10 Must-Try Dishes That Capture the Essence of Istanbul
A local food writer shares her secret spots in Turkey’s capital for kebap, meze, grilled fish, and more.
This piece originally appeared in SAVEUR’s Spring/Summer 2025 issue. See more stories from Issue 204 here.
The first time I came to Istanbul as a student in the late 1980s, I was instantly hooked on the food. There were dollhouse-like baklava shops, teensy manti dumplings cloaked in yogurt, and green beans braised in olive oil until silky and luscious—a classic preparation known as zeytinyağli. What’s more, meals often came framed by vistas so breathtaking, it felt like the city was a mirage.
Eventually, I bought an apartment in Istanbul, and each visit brings a new quest for the most succulent kebaps, crispiest lahmacun, and plumpest stuffed vegetables. As a quasi-local, I take comfort in knowing that, beneath Istanbul’s picturesque gloss, a deep and codified food culture still thrives—one that my book National Dish explores.
Perhaps as a legacy of Ottoman chef guilds, traditional restaurants here continue to specialize in particular genres. You eat your kebap at a kebapçi (kebap house) along with pomegranate-laced salads. For fish, you go to a balikçi (fish house) by the twilight Bosporus shores. And then there are the meyhanes, boisterous drinking taverns where a mosaic of meze unleashes rivers of raki, Turkey’s signature anise firewater.
This megalopolis of nearly 16 million—straddling two continents and lapped by three different bodies of water—can seem overwhelming to newcomers. But its essential dishes, and my favorite places that serve them, will satisfy your hunger for the best sweets, grills, and street food—and help you uncover less-trodden parts of this magical city.
Dolma at Seraf Vadi
Baked, boiled, or braised in olive oil, dolma (stuffed dishes) and sarma (filled leaves) flourish in Istanbul as something of an edible life force. Savor several kinds at this pilgrimage-worthy restaurant in the northern district of Vadi. Chef Sinem Özler collects regional recipes from across Turkey and refines them with stellar technique and ingredients. Case in point: her delicate sogan dolma—wood-fired onions stuffed with currant-studded rice perfumed with allspice and cinnamon—an old Armenian Istanbul favorite. Or try her chard sarma from the Black Sea region: greens folded around a comforting mixture of bulgur and ricotta-like lor cheese.
Meze at Cibalikapi Balikçisi Haliç
Istanbullus eat their meze at meyhanes, establishments that were run in the Ottoman era by non-Muslim minorities. Today’s offerings are anthologies of Istanbul’s polyglot past: Armenian bean plaki, Albanian liver, Circassian chicken. That heritage is on display at this snug three-story tavern that serves outstanding Armenian topik (a mashed chickpea ball filled with caramelized onions), fish-centric meze like çiroz (cured dried mackerel), and the city’s creamiest tarama dip. The restaurant’s recipe for “Ottoman escabeche”—fried sea bass marinated in vinegar, honey, pine nuts, and 17 spices—comes from a 1748 medical treatise.
Kebap at Çiya Kebap
For an encyclopedic selection of grilled meats from southeastern Turkey, grab a sidewalk table at Çiya Kebap, one of the restaurants (along with Çiya Sofrasi, right across the street) owned by Musa Dağdeviren, the celebrated anthropologist-chef. The rotating roster of some two dozen offerings (usually shaped from hand-minced lamb or beef) features kebaps on a bed of yogurt or smoky mashed eggplant, more kebaps studded with poppy seeds or pistachios, and the recent summer stunner called lahm-i kiraz, a still life of grilled meatballs, baby onions, and cherries. Insider tip: Customers can ask for meze and stews from Çiya Sofrasi to be brought to their Kebap restaurant table.
Lahmacun at Mahir Lokantasi
Along with kebap, lahmacun arrived in Istanbul from the country’s southeast in the mid-20th century. Now, this thin flatbread baked under a tomatoey schmear of ground meat is the fuel of a million lunches and snacks—a local obsession. Ask for it çitir (extra-crispy), then roll it up with lettuce, herbs, and squirts of lemon. For the flatbread’s Platonic ideal, queue for a table at this handsome traditional Osmanbey restaurant run by Kurdish chef-owner Mahir Nazlican. Blistered in a stone oven, Mahir’s ethereally light lahmacun comes topped with minced lamb and a smidgen of beef blended with tomatoes, parsley, and dried chiles, including the smoky isot pepper from Urfa.
Kokoreç at Apartiman Yeniköy
Kokoreç is a gutsy dish of lamb intestines rolled into cylinders around sweetbreads, then roasted or grilled. A favorite hangover remedy, it has remote Byzantine origins and a deep Balkan connection and is claimed by Turks and Greeks alike. For an exalted rendition, head to this charming restaurant in the Yeniköy district. Chef-owner Burçak Kazdal is a former butcher’s apprentice with an appreciation for offal. Starting with a slender suckling lamb kokoreç roll, she roasts it for hours with spices, crisps it in her oak charcoal grill, then sends it out with palate-cleansing accompaniments such as a cacik (yogurt dip) of sour green plums and arugula dressed with pomegranate molasses.
Fish at Lacivert
Under the soaring span of the Second Bosphorus Bridge on the Asian shore, this glamorous waterside spot smartly updates fish house classics: Lakerda (cured bonito) comes with a cute pickle assortment, and a brawny grilled octopus starter is served with fire-singed green beans and asparagus. For the main event, choose something cheffy from the printed menu—say, branzino with mastic-scented eggplant—or pick from the daily catch glistening on ice and have your çipura (sea bream) or levrek (sea bass) expertly grilled. Savor it all as the bridge lights up in the gathering dusk while white ferries glide by and the evening air turns salty and bracing.
Syrian Sweets at Sultan Tatlisi
Behold ghraybeh bi ashta, a miraculous pastry with a scallop-edged shell giving way to a luscious center of clotted cream (ashta). This treat—plus the crumbly date-filled ma’amoul cookies, cheese-oozing knafeh, syrup-doused semolina confections, and many iterations of baklava—are on display at the pastry shops in Istanbul’s Fatih district, where Syrian exiles have been opening businesses since the start of their country’s ruinous civil war. My current favorite bakery is this upmarket chain with several Istanbul branches. Try their halawet el-jibn, a fluffy roll of semolina cheese dough stuffed with more cheese and ashta—a cult treat of exile nostalgia.
Crispy Artichokes at Hodan
One joy of being in Istanbul in spring is watching enginar (artichoke) vendors speed-peel their ’chokes to set them bobbing on display in tubs of vinegar water. Usually, these knifeworks end up in a zeytinyağli—braised in olive oil along with carrots and peas. But chef Çiğdem Seferoğlu had a better idea; at Hodan, her glamorous Beyoğlu restaurant, she fries the artichoke bottoms tempura-style, then serves them in a green shock of blanched peas and fresh herbs drizzled in lemony olive oil sauce. To find the best artichokes, Seferoğlu follows the harvest from Turkish Cyprus to the Aegean to the fertile Sakarya province, getting them at their seasonal prime.
Mussels at Biz Istanbul
Shiny mussels hawked from steel trays are a quintessential Istanbul street food, usually sold by Kurdish vendors near chaotic ferry terminals. For something more elegant, claim a bar stool at Biz Istanbul, a new restaurant perched atop the Ataturk Cultural Center in Taksim Square, and order the midye dolma (stuffed mussels) with an Armenian-style filling sweet and aromatic with slow-cooked onions and cinnamon. There are also terrific fried mussels—a Greek Istanbul specialty—served on toast with dabs of creamy tarator sauce. Eat your way through the bar menu while watching the sun set over the Bosphorus—an essential dining experience in this hedonistic city of sweeping vistas.
Bal Kaymak Breakfast at Boris’in Yeri
Before Istanbul breakfasts evolved into today’s extravaganzas, morning meals were simpler affairs that often revolved around the iconic combo of honey (bal) drizzled over rich clotted cream (kaymak) thick enough to cut with a knife. Founded by a Bulgarian dairy merchant named Boris in 1936 in the Kumkapi district, Boris’in Yeri peddles in nostalgia and the city’s definitive kaymak, made using water buffalo milk sourced from small farms and served in a puddle of thick Black Sea honey. There are farm-fresh eggs, too, fried with kavurma (braised beef) or scrambled with stewed tomatoes and peppers. Follow suit as elderly regulars stir honey into their glasses of warm milk.
Getting There
Turkish Airlines flies to more countries than any other carrier on earth, which makes Istanbul an easy city to visit wherever you’re based. It is often ranked by Skytrax as one of the world’s top 10 airlines, and its flexible Istanbul layover program includes complimentary hotel stays and city tours, an uncommon perk well worth cashing in on.
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