Food Tour! -- Istanbul, Turkey

Monday. Monday was the day I’d been looking forward to for a very long time. When Cathy had started researching her trip to Istanbul, she wrote that perhaps we could take a food tour together on one of the afternoons.

A food TOUR? That is the fantasy of all fantasies. A food tour in ISTANBUL? I think my brain (or my stomach) just exploded from too much happy.

Cathy knows that I’m broke. She is well aware of the fact that I am trying to make a few thousand dollars (the very bottom rung of few, mind you) last two more years. So she has been strikingly generous on this trip. She pays for my coffee, for my meals for my museum entrance fees. I thank her and she smiles warmly and says, “you’re the guide.”

So. Before I continue with this post and get sucked into the seductive world of Turkish cuisine, I want to publicly thank my wonderful friend, Cathy Kelleher, for her heartwarming generosity and for sharing her playful and adventurous spirit with me. You make a damn fine travel buddy (kanka, in Turkish) and anyone should consider himself or herself lucky to get good and lost with you.

Monday morning dawned cold. It was the coldest it’s been in Istanbul since before Christmas (when every blog post had at least two paragraphs wherein I whined about my aching joints). I sat in the breakfast room and cupped my drip coffee between my cold hands. The rest of the week was forecasted to be bitterly cold, windy and rainy.

Of course. The one time my friend visits from – ARGH! Aimee, please try to remember that the weather does not know you exist. It would behave this way regardless of whether or not your friend from Colorado was visiting.

I munched, crunched on a succulent dried fig.

At least Cathy had two warm days.

As a long-term traveler, I always feel incredibly sorry (not in a condescending way – just in an “oof... that’s so unfortunate” way) for those who only have a short period of time to spend in a given place. I’m able to experience ups and downs, rain and shine – but the short-term traveler might just get rain. Or might just get down.

I’m afraid that Cathy experienced quite a bit of “rain” whilst in Istanbul.

The food tour commenced at nine-thirty in front of a restaurant called “Hamdi” near the Eminönü tram station. Because I wasn’t exactly sure where the restaurant was and because we were not going to be late, we left our hotel at about eight thirty. We found the Hamdi restaurant right off the bat (I’m glad I don’t have to explain that idiom to my native English readers) and sat down for a cup of çay while we waited.

First food tour ever. I wonder how it will compare to the rest of the food I’ve eaten over the past two months.

Cathy paid the bill and then we stood outside to keep an eye out for our guide.

“It’s... so... c-c-c-cold...” my teeth chattered as I stated the glaringly obvious.

Ugur arrived at nine thirty on the dot and the rest of the group followed behind. A young German couple (from a part of Germany I haven’t visited) and an American couple working for Ebay in Switzerland. It was invigorating to be able to talk to so many energetic, adventurous Americans.

There’s something about the attitude of adventurous, traveling Americans that really appeals to me. Maybe it’s because we share so much. Sense of humor, passion for learning through travel -- I feel like I can connect with them without having to try. It’s effortless. And effortless connection gives me a sense of belonging.

The Americans were dressed in very flimsy garments for such chilly weather.

“We’re leaving for Africa tomorrow,” the girl explained. “We didn’t want to pack too many warm things just for Istanbul. We’re regretting it now...”

Our first stop was in a covered hall in front of a teashop. Ugur purchased olives, dried figs, dried apricots, dried mulberries (at Cathy’s request), buffalo kaymak drizzled with honey and nuts. We sat down in front of a makeshift table covered with a brown packing paper tablecloth – someone made a joke about a five-star restaurant, but I wasn’t listening. I was too busy looking at the cheese. He provided the rest of the guests with regular bread and offered me some rye, hoping it would be gluten-free. I informed the well meaning Ugur that rye does indeed contain gluten and happily demolished my cheese as I normally do – in giant forkfuls.

“Pace yourselves,” Ugur warned us. “We have ten stops.”

I ignored him and took another large bite of buffalo cheese.

“Now, would you like coffee or tea?” Ugur thoughtfully eyed the disappearing kaymak.

I ordered a Turkish coffee with a small amount of sugar and grinned when one of the Americans ordered a medium amount of sugar.

Rookie move. He’s going to regret that.

We drank our hot beverages and I longed for a cup large enough to warm up my frigid hands. When I reached the grounds, I placed the saucer over the top of my diminutive cup, swirled three times and turned it upside down. The other coffee drinkers forgot to turn their cups upside down, so the waiter made off with them.

In Istanbul, a waiter will never take a coffee cup that’s been turned topsy-turvy. That would be like stealing your fortune.

“Can you read fortunes?” I asked Ugur.

“No, but if you’ve been here for two months, you should be able to.”

“I know there’s an app for it. You take a picture of your coffee and submit it. The program processes the grounds and then sends you your fortune in about five minutes. Some of the highschoolers who couldn’t read the fall themselves did that for me.”

I didn’t know how to read the fortune myself and improvisation has never been my strong suit, so Cathy grabbed Ugur’s cup and predicted that he would become king of Turkey. My cup had a cave in it, so we decided that I would visit Cappadocia at some point. This is the first fortune that I actually agree with. No babies or marriage. Win!

After we’d finished our tea, we walked a short distance through the bitter cold to a restaurant where the rest of the group ate lentil soup, but since a roux had been used in the base, I ate meneme. Cathy adored her soup, complimenting the flavorful broth and talking about how great it is when something so simple tastes so good.

Meneme and lentil soup finished, I huddled close to my friend (for love and for warmth) on the way to the next stop. The rest of the group ate a batter fried meat dumpling called Icli Köfte. I ate dried eggplant skins reconstituted and stuffed with rice. Mine was nice, but it looked like Cathy was enjoying her köfte more.

I will not be sad I’m celiac. Will NOT be sad. I can eat cheese all f*cking day. And bacon. Who needs any stupid icli köfte?

 There are many times when I try so hard to be mature that my inner-monologue is surprisingly, unpleasantly infantile.

We drank more tea to warm ourselves, ate some helva crumbs (a sweet made from tahini and sugar) and reluctantly returned to the cold.

I’m going to be using the word “cold” a lot in this post.

Cold. Frigid. Biting. Bitter. Glacial. Icy. Frosty. Hostile. NASTY.

All these words could be used together to describe the weather. As I am a nice person, I will try to use only one or two at a time as opposed to the whole lot. But when I use one or two, try to keep all of them in your head.

Cold. Frigid. Biting. Bitter. Glacial. Icy. Frosty. Hostile. NASTY.

At this point, the shivering Americans spoke up, saying that they really loved the tour but were perishing from cold. As they had come dressed for Africa and all that. I wanted to call them pansies, but my mouth froze around the word and I decided that simply feeling sad that they were leaving was adequate.

“Come to at least one more stop,” Ugur pleaded. “I can at least send you off with something sweet.”

The American Swiss acquiesced and we were led into a baklava restaurant where the rest of the group nibbled at three different flavors of pistachio, syrupy goodies and Ugur explained the intensive training process baklava makers must undergo. I had expected to sit quietly and watch the group enjoy their dessert, but Ugur surprised me with a package of gluten-free baklava he had found at a firin near Karakoy.

I was ecstatic.

“This is like getting to try pizza in Italy!” I squealed my delight through mouthfuls of mixed nuts. “Now I get to eat baklava in Istanbul.”

I’m sure my excitement appeared excessive and out of place, but I don’t care. I ate four pieces of baklava (continuing to ignore Ugur’s “pace yourself” warning) and sat back with a sigh of contentment. 

People couldn't keep their bloody hands out of the picture. Not that I could blame them.

Gluten-free Baklava!

So awesome. Awesome equals great equals good equals amazing equals yes please, more baklava.

Maybe I’m not the best English teacher ever.

The Americans decided to stay with us if we were able to rush from place to place and spend the majority of the time sheltered from the cold inside eateries. None of us argued.

Next tasty tidbit? Turkish pide.  Cheese and sausage and fresh tomatoes and glutinous dough. This is where I didn’t get to eat anything, but it was fun to watch the chef deftly toss and stretch and pound the pastry into the traditional boat shape. I liked listening to the German man fret about whether he had enough room left to accommodate lunch and I liked cuddling up to Cathy in the upstairs dining room.

I’m really going to miss this lady when she leaves.

 Moving slowly now, we trundled to a Turkish Delight shop where other syrupy sweets were also sold. I’ve never been a fan of Turkish Delight (tasting the morsel was such a letdown after reading how much Edmund loved it in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe), but this was quite a bit better than the version I tried in America. The rosewater flavored bite tasted like an entire bottle of perfume instead of a mist someone had sprayed ten minutes before to cover up something foul. We sucked on hard candied to remove the harsh perfume from our mouths and then re-zipped our jackets and braced ourselves for the wind.

For the past two months, I’ve been seeing some chunky yellow drink called “boza” in front of cafés and near the checkout in supermarkets. I never bought a whole bottle because I wasn’t ready to commit to that much chunkiness, but I’ve been dreadfully curious about this strange, cold winter drink for a long while now. Hence, I was thrilled when Ugur stopped in front of a famous boza shop near the spice market.

Boza is sprinkled with cinnamon and dotted with roasted chickpeas. Roasted chickpeas are far from tasty, but the sweet spice was a nice touch.

I shouldn’t have worried about committing myself to a whole bottle.

“It tastes alive!” I turned to Cathy in wonder after licking the half-pudding/half-drink off my dessertspoon. 

“Mmm....it’s sour and bubbly,” others chimed in.

“It’s fermented millet,” the guide contributed. “People used to take it around the city in carts – like simit and sahlep – but now you can only buy it in shops.”

“And why is it a winter drink? It seems too cold for winter.”

“Because they needed the cold for fermentation and storage in Ottoman times when the drink was invented. We could drink it in the summer now, but since it is our tradition to drink it in the winter, we drink it in the winter. It is also supposed to have many medicinal benefits -- ”

Most things that taste alive have medicinal benefits...

“ – balances blood pressure, gives more milk to woman who are lactating, helps with digestion and contains many vitamins.” 

It also enlarges your breasts, I finished reading the sign by the door. Maybe I was right not to commit to a whole bottle. 

This is a seriously old drink, originating in Mesopotamia 8000 – 9000 years ago. When the Ottomans invaded Turkey in the 13^th century, they kindly contributed this fermented beverage to the local cuisine. Vefa Boza is celiac friendly because it’s made of millet, but those with gluten-sensitivities should abstain from boza whilst traveling through the Balkans. I was deeply saddened to learn from Wikipedia that the Albanian version of this effervescent pudding is made of corn and wheat. 

Oh well... just means I’ll have to appreciate it now. I’m sure Albania will have plenty of tasty things besides boza.

At this point, I was stuffed. My stomach was nigh exploding with Turkish Delight and boza and gluten-free baklava and hard candy and kaymak and tea and coffee and helva and...

Don’t think about it, Bourget. Best to just not think about it, I patted my belly. Just one more meal -- hang in there, guy. I believe in you.

“Are you ready for lunch?” asked Ugur. The Germans looked terrified. Cathy looked interested. The Americans looked cold.

I’m sure I looked like a combination of the three.

Our final meal was kuzu tandir – lamb slow-cooked over coals. We were served cucumber, pepper, tomato and parsley salad with pomegranate molasses, traditional Ayran, turnip/purple carrot juice (which just tasted like pickle juice), coffee and kunefe (kunefe is a sweet cheese dessert covered with bread, so I just ate more gluten-free baklava).

A meal stuffed with rice, lamb, dried fruit and nuts. It is a traditional wedding dish and is supposed to symbolize the whole package. Your marriage will contain good and bad, sweet and bitter -- like this mountain of fried rice contains meat and rice, fruit and nuts.

Slow roasted lamb!

A spicy dip covered with oil and pomegranate molasses

Shepherds salad.

Kunefe -- a sugary, bready, cheesy dessert

Traditional ayran. Not as good as I wanted it to be.

Where one goes to get gluten-free baklava!

What a prodigious amount of good food.

We walked downstairs (with difficulty) and parted ways. Cathy and I wandered through the Spice Bazaar -- 

-- and then stood in the long line (I propped myself up against the wall whenever possible) where Turks and tourists alike purchase good coffee and sahlep. 

As the day was numbingly cold, we spent most of the evening confined to the warmth of our peculiar hotel room near the Blue Mosque. Cathy wrote home and I worked on my blog. There was something oddly comforting about sharing a room with another woman writing home.

I’m not the only one who has to write to find connection.

There was a quick venture into the Grand Bazaar -- 

-- but our chattering teeth and numb fingers soon got the better of us and we scurried back to the Hotel Spectra. Where we drank a cocktail, I believe.