if you are lucky you will still come across
local apple varieties, indigenous fruit and
honey, and traditional ways of preparing
kebab, fish and bread that have been
passed down the generations and vary
from region to region.
The big cities served as a melting pot for
these traditions. This is to be expected
in Istanbul, a city that has been a
crossroads of successive civilizations
and a magnet for migrants from across
Turkey and middle Asia. Every group
added their own flavours to the culinary
pot. Istanbul has truly become a world
culinary capital, where newer and
more upscale restaurants are acting as
havens for both culinary conservation
and experimentation, with young chefs
putting traditional ingredients to good
use.
You don’t have to visit the 21 provinces of
Turkey to sample the regional tastes. At
Kanaat restaurant (the name means ‘to be
contented with little’) on the Asian side
of the Bosphorous you can eat lamb in
several regional styles on the same plate,
with vegetables cooked in olive oil, while
being entranced by the views back across
the bay to one of the world’s greatest
cities. Or try the chicken vermicelli soup,
Kebab in pastry, meatballs with lemon
sauce, lamb in béchamel sauce, braised
beef, aubergine moussakka and hariko
beans in olive oil. “Cooking is not done by
a recipe, but with the soul,” the founder
Vahdettin Kargılı once said. “What you
need is not good ingredients but morals.”
Today, Turkish Airlines’ in-flight catering
firm, Do & Co, offers a mix of Turkish and
International hand-prepared meals from
their kitchens near Ataturk airport.
It took a while for Turkish chefs to become
confident about serving Turkish food.
When Turkish Airlines started flying, it only
offered international cuisine. Now Do&Co,
the acclaimed catering firm responsible
for Turkish Airlines’ in-flight catering offer
a mix of Turkish and international, lovingly
hand prepared at their kitchens near
Ataturk airport.
“Our policy is to serve local food using
local ingredients,” Bugu Karatas of Do
& Co says, “and we find International
passengers love our Turkish food.” Turkish
cuisine has been growing in confidence,
especially with the dishes most closely
associated with the country. Meat stews
in terracotta pots, oven-baked lamb
Buğu Kebabı, köftes, stuffed dolmas, Kuru
fasulye, meatballs in egg lemon sauce
and dough-based desserts are now more
widely recognised, in no small part to
the strength of Turkish Airlines and the
company’s global reach.
The new confidence is firing up the
kitchens of Istanbul and Izmir, and the
more cosmopolitan resorts. The Turkis