I’ve come to Istanbul to understand my roots, but while I’m here I meet people who are planting new ones. One evening I zip past fluttering flags celebrating a century of Turkish independence to meet Anya von Bremzen, author of the recent book National Dish, which explores the relationship between nationalism and food. She’s offered to take me on a tour of Little Syria, part of the historic Fatih neighborhood. Approximately 3.3 million Syrians have crossed into Turkey since 2011, and more than 532,000 live in Istanbul. Not unlike in America, anti-migrant sentiment is on the rise across Turkey, just as the new arrivals have begun impacting the culture of their adopted home.
We spend a few hours traversing stores and restaurants lined with buckets of Syrian pistachios, vats of tahini that we sample, stacks of silver tea trays, and baskets of dried roses. At the shoebox-size Buuzecedi, which was transplanted here straight from Damascus, an Arabic soap opera plays on the television as we order fatteh—a Levantine dish packed with crispy pita bread, chickpeas, tahini, and pistachios, and topped with ghee—along with a basket of falafel. You can find this dish in Syria, but also in Palestine, Egypt, and Lebanon; it transcends the artificial borders that were drawn and redrawn during and after the fall of the Ottoman Empire. It reminds me of my own connections to Syria. My great-grandmother was born in Damascus; another ancestor was its governor.
Much of my family in this part of the world now lives in Arnavutköy and Bebek, two tranquil, moneyed neighborhoods that creep up from the Bosphorus into the hills. The colorful wood houses and fishing boats bobbing on the water take me straight back to the ’90s—long, hot afternoons filled with walks to the ice cream parlor with my dad and great-uncle Korkut, who owned a talking parrot, and evenings spent running around with my cousins while the adults drank wine and smoked on the terrace of the family home.
I go to Arnavutköy to visit jewelry designer Rafael Indiana Cemo Çetin at his studio, a beautiful appointment-only space inside an old Ottoman building with high ceilings and kilims thrown casually over wood floorboards. Çetin, who starts his mornings by jumping into the Bosphorus for a swim (“like in the Amalfi”), recently moved back to Istanbul to start his own brand after a stint as a filmmaker in New York. He bases his designs, which have already been picked up by cult label Maryam Nassir Zadeh, on ancient coins he finds in the “underbelly” of the Grand Bazaar. He has these discoveries engraved by an artisan in Adana, where my dad played as a child, near the epicenter of the 2023 quake. “One piece of jewelry goes through a life of processes,” he says.
Later I have my drinks date with Dilber and my cousin at Bebek Hotel by the Stay, a beloved (and recently spruced-up) 1950s property on the water. The early-fall weather is pleasantly cool, a breeze carrying the call to prayer below the hum of party boats. Inevitably we drink too much, and Dilber and I end up running late for dinner with her boyfriend, Fatih Tutak, who has promised to walk us through the menu at his new restaurant, Gallada, on the roof of the Peninsula. Rush hour traffic is at a standstill, so Dilber calls a water taxi. Suddenly we’re flying along the Bosphorus, icons like the Dolmabahçe Palace flashing past us. Our driver keeps one hand on the wheel and the other on his phone. This is how you get to dinner Istanbul-style.
The 39-year-old Tutak, whose Gallada is the only two-Michelin-starred restaurant in Turkey, has brought many traditional Turkish recipes into a fine-dining setting for the first time. His debut restaurant, Turk Fatih Tutak, opened in 2019 to great acclaim, so Gallada has been majorly hyped. Dinner is a glitzy Istanbul night out with a crowd to match, the food an adventurous fusion of familiar Turkish flavors with far-flung ones that Tutak discovered during restaurant stints across Asia. It’s part ode to the Silk Road, part nod to the Peninsula’s long history in Hong Kong. No good Turkish meal is complete without lamb, and there’s plenty of it here, from the shashlık kebab sprinkled with shavings of vinegar-soaked red onion to my favorite, the Adana kebab dumpling, an unexpected play on a classic southern dish, grilled on an open mangal, which my dad grew up eating. There are other memorable bites, like tiny skinless tomatoes soaked in yuzu that we pop into our mouths like candy and a warm Medjool-date cake soaked with masala tea.
