Signature Dish: Restaurant at the Likya Hotel

A brief note about Signature Dish.  Kalkan has quite a fair share of restaurants, and each year many new restaurants pop up beside the classics that remain season after season.  To create our Signature Dish posts, we have partnered with many restaurants in Kalkan to discover not only their signature dish – the dish that best represents the restaurant it is made in – but also how the dish is made, where ingredients are sourced, and a bit of the chef’s and/or owner’s philosophy on food, cooking, and the restaurant experience.  Signature Dish will be a recurring feature on Turquoise Collected.


Your chef:  Yilmaz Yel

Yilmaz has been a chef for sixteen years - and he's only thirty-one!  At the age of fourteen, he joined his father, also a chef, in his restaurant.  From the age of eighteen on, Yilmaz went on to work in six five-star restaurants in Antalya, where he was born.  He holds many awards for his cooking, having competed in national cooking competitions in Istanbul.  2011 marks Yilmaz's third season as chef at the restaurant at the Likya Hotel.


On to the food!


When I began speaking with chefs and restaurant owners about their signature dishes, what I was not prepared for was that it would be so difficult to get them to choose just one dish.  When I asked Yilmaz if he could, please, choose just one dish to represent his restaurant, his response was (paraphrased), "Asking me to choose one dish is like asking a parent to choose their favorite child."  Basically: impossible (unless you're my mother, of course - hi Ma!).  But then I thought, "Let them make two dishes if they want!  It means I get to eat more!"  So, here they are, the Likya's Signature Dishes.


For appetizers!

Beetroots with a cheese-y mousse and pine nuts.

Unfortunately, I forgot to photograph the second signature appetizer (I was probably too busy shoveling the first one into my mouth.  Forgive me?), but here is a shot of it being prepared:

Shrimp and asparagus in a cream sauce garnished with croutons and a salad.

This was my second time for the shrimp as I had ordered it the first time we went to the Likya, before I even met Yilmaz.  Points to me!  I ordered a signature appetizer without even knowing it!  Both appetizers were nice and light - a good way to start a meal.


For the main course(s), Yilmaz chose on the following:

Lamb fillet served with mushrooms.

The lamb in this dish comes from the Burdur region of Turkey.  As this area is home to many nomadic people, the lamb travel with them, and feed only on the grass from this area.

Grouper served with risotto and fresh vegetables.

This grouper was freshly caught, as is all the fish served at the Likya.  This was a light, yet filling, flavorful dish.


And if that weren't enough, here's dessert:

An apple and pumpkin concoction, left, and pineapple pan-fried in sugar, right.

But wait, there's more!  This showed up between the appetizers and the main courses:

A frozen concotion made with lemon, mint, and vodka.

When you're sitting in the hot sun, this makes for a very refreshing treat.  Overall, this was a meal that was lovely to look at and yummy to eat.


But with Signature Dish posts, I want to focus not only on the finished product, but also the preparation of these dishes.  Going through the photographs I took in the kitchen, what stood out to me the most is the great delicacy Yilmaz displays when cooking.  Nearly every photo I took looked like these:

Every dish he prepared featured this graceful touch and attention to detail.


But enough waxing poetic!  This is what you came to see, right?  The kitchen pyrotechnics: