's airport after a flight from Istanbul. We returned to the same Sunday market that we briefly lighted on in January -- and were treated to our first taste of this fall's hamsi catch -- and feasted on spit-roasted lamb in the nearby town of Taskopru, known for its garlic. We poked around the brick-paved streets in Kastamonu's market neighborhood, and found a good restaurant serving local dishes, including a version of etli ekmek ("meat bread") very different from the etli ekmek we ate last year in Mardin, in southeastern Turkey (a town which, coincidentally, is also built on a hill).

And we ate enough meat to fortify us for the self-imposed nothing-but-seafood diet we had planned for the next two weeks, which we would spend on the coast.

When one thinks of Turkish food it's lamb that most readily comes to mind. But in many parts of the country (like Kars) beef is the preferred red animal protein. Most of Kastamonu's kasab, or butchers, display not sheep but cow carcasses. And pastirma -- cured, air-dried beef -- is a local specialty.

In Kastamonu, beef, pastirma and garlic from Taskopru

Pastirma is usually associated with the eastern Anatolian city of Kayseri, where it is heavily flavored with garlic. Kastamonu's pastirma is also garlicky but less so. We know this because we carried some in our car for most of a day with minimal stink. A decade ago we bought some pastirma in Kayseri and attempted to do the same, but after two hours the interior of our car was so heavy with garlicky-ness that we were forced to pull over and eat the culprit.

In Kastamonu pastirma is preserved with and without an orange coating of ground seasonings -- garlic, fenugreek and paprika -- called cemen. The former is eaten as is while the latter is cooked into etli ekmek (which is then known as pastirmali ekmek), stewed with vegetables, or pan-fried with eggs.

Monday is beef delivery day in Kastamonu's pastirma/butcher area. Early in the morning we spotted men dressed in blood red uniforms unloading huge sides of beef from a truck. We followed them through a maze of passageways to a butcher shop, where we drank tea (of course) and chatted a bit with the shop's owner..

Kastamonu native Bayram Sari has owned his butcher shop, where he sells beef and his own pastirma and sucuk (sausage), for a little over 15 years. The enormous sides of beef hanging in his window are from Simmental, a breed of dairy and beef cow that can weigh up to 400+ kilos.

Bayram Bey makes his pastirma in a "secret" location about 45 minutes from downtown, he says. Curing is done from September to November, after summer has well and truly finished but before the worst of Kastamonu's bitter winter begins. To make the pastirma, beef loin and flank are rubbed with salt and air dried it for one to two months; the cemen coating is added after the meat is dried. Kastamonulu love their pastirma -- Bayram Bey figures he sells about 1.5 to 2 tons of the cured meat every year.

"That's no good," he said, pointing to a bag in my lap bearing the name of a pastirma shop next to the truck from which Bayram Bey's carcasses were being unloaded. "You have to try my pastirma!"

He had his shop assistant shave us a couple hundreds grams off a hunk in the display case. It was indeed delicious: not quite as dry as bresaola, supple and rich in flavor, tasting of beef first and then of garlic and spices. He also gifted us a few links of delicious sucuk which, with their hit of cumin, had me wishing for a soft corn tortilla. Go figure.

It's fair to say that when it comes to curing meat Bayram Bey is a maestro. After bidding him "Gorusuruz" (See you again -- and we will) we headed back to our hotel and packed our car for the drive to the coast.

We tucked the pastirma and sucuk into a bag with other edible souvenirs of Kastamonu -- sour plum fruit leather, "black" bulgur (coarse bulgur made from emmer, aka farro -- one of the province's specialty crops) and freshly harvested walnuts. Halfway to Inebolu the sun came out and we made an impromptu pitstop at cafe perched on a hilltop, where we refueled with tea, bread and Bayram Bey's pastirma (opening photo).

Suitable for Framing II: Famous Garlic and a Market

Famous Taşköprü garlic, Turkey, October 2011

Market in Mardin, Turkey, June 2010

This is the second post in a series that we're running every Tuesday through early December.All images in the series are for sale, via Photoshelter or directly from Dave.

To learn more about the series visit the first post, here. Images can be viewed full screen in Dave's Suitable for Framing gallery, here.

About the photographer:

David Hagerman is an editorial and commercial photographer specializing in food, travel, portraiture and street photography. His work has appeared in the New York Times, Saveur, Food & Wine, Travel+Leisure Southeast Asia, Wall Street Journal and other publications.When not on assignment or otherwise gainfully occupied Dave offers private photography workshops in Penang and elsewhere. Contact him at drhagerman@gmail.com.

In Istanbul, A Perfect Lunch and the Call to Prayer

Eating seafood by the water in Karakoy, Istanbul -- such a cliched tourist experience. But Istanbullu eat seafood by the water in Karakoy too. And because of these fish, these fried hamsi (anchovies), we found the best spot in the city from which to listen to the call to prayer.

On a gauzily bright afternoon last January we walked through the small fish market at the northern end of the Galata Bridge. We like the little restaurants there. They tout a bit and a menu may be waved in front of your face, but there's nothing overly aggressive about the salesmanship.

Prices are clearly marked, and reasonable -- especially if you stick to what's in season (and avoid prawns/shrimp). The service isn't to white tablecloth restaurant standards, but if you've dined at white tablecloth restaurants in Istanbul you might think that's not a bad thing. (Our tolerance for snooty waiters is pretty low).

The food is basic, and good.

We walked to the "restaurant" at the very end, the one with tables right on the water. We sat in the sun and drank in that view that's impossible to tire of. We ordered hamsi and a mackerel-y type fish and a salad. After many trips to Turkey we still marvel that a beautiful salad is so easily had no matter where in in the country you find yourself.

The fish arrived griddle-fried and crispy outside, moist and sweet within, accompanied by big fleshy leaves of peppery rocket and wedges of lemon. Our salads (greedy for the tangy pickled red cabbage that's a component of this tri-color assemblage, we ordered one each) were dressed with a drizzle of olive oil and the lemon juice we squeezed on top.

We ate whole anchovies, leaving aside only bits of head, and picked flesh from mackerel bones and soaked up lemony olive oil with chunks of bread, and felt absurdly lucky to be there, dining outside comfortably in the middle of January and drinking in one of the world's most beautiful skylines.

After lunch we hopped on the small ferry we'd watched chug back and forth between our "restaurant" and Eminonu, on the opposite bank. We could have easily walked across the bridge, or taken the train. We could have stayed in Karakoy; we had no reason or desire to be in Eminonu.

But it seemed right, after a simple meal of fish and salad by the water, to ride close to its surface on an old-fashioned ferry. So we paid the ridiculous foreigners' price, equal to almost half the cost of our cheap lunch, and climbed aboard.

We sat outside and let the wind slap our faces as we listened to the ka-chug ka-chug of the motor and the hollow punch of waves against the boat's wooden sides. It was a short ride, less than five minutes, and if we'd had the nerve we would have asked the gruff boatman if we might stay on board for a few more back-and-forths.

But we didn't, so we didn't. Instead we alighted in a parking lot with a perfect vantage of Galata tower just as the loudspeaker of a mosque nearby began to crackle.

It started there, and then marched up the hills behind us as muezzin at other mosques joined in. Then morefrom the opposite side of the bridge. We by the shore as the call to prayer bounced and echoed all around us, a cascade of rising and falling male voices.

When the last bit faded away we walked to Eminonu pier and caught a ferry to Kadikoy, just to be on the water.

Fish restaurant at the Karakoy fish market: if you're at the Galata Bridge facing Eminonu the fish market is on your right. Walk through it to the very end, to the tables on the water. The menu is basic: fish and salad. About 20 Turkish lira for two fish plates and a big salad.

 

Golden Oldies in Beşiktaş

It's no secret that we love most any restaurant, street stall, or food shop with a history. So it's only natural that we're drawn to Istanbul, a city so filthy rich in edible backstories that we could spend six months roaming, eating, shooting and asking questions, and yet still barely scratch the surface of its culinary history.

Take Beşiktaş, a slice of the city that -- for whatever reason -- seems to be overlooked by visitors. Sited on the European shore two pleasant ferry rides -- or a straight bus or combination tram-and-bus/or taxi journey -- from Eminonu, it's a bustling municipality built up around a sweet little historic center. If you go the ferry route, hop off and follow the crowds across a busy thoroughfare. Quite suddenly, you're in a neighborhood of brick-paved streets winding up and around a hill.

Sure, central Beşiktaş' lanes are lined with their share of tacky pubs and unattractive shop fronts, but the neighborhood's got heart -- in the form of a wonderful little fish market, sitauted at the intersection of several usually pedestrian-only lanes, and a few great eats that have stood the test of, well, more than a century.

Places like Yedi Sekiz Hasan Paşa, for example. This bakery was introduced to us last summer by our Istanbullu friend Evren, whose mother has been making her way to Beşiktaş for its fresh-from-the oven rusks, cookies and breads for as long as he can remember.

We didn't have to taste a single thing to fall for Yedi Sekiz; going on appearance alone, the place is a gem.

    

Enter and you're face to face with a portrait of the bakery's namesake, the generously mustachioed and stern-faced Hasan Pasa. The story goes that in the late 1800s Hasan -- a burly, brave illiterate who used the numbers "7-8" (yedi-sekiz) as his signature -- was tapped by Ottoman Sultan Abdul Hamid to bring order to the then dangerous, hooligan-ruled streets of Beşiktaş. The Sultan bestowed the military rank of Paşa  (pasha) on the young man, and he did such a bang-up job making the neighborhood safe that he enjoys near-saint status among its residents.

Across the shop from Hasa Pasa's countenance hang portraits of Ataturk, along with an evil eye and other good luck totems. Stretching between the two great men, is a tiled rear wall centered by a massive wood-fired oven.

 

In the middle of the room, warmed by the heat of the wood fire, is a vast terrazzo table covered with metal trays of more varieties of breads and other treats than one sould possibly sample in a single, or even multiple, visits.

More bounty is displayed in the bakery's front window.

With such an overwhelming selection, where to start? We can't highly enough recommend the acı badem, [ah-JUH BAH-dem], intensely flavored, crackly-outside-and-chewy-inside almond cookies reminsicent of Italian amaretti. It took us a few visits before we could even get past these wonders. They aren't available everyday, and don't come out of the oven till early afternoon.

We planned jaunts to  Beşiktaş around Yedi Sekiz' acı badem schedule, and never walked out of the bakery without at least two hundred grams' worth.

Other Yedi Sekiz highlights: coconut macaroons, a bit sweeter than the aci badem but just as deliciously moist,

 

portakalı [por-tah-KAH-luh] -- drier, less chewy biscuits heavily infused with orange flavor -- and tahinli [tah-HEEN-lee], massive, to-die-for coils of sweet flaky pastry layered with the most fragrant sesame paste. On our last trip to Istanbul we packed several of these back to Kuala Lumpur, where they survived very well for a month in our freezer.

Yedi Sekiz also does some lovely hearty breads, like these unsalted multi-grain rolls.

Just around the corner from Yedi Sekiz, a red and white awning says it all: "Kaymak-ful (Kaymak-y) Breakfast Here."

Most often described as Turkish clotted cream, kaymak can be made from cow, buffalo, goat, or sheep's milk. Depending on where you are in Turkey, it varies from thin as pouring cream to loosely solid and molded into thinly layered "cakes". Its a decadent accompaniment to sweets and is also eaten for breakfast -- especially in Van in eastern Turkey, where it's a central component in the gargantuan local breakfast spread.

It's also dangerously addictive.

This shop has been serving "kaymak-ful" breakfasts from its simple storefront breakfasts since 1895. They serve their luscious buffalo milk kaymak (just have a gander at that opening photo), which is made not far from central Istanbul, with a few simple accompaniments -- honey, bread, tomatoes and cucumber, eggs if you like, hot tea or milk.

The goods are served with a smile, and are best enjoyed leisurely at an outdoor table with a bird's-eye view of the comings and goings in old Beşiktaş.

Yedi Sekiz Hasan Pasa, Şehit Asım Caddesi. No 12, Sinanpaşa Mahallesi (neighborhood). Beşiktaş.

The bakery opens around 8:30am and closes in the late evening; the ovens are going all day. Little English is spoken and service can be a bit brusque when the shop is busy, but it's worth girding yourself for a little social discomfort and going for it. Have a good idea of what you want to buy BEFORE you get to the counter. Breads and rolls are purchased by the piece, but biscuits and cookies go by the gram, starting with 100 grams.

Beşiktaş Kaymakci, Koyici Meydani Sokak, Sinanpaşa Mahallesi, Besiktas. Open early in the morning until about 3pm (all-day kaymak-ful breakfasts!).

Sinop: It's Not Just About the Hamsi

"Sinop is paradise, it's the best city in all of Turkey. But not now! You must come back in the summer!"

This we heard over and over from residents of Sinop, where we enjoyed the best hamsi (anchovy) of our most recent trip to Turkey.

Frankly, we can't imagine wanting to return to Sinop in the summer. According to these boosterish locals the city's population of 30,000 bloats to 200,000 in July and August, when tourists descend on its campgrounds and fill its hotels. They come for beaches and sun, boating out of the city's idyllic harbor and, of course, fish.

No way. Not for us. Give us Sinop -- or any of Turkey's ocean or lakeside vacation spots, for that matter -- off season, when hotels are empty, restaurants don't require reservations, empty tables at tea gardens beckon, and the eye isn't assaulted by meters of flesh that shouldn't be seeing the light of day in the first place. For us, crowds are something to be avoided, not sought out.

We were in Sinop for only two days but would gladly have lingered a few more if we'd had the time. To be honest there's not much to do in Turkey's northernost city, but then tourist sites are not what floats our boat anyway. We did visit the city's 7th-century (BC) kale or fortress and, after inquiring for the key at the model boat shop across the street from its entrance, we had the ramparts to ourselves.

We stopped in at Sinop's Seljuk-era mosque and admired its fountain, took a spin through the city's medrese (and wished that we'd known earlier about the small cafe there serving local specialties), walked the U-shaped promenade around its picturesque harbor.

We drank glasses and glasses of tea, dividing our time between the various cay evi (tea houses) and tea gardens that face onto fishing boats awaiting their next trip out: one for grizzled fishermen, another that inexplicably morphed, around mid-afternoon, from old-timers' idling spot to young hipster hangout, and still another that offered free wifi (we didn't take advantage).

We chatted with Sinop's friendly, laid-back residents (another bonus of off-season travel: the unharried locals have time, and the inclination, to talk). We shopped for culinary souvenirs. (found, and carried back to Malaysia: strips tangy peach pestil -- fruit leather -- rolled around chopped fresh walnuts and doused with honey. And, of course, we ate.

Hamsi, mostly. And barbunya, forefinger-long red mullet dusted with flour and deep-fried. After our massive lunch at Mert's we hardly had inclination for dinner. But we did manage to sample two other Sinop specialties: nokul and cevizli mantisi.

Nokul are spiral pastries some 8 inches/20 centimeters across, made with several fillings. Üzmlü ve cevizli nokul hide dried grapes (raisins, obviously, but the raisins in Turkey taste so much more like actual grapes than the raisins in the USA do), chopped walnuts, sugar, and are well lubricated with butter. There's minced lamb in there too, just a wee bit, enough to render this pastry taste-androgynous. Is it sweet or is it savory? Both equally, and intriguingly.

According to this nokul recipe there yogurt and olive oil go into the dough, which is 'wet', soft, elastic, and chewy rather than crisp and flaky. Nokul are not snack-y bites -- they're huge and heavy, and one is easily enough feed 3 or 4 eaters (or 2 gluttons) for breakfast. Other fillings include cheese (peynirli) and plain minced lamb (kıymalı).

We're manti (Turkish 'ravioli') lovers from way back, so when Mert told us about the local version made with walnuts we made straight for his recommended source. Imagine a huge plate of minced lamb-stuffed ravioli (small portions are not found, it seems, in your average Turkish restaurant) tossed in soupspoon fulls of rich freshly churned butter. Add handfuls of crushed walnuts so fresh that they're fairly oozing oil.This meal, our last in Sinop before we hit the road for Kastamonu, nearly put us over the top. But it was well worth the physical discomfort.

Beyond the butter and walnuts (manti are usually sauced with yogurt and melted butter), what's a bit different about Sinop's manti is their shape -- like a boat's sail, as Mert says -- and their skins, which are lighter and thinner (almost like wonton skins) than those of versions we've eaten elsewhere in Turkey.

At Teyzenin Yeri (Your Auntie's Place), the cafe in Sinop known for serving the best cevizli mantisi, the dumplings are made right in the dining room as you eat. Thick yogurt is offered alongside and we accepted. But we left much of it uneaten -- the tanginess of the dairy fought too fiercely with the lovely walnuts and local butter.

So, there's plenty of reason to visit to Sinop, even outside of hamsi season. I know we'll go back.

But not in the summer. No way.