Sunday 25 July 2010

Honest Food

There is a deception that occurs throughout the summer months. It happens with those disappointing first bites of what seems by all outward appearances to be a perfectly ripe [insert summer fruit or vegetable here]. Unless one is lucky enough to tick off the entire grocery list at a farmers' market, farm stand(s), or other local supplier, some of those store-bought tomatoes and strawberries are bound to disappoint. Those glistening, red skins hide tasteless, watery, mealy white mush.

Unless one lives in Anamur, Turkey.

Here, bananas--among a plethora of tropical fruits--reign, and it was thanks to this fruit that a brief visit to the coastal town turned out to be so memorable.

Leaving the happy wedding party behind, R. and I boarded a bus from Mersin to Anamur, and after a five-hour, vertiginous journey of hugging sheer cliffs (English hedgerows have nothing on these blind turns), which turned into an eight-hour journey thanks to a flat tire--and which involved me almost being left in the gas station toilet--we arrived at dusk.

Tired and a bit nauseous, we headed for a large fruit stand across the street from the bus station where pile upon pile of bananas were stacked. 'Banana Man' offered us a place to sit at the adjacent cafe and suggested we stay at his friend's hotel in the Iskele [port] district, near the beach. His friend would even come pick us up. Letting down our urban guard of distrust and general code of cynicism, we felt comfortable enough chalking the offer up to genuine, small town hospitality, and agreed.

Within minutes, Hamdi Bey turned up in his car, led us to our basic but charming room, and sent his teenage colleague to accompany us to the best fish restaurant in town, Kap Hotel Restaurant.

We chose a sea bass out of the cooler and ordered calamari and two mezes spreads to top the famous 'pillow bread'. Our fish was promptly grilled to perfection and served with lemon and rocket, along with tomato and cucumber salad. Washed down with a cold Efes and finished with a massive plate of some of the most tasty fruit I've ever consumed, we left contented, to say the least.














(before) (after)















There was nothing extraordinary about this delicious meal; it's not dissimilar to the fish restaurant offerings one would find dotted all along the Mediterranean. The beauty was in the simplicity. The fish had clearly been caught that day, the bread was straight out of the wood oven, and the fruit...well, the fruit tasted as it should--cherries with deep, liquored juice, peaches whose juice ran down chins, and melons that actually tasted of something. I don't like watermelon, but I ate watermelon [karpuz] in Anamur.

Best of all, however, were the bananas. Anamur's is the only climate in Turkey capable of sustaining large-scale banana production, and there are greenhouses as far as the eye can see, nestled below the Toros Mountains. They are smaller than imported varieties, and it is as though the flavour is concentrated in its smaller size. With a firm texture and rich, velvety flesh, what to bring for lunch at the beach was a no-brainer: we feasted on pepinos (tastes like a cross between a cucumber and a melon), sweet and sour cherries, and bananas.















The Anamur Muz [banana] Festival takes place in August, and transport to the area is improving with the opening of the Gazipasa airport, near Alanya.

Kap Hotel Restaurant (İskele Meydani'ndaki; +90 (0)324 814 2374)

Eda Motel (İskele Mahallesi, 24-Turgut Reis Caddesi (Eski iskele yolu) No:14; +90 (0)324 814 6319)

Wednesday 7 July 2010

Tantuni-Land

I'm back!

It's been over a month since my last post, and copious and varied foodstuffs have been created and consumed during this silent but scrumptious hiatus.

Most exciting of these culinary adventures was a recent trip to Turkey to witness dear friends, J. and M., tie the knot on a beach in Mersin. A global network of friends and family came together from all over the world--first to Istanbul and then to Mersin-- for the event, and I cannot imagine a more fabulous, curious, ravenous-to-try-anything group ever assembled.

After a beautiful Istanbul fete complete with Bosporus cruise and lots of dancing, we all boarded a plane for the hour-and-a-half flight to Mersin. The day before the big event was free to explore this Mediterranean coastal town, and we hit the ground running in the direction of tantuni.

Allow me to digress a bit. When I worked at an English language immersion camp for two summers towards the end of my undergraduate years, many a night out in Taksim's rooftop clubs and bars ended with a large group of us counselors, both Turkish and yabanci [foreign], crouching on small wooden stools and sloppily devouring one portion of tantuni after another. The dish that we had become familiar with at a tiny establishment of Istiklal Caddesi consisted of a scant amount of sauteed mystery meat, heavily spiced with cumin and pepper, drizzled with lemon, covered in more cumin and parsley, and rolled up in durum [a kind of flat bread]. Friends would always bemoan the distance between Istanbul and Mersin, M.'s (the groom's) hometown, and how much better the true Mersin tantuni is.

So, there we were in the cradle of tantuni, where the mighty, spicy meat wrap was no tipsy fare, but THE main event.

Having consulted our friend H. on where to get the best, we headed to Gokzel Tantuni. Despite initial reservations--prompted by spotting multiple locations (a chain!) through the dolmus window--I was far from disappointed. Couples sat around us, daintily and artfully consuming their durums, which never seemed to drip or fall apart, and sipping frothy mugs of ayran.

Over at our table of six, however, twelve eyes grew wide as plate after plate of tomatoes, green spicy-sweet peppers, really hot, small, green peppers, mint, parsley, lemons (the skins are green here), and red cabbage came and just kept coming--many dusted with sumac or pul biber (red pepper flakes). How was all of this goodness to make it to our mouths? And how quickly could it be done?


Durum wraps were unwrapped to reveal glistening, moist, spiced meat, promptly loaded with all of the above, and raised to mouths, tomato, lemon, and meat juices gushing.

















The spicy meat was delicious and moist, and the secret of tantuni is in the method of cooking. The minced meat is cooked in a conical metal contraption that captures the fat and juices in the center, where the meat to be served is doused and seared with a bit of water.

This video is chatty, but it shows how lightening-fast the cooking method is:



Somehow, after a walk on the seaside boardwalk, we found room for a scoop of ice cream from Balli Baba Dondurma--a more stiff, glutinous ice cream than one might be used to, but delicious--there was everything from almond and honey to pistachio and melon.

It was the perfect ending to a tantuni feast.