54 Best Restaurants in Turkey

At this waterfront restaurant, you should begin your meal with a selection of meze, like stuffed zucchini flowers, roasted eggplant with tulum cheese, and octopus salad. Then you can let the owner, Cengiz Bey, or his waiters help you select the best local fish for the grill. Whatever you choose, don't skip dessert: Gaziantep baklava or irmik helvası (traditional warm semolina halvah) served with ice cream.

Excellent coffees, detox juices, herbal teas, croissants or healthy sour-bread breakfasts, vegan dishes, German-style baked cakes, cookies, and desserts are served in this bright yellow corner cafe on the traffic road leading away from the Bodrum Marina. A breakfast Bellini is possible, as it is licensed for alcohol service. The team also creates the Munchbox takeout or delivery boxes of savory or sweet platter nibbles.

This lovely restaurant on the waterfront specializes not only in fresh fish, seafood, and meze but also serves an excellent summer brunch. Tables are only a few feet from the peaceful waters of the bay, with a truly romantic view of the ancient ruins of Rabbit Island, often with a soft breeze. The waitstaff are cheery and attentive, and though the kitchen has been refurbished almost beyond recognition, it retains a 300-year-old hearth from when it served as the bakery for the surrounding villages.

What was once the house of a prosperous Greek merchant is now a fine restaurant specializing in regional grilled lamb dishes. The wine cellar has more than 12,000 bottles, including a good selection of Turkish wines. The Turkish breakfast, served until 2 pm, is also popular. On hot summer days, you can take refuge in the cool basement; at night, the restaurant lights the abandoned buildings all around, creating an atmosphere that is romantic or spooky, depending on your take. Unusually, free transportation is available to and from hotels in the Fethiye/Ölüdeniz area.

Forget the printed menu and order from the meze case, where the wide range of tempting starters includes unusual mushrooms from the mountains out back, fresh seaweed dishes, and squid in garlic, oil, and lemon. Özcan's mains are predominantly seafood but there are also excellent kebabs and local lamb dishes. It's set on the wide esplanade that makes up Göcek's main public harbor.

Every Turkish village has a fırın: a tasty, unpretentious bakery that churns out a daily bounty of smooth puddings, flaky pastries, fresh bread, and sweets. The amazing thing about this one is that it's survived in the heart of touristy Kaleiçi—and with reasonable prices, and friendly service. Options include spicy spinach börek and incirli cevizli muhallebisi, a delectable milk pudding flavored with local figs and walnuts.

This large Turkish restaurant near the Ephesus Museum has an equally large menu, focusing on grilled meats, but also including pide, meze, salads, breakfast, and some specialty desserts. There are also some daily specials, such as slow-roasted lamb on Fridays. Beer, wine, and rakı are available to accompany the well-prepared dishes.

This very popular bakery in hip Alsancak serves up probably the broadest selection you’ll find of boyoz, a round flaky pastry with Sephardic roots that’s these days almost unique to İzmir. Get yours savory or sweet, or perhaps with a hard-boiled egg on the side in traditional style. Go early for the best selection, and you might even get a gevriği, the İzmir version of the Turkish circular simit.

With ornate Arabesque decorations and mosaic lamps, this centrally located café is an atmospheric place to spend a long morning. The picturesque breakfast spread is expansive and includes a mixture of Turkish and Lebanese dishes. Arada has two other outposts, one a five-minute walk up the hill from this one and the other in Üsküdar.

This charming outdoor café and restaurant is just a five-minute walk from the Priene ruins and features a shaded, leafy atmosphere with gazebos and picnic tables. The menu consists of classic Turkish staples and the specialty is gözleme: savory crepes stuffed with either potato, spinach, or cheese.

Hearty traditional Turkish soups, stews, and meat and vegetable dishes are arrayed buffet-style at this cheery lokanta (a casual home-style eatery), which is always bustling at lunchtime. At the top of Alaçatı village near the minibus stop, it offers a reasonably priced and reliable alternative to the increasingly expensive fare found farther into town.

In good weather, the place to sit is the stone-lined terrace with wooden picnic tables that look over the mountains and the waterfall. The kitchen turns out trout and local dishes such as stuffed cabbage and turşu kavurması (roasted pickled vegetables), as well as meat options, and serves an open buffet breakfast every day.

Alongside a 16th-century hammam in downtown Bergama, this casual room serves around 20 dishes—stews, casseroles, grilled meats, and soups (fewer options are available at dinnertime). Try the kadın budu köfte (ground meat mixed with rice and parsley and lightly fried in egg batter) and the kemalpaşa, a traditional sweet served with kaymak (clotted cream) and tahini, for dessert. No alcohol is served. Restrooms are outside.

Almost opposite the Antalya Museum, but hidden a little down the hill towards the sea, this restaurant may well have the best view in town from its beautiful stone wall terrace. The menu focuses on usual fare—meat, pasta, pizza, and burgers—and regulars praise the steak. Owned by an Antalyan former basketball player (aka the Big Man), it's a popular place for locals to come for a special meal. 

A humble and hospitable spot for a quick bite on your way to or from the beach and ruins, this simple, open-air eatery offers a wide range of gözleme (a stuffed Turkish crepe), including those with less-common fillings like eggplant and cheese or chicken with walnuts, as well as sweet options. You can also get egg dishes, meatballs, chicken kebabs, and other standard fare.

This busy harborside fish restaurant is popular with Göcek locals and visitors alike, and is considered an institution of the town. In summer, the seating extends out toward the waterfront, under tropical trees and with romantic views of the water. Main dishes (kebabs, steak, seafood) are typical, but the pride of the menu is its wide selection of hot and cold meze. The homemade bread is delicious, and wild mountain mushrooms are served as a side dish in spring and fall.

Stopping here for pide (Turkish-style pizza or calzones, piled with a variety of ingredients that can include cheese, spinach, meat, or egg) is a highlight of a trip to Ilıca and a great choice for a quick lunch, or even breakfast, though on the pricey side compared to similar fare elsewhere. The menu also includes kebabs, soup, pizza, and traditional Turkish desserts.

The Ottoman motifs seem a bit touristy, but the place is done up nicely, in the peaceful, open-air courtyard of an old house, shaded by a towering grapefruit tree. Eski Ev ("old house" in Turkish) serves a wide selection of Turkish meze and main dishes, including some nice choices for vegetarians. The restaurant's specialty is a delicious concoction of lamb, vegetables, and rice, served on a copper dish with its own tiny flame beneath. 

From late-night soup to early morning breakfasts, pide to full plates of grilled kebabs and döner kebabs, everything here is served fast and efficiently in a very clean restaurant that's popular with local families and all age groups. No alcohol is served. It's open 24 hours in summer, and late hours into winter.

A few blocks north of the fray, Flash attracts more locals than tourists and survives on word of mouth. It’s known for soups, steaks, kebabs, and meat stews cooked in a clay pot (kiremit); it also makes delicious oven-fired pide and lahmacun (wafer-thin spiced-meat flatbread). Come ravenously hungry, and you may have room for a dessert of künefe, a rich confection of cheese, strands of stringy pastry, and sugar syrup sprinkled with pistachio.

Part of a new wave of small cafés, craft shops, restaurants, and antiques dealers popping up in the atmospheric but long-neglected neighborhood of Balat, Forno distinguishes itself with owner Yona Grunberg’s short, high-quality menu of freshly prepared pides, pizzas, salads, and soups. With its brightly colored geometric tiles, exposed-brick walls, and large wooden communal table, this is an equally pleasant place to just relax for a while over a coffee or tea, and the weekend breakfast gets raves.

Tour groups often fill this restaurant at dinner for good reason: the food is both delicious and inexpensive, a combination that also makes it popular with locals at lunch. The restaurant also offers a nice, traditional Turkish breakfast. Expect all the usual Turkish dishes, plus local specialties including soups, stews, and börek pastries.

The specialty of the house at this simple eatery on the boardwalk in Türkbükü is large, rather greasy portions of çiğ böreği, a Crimean dish brought to Turkey that consists of flat, fried pastry stuffed with ground beef, onion, and spices. One of the few unpretentious (and relatively inexpensive) places left on the Türkbükü shoreline, this place has a beach-hut vibe, its own little patch of sand, and a family clientele.

The largest and one of the most popular branches of this local chain of chic eateries is directly on the waterfront, with stylish furnishings and two enormous open-air terraces. The international menu ranges from starters like Asian-style crispy chicken fingers and salmon ceviche to main-course salads, pastas, pizzas, steaks, and the signature house burger.

Little-consumed most other places in Turkey, hummus is a mainstay of the Antakya diet, and the old town is full of tiny, no-frills shops serving up little else, often as a filling breakfast. Jolly İbrahim, a hummus “usta” (master), who learned his trade in Lebanon, makes everything from scratch—even grinding the sesame seeds for his own tahini. Orders come with pillowy bread and an array of spicy peppers and pickles.

Attached to a pansiyon of the same name near the entrance to town, this casual restaurant offers an assortment of grilled meats and home-cooked dishes as well as meze and gözleme (Turkish-style crepes). Meals are served in a pleasantly tree-shaded, plant-filled courtyard decorated with brightly colored hanging lamps, some made out of dried gourds. The entrance and wall are so colorful it is a popular spot for posing for photos by day-trippers.

This popular, cozy hangout, named after famous Turkish photographer Ara Güler, whose black-and-white photographs of Istanbul line the walls, is a nice place for a light meal or cup of coffee. The menu includes several Turkish meat dishes along with more international fare, such as grilled entrecôte (sirloin) steak with fries or tagliatelle with salmon.

With a prime spot right on the beach, Karakuş is a beautiful spot to enjoy any time of day—and if you spend 500 TL on food, you'll get sunbed and umbrella use for free. The mezes, grilled fish, and oven-fresh flatbreads are delightful, and the beachfront scene is serene.

This popular spot just opposite the Ayasofya serves soups, beans with sliced Turkish pastrami and rice, and typical home-style dishes. The işkembe (tripe soup) is probably best only for those who are into experimenting—you'll either hate it or love it. The atmosphere is a notch above most eateries of this type. The place opens early, at 5 am, but don't plan on a late dinner—it closes at 8 pm.