After eight kilometres on the marble streets of Ephesus, even my most enthusiastic guests are starting to slow down a little bit by the time we reach the upper gate. By the way, this is completely normal. The morning begins with the Library of Celsus and the Grand Theatre, and by midday everyone is ready for the second part of any good Aegean tour — sitting under a vine canopy, with cold water and a plate of something delicious in front of you.
Aegean Turkish cuisine is one of the lightest, freshest, and most herb-rich cuisines of the entire Mediterranean. It is built on olive oil, on wild greens picked from the hillsides, on small fish from the sea right next to us, and on the slow rhythm of meze tables which can last two or three hours if you are not in a hurry. Ephesus is the ancient story of this region, but the food is its living continuation.
Here are seven dishes which I always recommend my guests to taste while they are travelling in our region. Some of them are very local to Selçuk and Kuşadası, others belong more to İzmir, but all of them are part of the same Aegean kitchen.
1. Çöp Şiş — The Pride of Selçuk
If there is one dish which Selçuk, my own home town, is famous for in all of Turkey, it is çöp şiş. The name literally means “twig skewers” — small wooden skewers, thinner than a pencil, with three or four tiny cubes of marinated lamb on each one. They are grilled very quickly over charcoal, salted on the spot, and served with thin pita bread, grilled tomatoes and green peppers, and a plate of fresh raw onions with sumac on top.
You can find çöp şiş restaurants on the road from Ephesus into the centre of Selçuk, the most famous ones are sometimes with a queue at the door on a summer afternoon. Order ten skewers, not five. Trust me on this one.
2. Midye Dolma — Stuffed Mussels on the Harbour
Walk down to the harbour of Kuşadası in the early evening and you will see them everywhere — small carts and shops selling shiny black mussels stuffed with spiced rice. This is midye dolma, “stuffed mussels”, and they are eaten one by one with a squeeze of fresh lemon. The rice inside is mixed with onion, pine nuts, currants, allspice and a touch of cinnamon, in a recipe which goes back to the old Ottoman Greek and Armenian kitchens of the Aegean coast.
A good seller will open the shell for you, give you the lemon, and the empty shells will pile up on your table while you keep saying “one more”. They cost almost nothing. You will probably eat fifteen. 🙂
3. Zeytinyağlı Yemekler — The Olive Oil Dishes
Aegean people say that without olive oil, there is no Aegean cuisine. The whole region is covered with olive groves, some of the trees more than two thousand years old, planted before the first stone of the Library of Celsus was laid down. Out of this olive oil comes a whole family of cold dishes which we call zeytinyağlılar — vegetables cooked very slowly in olive oil and served at room temperature.
The most beloved ones are zeytinyağlı enginar (artichoke hearts cooked with broad beans, dill and olive oil), zeytinyağlı yaprak sarması (vine leaves stuffed with rice, pine nuts and currants), and barbunya pilaki (cranberry beans in tomato and olive oil). When you see a long counter of small cold dishes at a meyhane or a lokanta, this is what you are looking at. Order three or four of them, share them around the table, and have plenty of bread ready.
4. Ot Mezeleri — The Wild Greens of the Aegean
This is the dish category which most surprises my international guests. Aegean village women still walk the hillsides in spring and pick wild herbs which they then boil, drain, and dress with olive oil, lemon and a little crushed garlic. The result is ot mezeleri, the wild green meze table.
The names sound strange even for many Turks who are coming from other regions: radika, turp otu, ebegümeci, deniz börülcesi (which means “sea bean”, growing in the salty marshes near the coast). Each one has its own taste, slightly bitter, slightly herbal, very refreshing on a hot summer day. If you see a restaurant with a fridge full of these green plates, you are in the right place. This is the part of Aegean food which you cannot find anywhere outside our region.
5. Balık Izgara — Grilled Fresh Fish at the Harbour
Kuşadası harbour and the small fishing villages around it are serving some of the best grilled fish on the entire Turkish coast. The Aegean style is very simple, almost minimal. The fish is grilled whole, with nothing more than olive oil, salt, and a wedge of lemon on the side. No heavy sauces, no complicated marinades. The taste is the fish itself.
The most loved species are çupra (sea bream), levrek (sea bass), and the smaller but very tasty barbun (red mullet). My personal recommendation is, ask the waiter what came in fresh that morning and order whatever he tells you. A bottle of cold rakı, served with ice and a little water on the side, is the traditional drink to go with grilled fish in the Aegean. You can also order a side of roka (rocket leaves) and a çoban salatası (shepherd’s salad of tomato, cucumber, onion and parsley).
6. Boyoz — İzmir’s Sephardic Breakfast Pastry
If you spend a morning in İzmir, the third largest city of Turkey and only one hour by car from Ephesus, do not leave without trying boyoz. This flaky, oily, layered pastry is one of the most unusual breakfast foods in all of Turkey, and it has a very interesting story behind it.
Boyoz was brought to İzmir by the Sephardic Jews who came to our region after they were expelled from Spain in the year 1492. They settled in İzmir, which was at that time a great Ottoman port, and they brought their breads and their pastries with them. Boyoz survived almost only in İzmir, you cannot really find it anywhere else in Turkey. Today it is sold in the old neighbourhoods like Asansör and Kemeraltı, often eaten together with a hard-boiled egg and a small glass of Turkish tea, standing on the sidewalk in the morning. It is not a fancy thing. It is a piece of living history.
7. Şirince Meyve Şarapları — The Fruit Wines of Şirince Village
We finish where many Ephesus tours also finish — in the beautiful old Greek village of Şirince, only twelve kilometres up in the mountains above Selçuk. Şirince is famous in Turkey for one thing in particular: its homemade fruit wines. The villagers are making wine not only from grapes, but also from blackberry, mulberry, peach, pomegranate, melon, apple, cherry, and almost any other fruit which grows in their gardens.
These are sweet wines, not at all like the dry European wines, and they are served in tiny tasting glasses by the shop owners themselves. You walk into a small wooden shop, you sit down, and they pour you ten or fifteen different wines, one after another, until you choose the one which you love the most. It is a tradition which I think every visitor of Ephesus should experience at least one time in their life. By the way, Şirince is also producing some very good dry grape wines now, for those who prefer something more familiar.
A Final Word from Your Guide
Aegean food is not in a hurry. A real Aegean meal is not a fuel stop between two ancient sites — it is a long, slow afternoon under a tree, with small plates arriving one by one, with conversation, with a cool breeze coming from the sea. When my guests give themselves the time for this, they always tell me afterwards that the food was one of the best memories of their entire trip to Turkey.
When you come to visit Ephesus with me, we will of course see the great monuments, the marble streets, the Library of Celsus and all the rest. But I will also take you to the right restaurants, the right village kitchens, and the right meyhane tables, where the food is honest and the bill is fair. To plan a tour which combines the ancient Aegean with the living one, contact me through theephesus.com or toursaroundturkey.com. Come and unravel the flavours, as well as the mysteries, of Ephesus with me. See you soon, Hasan Gülday.
