The best Fusion Menu in istanbul, Turkey
 

Although I am usually banned from reading, writing and printing anything related to food by my family, friends and dietician(s) , i managed to get away this one time to post some selections from the tasting menu of a very special restaurant in Istanbul.

The owners and the chefs are intellectual, curious, creative, and meticulous.

- Beetroot and Swiss Chard Soup
- Quail egg with aioli and salad of micro spice greens with orange vinaigrette
- Beef and pineapple shish kebab
- Antakya salty noodles with beef ribs and gremolata
- smoked duck, white cheese and celeriac pickle Spring Roll with tamarind sauce
- sea bass with creamy basil sauce, accompanied by red turnip and apple leather studded with hazelnuts.
- sorbet of Isabella grapes from the Black Sea
-Tahini chocolate truffle

There are more items, but i have to close, because my wife has just come in the room, and i have a very strange urge to visit the kitchen. :)

Hopefully, the reader will realize that there are those who are continueing the Ottoman tradition of serving "delicate tastes for delicate (less than 20 stone) people."

Maybe I'm a little slow.....
is this the food served in your home (if so, please send me your address and let me know when I can come for dinner!!!) or did you forget to list the name of this restaurant?

Wasn't this restaurant the one featured on the most recent episode of Anthony Bourdain's NO RESERVATIONS? I can't remember the name, either, but was mesmerized by the segment!

Interesting, you should ask. :)

I do not like to advertise or promote on the forums, but i guess i should give some more hints and additional info:

- The tasting menu is listed at TL96. From past experience , this should be enough for not very hungry two people to share, with maybe one additional entree or dessert. A medium price but good quality wine, Doluca Kav, should be about TL70 per bottle.

- The restaurant has two locations, one very close to Taksim, at Siraselviler Street, and the other one at the Sabanci Museum, in Emirgan, on the Bosphorus.

- I am actually planning a web site and similar fusion menus to very well-off visitors, who are willing to pay for eating in an atypical Turkish home with a panoramic Bosphorus view, while conducting a conversation on literature, history, antiquity, art, politics, finance, economy, architecture, insurance, child rearing, marriage, fortune telling, ethics, philosophy, travel planning, diverse cultures, instincts, persian cats, bypass operations, cure for carpal tunnel syndrome without operation or costly physiotherapy, etc.

If you have managed to read this far, the name of the restaurant appears in the following essay, published in my book (sold at Amazon US):

WONDER TO WONDER



I have wondered, always, whether I would find things to wonder about when I ripen or grow.

One of my favorite wonderings was this:

“If I find and buy the smell of love in a tightly stoppered bottle, in an old shop in a new mall, as in all the stories of bottles found in magical, mystical shoppes, will I immediately open the bottle or keep it as it is? That is, will I keep it till the need for love grows dim, but knowing that the smell will still be fresh; as fresh as the day it was bottled so long ago, when the decision to save it was made, just like other indecisions.”

This wondering is not much of a favorite among the aged or younger selves, themselves being parts of the wonderings.

I wondered a new and more fashionable wondering (or was it the unearthing of an old one?), just the other day, while daydreaming seemed an unnecessary and maybe an unattainable luxury, as it happens to appear to be, more and more these days:

“My falcon eyes did not notice any of the cogniscenty in the building or on the terrace, so that I might invite a few to share the touch, the taste and the music. It must be that all the bright, knowing, artistic, connoisseurring ones are in hiding these days, in this time frame and location. Even a taste of Rodin was limited to our table in Changa, and seemed to be under constant threat by the siegers or defenders of Constantinople and Vienna. ‘Why should one wonder about this when the Rodin exhibition and exquisite food was meters and minutes away?’ was the wondering of the day.”


Ahmet C. Celebiler

It is of'course customary to offer free trials to connoisseurs before the establishment opens its doors to the public. So you are welcome, to join us for dinner, with your children for a sample.
18 June, 2006

okay, I give up. I just found this entry as I reach the final flight path for our visit to Turkey in a couple of weeks (one week after our son's wedding). I looked on Amazon but Wonder to Wonder is not there. I'd really love to know the restaurant with such an interesting menu. Sounds like great fun for the taste buds.
Please share the secret name!

Thanks Mediatorr,

The name of the restaurant is "Changa". Their original location is very near Taksim, on Siraselviler Street. The other one with a somewhat different menu, and also a scrumptious breakfast, on weekends i think, is at Sabanci Museum, at Emirgan, on the Bosphorus, next to the Emirgan Park.

My book is called "dreams and Perception" or "Dusler ve Gorusler" in Turkish. Wonder to Wonder is one of the few pieces in English in the book. there are all together only 14 pieces in English. the rest are in Turkish. but there are also lovely photographs taken by my wife, cartoons drawn by a reasonably famous cartoonist and a few drawings by my architect daughters.

we are now at our getaway on iznik (Nicea) lake and the laptop does not have everything, but will give you the webshots adress of my wife's Mardin photos and prsentation, sunday evening.

She also posted her Mardin presentation on youtube *her name is Eser Celebiler.