‘Tutti Frutti’ list
The highly awaited Istanbul Michelin stars have been announced. The Michelin Guide, one of the world’s leading restaurant rating systems, came to Türkiye, but currently only for the city of Istanbul. Covering the whole of Türkiye will take place in the coming years, and the Istanbul list will be renewed every year. There will be new entrants to the list, as well as those who will lose their position. A total of 53 restaurants were selected in the first edition of Michelin Istanbul Guide, no three stars were awarded and the only two stars were given to Fatih Tutak’s Turk, and four restaurants got one star, namely Araka, Neolokal, Nicole and Mikla, and the Bib Gourmand list covered 10 restaurants. Neolokal also received a Green Star for sustainability, a Young Chef Award to Mürver, and the Michelin Service Award went to Sunset Grill& Bar. The arrival of Michelin to Istanbul was declared by the end of April, and the results were announced on Oct. 11. The list stirred hot discussions, and many food writers condemned the list as being far from accurate, missing many places worthy of entering the list, and being unbalanced. Of course, as always, some of the criticisms are biased and reflect only the view of the commentator, but it is also obvious that the prestigious guide could not avoid the pitfalls of judging Istanbul’s culinary scene in such a short time.
Istanbul is an exciting city in terms of food. The inspectors must have been a little stunned and even stumbled by the diversity. In gastronomy terms, the city has its own unique way of eating out, a diverse selection of eateries, ranging from street foods and single-dish restaurants to kebab joints, fish restaurants, and above all the favorite of locals’ meyhanes. Even the single-dish places constitute a world in itself, such as köfteci, offering only grilled meatballs; or pideci, serving only a selection of pide, flatbreads with various toppings, the Turkish answer to pizza; or the dönerci, sometimes a hole in the Wall place serving only döner kebab; or a mantı shop, offering only Turkish dumplings, and the list goes on expanding to işkembeci serving only tripe soup and the like. Last but not least, muhallebici, the iconic pudding shops that serve milk puddings, also offer satisfying plates, and the sweet scene becomes stickier to judge, if you think about all the baklava and sweet shops, expanding the range to bakeries and patisseries. It is hard to comprehend fully the whole profile of the culinary scene in such a city. Grasping the real essence of Istanbul’s eating places is hard enough, checking each worthy one is even harder, or practically impossible in a mere couple of months.
As said, it’s not easy to compare apples and pears. Michelin Guides International Director Gwendal Poullennec was in Istanbul personally to present the awards. When I asked him this question, he said that their aim is always to choose the best apple and the best pear. However, this target could not be fully met and the category of Bib Gourmand and Recommended Restaurants has become like mixed fruit salad, a truly “Tutti Frutti” selection. One of the most repeated criticisms was, “If these places can enter, why not these?” That was the subject that everyone talked about the most. Meanwhile, the inspectors seemed to be focused on the city center mostly. In many countries, and especially in countries like France, Spain and Italy, some of the most celebrated Michelin restaurants are in the countryside. In Istanbul, everybody expected a star or at least a recognition given to Casa Lavanda, which is way out in Şile, nearly a 45-minute drive, but still within the boundaries of the city. It is pretty clear that off-center places like Şile, or Silivri, or the Princess Islands remained under the radar of the inspectors. The joke of the night came from Sinem Özler, the chef of Seraf, one of the few women on the recommended list: “At least, we succeeded in bringing Michelin to Bağcılar,” she said, which was received with a big smile by many, since the neighborhood was not among the poshest places of the city, to put it mildly. When I asked how the borders of Istanbul were defined by the Guide, he could not give a clear answer to my question, instead, he said they sometimes have to focus on the center only. I wish they made it clear where Istanbul starts and ends.
Another big controversy was about a restaurant that everybody thought was closed. Nicole was closed way before the pandemic when its chef, the talented Aylin Yazıcıoğlu left following a dispute with the owner. Since then, nobody heard about the place, but apparently, the place was reopened silently with a new chef in position, Serkan Aksoy, who also went under the radar of many people in the culinary circles. Despite the opening last December, they did not do any PR activity at all. When I asked Poullennec whether a newly opened place could receive a star, he frankly gave me a straightforward answer, giving the example of Plenitude in Paris which received three stars within six months of its opening. Everybody was fiercely criticizing this choice, so trying not to be judgmental, I did a little investigative journalism and solved the mystery. When I read the description of the dish mentioned in the guide, I was suspicious. It was definitely not a dish that was featured in the previous menu so I did a little sleuthing on that. Apparently, the tasting menu had been completely changed. I understood that the plates were different, but it was still very familiar, especially the interpretation of dolma in the guide, which impressed the inspectors very much, reminded me of something I tasted before. After a little more research, I came across chef/consultant Melih Demirel’s post-award comment about chef Aksoy, who was once a Frankie chef. It was not hard to trace the rest. Aksoy had been an apprentice in the kitchen of former Frankie’s creative Greek chef, Simos Triantafyllou, who once made legendary interpretations, especially a terrific vine-leaf dolma with yogurt foam. He was a young boy from a village in Bolu, worked in hotels in Bodrum at a young age, worked as a cook in Afacanlar eatery at Istiklal Street from the age of 17, and decide to become a restaurant chef after his military service. He started from the very bottom, trying to get as much experience as he could get. There is another experience that Aksoy puts in between. He says that he worked with the Greek chef Kyrkos Zisis in the famed Maça Kızı restaurant, which he went to with the suggestion of Simos in 2015. Aksoy says: “He has been the person who shaped me, who made me who I am today.” Then he returned to Frankie and then served as the chef of Malva’s kitchen at Susona Hilton LXR in Bodrum for two seasons. It was pure coincidence that his path crossed with Nicole’s. In summary, the food today is no longer in the old Nicole line, but completely different. Aksoy obviously became a good soldier, a good learner and an achiever in the kitchen, and brought his humble start as a cook to the point as a chef who can get a star today.
Michelin Guide Istanbul edition has a lot of misses, but it is a start. To be fair, guides like Michelin provides a third eye to the culinary criticism in Turkey. Obviously, they were given some lists, and the rest they compiled themselves. Michelin should have to spend at least one full year to scour the city, and they should have given a crash course by serious experts. From late April to October, even if by an enormously hard-working tempo, it is obvious that five months would not be enough. Whoever guided them, or whatever their references were, they were definitely misguided, or to put more mildly, the brief they got was not sufficient. In our previous press meeting in April, Poullennec made it very clear saying that their inspectors will not leave a single stone unturned, they will scour the city, scrutinizing every possible candidate venue and try not to skip any place. And my verdict was in a city like Istanbul, their job would be very difficult, in this sea of stones and pebbles, there were many stones that were left unturned. Apparently, it proved to be so, many places went under the radar, and the inspectors failed to reach every corner of the city. My biggest criticism focuses on the ones who went missing, Michelin does not have the luxury to miss worthy places, but Istanbul is huge. The city is complex and hard to comprehend. A lifetime is not enough for Istanbul, a mere few months is too short to judge.
