Our Turkish breakfast

It is June here and we are not in Istanbul; in fact, this is the first spring since 2004 that we have not been in Istanbul.  We miss it, especially in spring.

So when E., our daughter, arrived from Ontario on Friday night, I suggested that we have a Turkish breakfast (kahvaltı) in the morning.  She had spent two years (and thus two springs) in Istanbul, and we had happy shared memories of Saturday or Sunday morning kahvaltı somewhere along the Bosphorus.

I knew we had good tomatoes to slice up and some fine small cucumbers, maybe not the choice curvy Çengelköy variety, but compact and tasty.  There was also no crumbly beyaz peynir, but we did have good Nova Scotian feta cheese.  Although the olives, both green and black, were Greek rather than Turkish, at least we were geographically close on that front. 

Often at the studio in Ortaköy where we usually spent our weekends, we put together our own breakfasts.  It was only a short walk to a bakery where we could buy fresh bread (ekmek), still warm and smelling faintly of woodsmoke, poğaça, great little buns that were plain (sade) or cheese-filled (peynirli), or fresh simit, like slender sesame covered bagels, also faintly smoky.  And if we needed something more, like a variety of breakfast cheeses or a small bag of fresh eggs or some thick kaymaklı yoghurt with a crust of yellow cream on top, there was always the kahvaltı shop just around the corner.

Or you could eat out.  We could walk to the Cheesecake Café down on the waterfront and enjoy their good 11 lira breakfast that included fine crisp sigara borek pastries and plenty of Turkish tea (çay) always çok açık (not too strong).  If we were more ambitious and/or wanted a real treat, we would hop on a bus or get the car and go to Emirgan, which was on the sahil yolu (Seaside Road) in Emirgan and was one of the finest kahvaltı spots we knew, famous for its bal kaymak, a small cylinder of white clotted cream with golden honey poured over it, perfect to spread on fresh ekmek.  Or we could go a little farther for some great menemen at the tiny place right on the water in Istinye where you could lean your elbow on the seawall while you ate if you were early enough to get that table.

I have wandered a little from my plan for a Turkish breakfast here on Saturday morning, but I realize in writing this how strong and fond are my memories of those weekend breakfasts along the Bosphorus.  So I suppose it does make sense that when I put out fruit, olives, vegetables, and cheese, sliced the bread, made ihlamur (linden) tea in the little teapot from the Ortaköy eskici, and cooled the boiled eggs under the tap, I would want to take a picture of the spread and write something about what it all meant.

It was Halifax Harbour outside the window and not the Bosphorus, but our Ferguson’s Cove kahvaltı was a pretty good treat on Saturday morning for us three expats homesick for Istanbul.