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Features - Category Archive

Nov 30
Monday

Istanbul’s Top 5 Street Foods: #5 – The Galata Cucumber Man

Filed under Features

The Cucumber Man of Galata -- photo by Jonathan Lewis

Editor’s note: This week Istanbul Eats is celebrating Istanbul’s vibrant (and sometimes plain wacky) street food scene with a highly subjective look at five of our favorite street foods and some of the best places to get them. We’ll be writing about a different food every day, so join us as we work our way up to #1 on Friday.

We’ve never learned his name and at this time of the year he is probably preparing for his winter hibernation. But we eagerly await the reappearance in the spring of the vendor we know simply as the “cucumber man of Galata” (pictured above, smoking), a chubby fellow with Coke-bottle glasses who sells what may be the city’s simplest, yet most satisfying street food: peeled and salted cukes, a fresh green rebuke to all those starchy and fried snacks out there. Continue…

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All entries filed under Features


Istanbul Top 10 (Take One)
3 responses - Posted 11.09.09
We were asked by the World Foodie Guide, a great blog that is a wonderful resource for all things food-related, to submit an Istanbul "top 10" list. You can read our guest post here. continue
Döner: Heavy Rotation
1 response - Posted 10.16.09
Editor’s note: This guest post was written by Atilla Kapar, author of the blog Türkiye ve Dünyadan Lezzetler (“Good Tastes from Turkey and the World”) and a Turkish food enthusiast who, as he describes it, “reviews lesser-known restaurants in Istanbul that offer great-tasting food.” Atilla is a graduate of Bosphorus University ...continue
Istanbul Eats’ First Photo Competition
1 response - Posted 09.24.09
We are happy to announce the start of our first ever photography competition. Open to all, the contest’s first prize is lunch at one of the restaurants reviewed on our site (winner’s choice). Subject: "Istanbul Food Culture" Deadline: October 31, 2009 (Note: Due to popular demand, we've extended the deadline to ...continue
A (Shady) Place in the Sun: Picnicking in Istanbul’s Concrete Jungle
4 responses - Posted 08.27.09
Summer months in Istanbul can be oppressively hot. In a city that seems more prone to laying asphalt than planting trees, a public place in the shade is hard to find. Though many Istanbulites escape to the green spaces outside of the city on weekends, we’ve compiled a few inner-city ...continue
The Grand Bazaar: Come for the Shopping, Stay for the Food
12 responses - Posted 07.15.09
We like to think of Istanbul’s Grand Bazaar – open since 1461 – as the world’s oldest shopping mall. If that’s the case, shouldn’t the Grand Bazaar be home to the world’s oldest food court? That may be taking the analogy too far, but for us, the Grand Bazaar can ...continue
Çiya: Loquat Kebabs and Mesopotamian Truffles at Istanbul’s Culinary Shrine
9 responses - Posted 05.06.09
For us, one of the highlights of spring in Istanbul is a visit to Çiya Sofrası, the Asian-side eatery that is very likely the best restaurant in Istanbul. It’s certainly not the fanciest or most cutting-edge place in town, but we rarely leave Çiya without having a profoundly new and ...continue
Kaymak: The Heavenly Cream
24 responses - Posted 04.01.09
In our imagination, kaymak - the delicious Turkish version of clotted cream - is the only food served in heaven, where angels in white robes dish out plate after plate of the cloudlike stuff to the dearly departed, who no longer have to worry about cholesterol counts and visits to ...continue

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