Signature Dish: Kalamaki

A brief note about Signature Dish.  Kalkan has its 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 restaurants in Kalkan to discover not only what their signature dish is, but also how the dish is prepared, 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.

Up this time: Kalamaki, located in the Old Town, serving Turkish cuisine with a hint of Europe

Your chef: Kubilay Beytaşi

Growing up in Izmir, Kubilay watched his mother cooking, and at the age of 11 decided that cooking was what he wanted to do.  By the age of 15, Kubilay was working in Marmarus, learning the ways of the professional kitchen.  After over eight years of study and then time spent in the Turkish Army, Kubilay returned to Izmir, where he opened his own restaurant, Aciktim (pronouced "adjectum") meaning, appropriately, "I'm hungry."  Kubilay then came to Kalkan, where he began work on Kalakmaki's menu in 2009.  Below, some of the fruits of his labor - Kalamaki's Signature Dishes.


For a starter, Kubilay prepared Shrimp with Salmon in Avocado (be still my heart).  The shrimp is sautéed with cream and white wine, and salmon and peppers are added; the mixture is poured into the slightly hollowed out avocado half; the shrimp- and salmon-filled avocado is then covered with cheese; and finally, the whole shebang is placed in the oven, to let the cheese lovingly melt on top.

Kalamaki's Signature main course is çökertme - beef steak (which, along with all of Kalamaki's meat, comes from Kubilay's home town of Izmir) sautéed with garlic butter and rosemary, served on top of thin-cut potatoes, and covered with both a garlic yogurt sauce and a garlic tomato sauce, which makes for unique presentation.

Et voilà!

Beef, with a bit of a Jekyll and Hyde complex. Highly recommended - it's like getting two meals in one! 

And finally, Kalamaki's Signature dessert, the Kalamaki Dream - pear cooked with cinnamon, cloves, ginger, and simple syrup, served with an edible chocolate cup filled with ice cream.  And while it is a dream to eat, I have to admit, the real treat for me was watching Kubilay prepare the plate:

The artist and his work.

Kalamaki serves its guests on an enviable roof terrace with a sweeping view of Kalkan Harbour.  Reservations are recommended.


And because I couldn't leave you without it, as always, the money shot:

Making Waffles

As I think of Kalkan busily gearing up for the 2012 season, my thoughts inevitably turn to all things holiday: days spent on the beach, nights spent eating and entertaining, and of course, waffles.  Though he probably is not concocting any fabulous desserts at the moment (he mans the waffle stand at Fener Cafe from April to November), Ahmet will hopefully being doing more of the following soon:





Can't wait for waffle season 2012!

Bringing America to Kalkan

A note from Turquoise Collected: I originally intended to post this story right after the 4th of July, but it somehow got lost in the shuffle.  I was worried that posting it now would seem a little funny given that it's six months later and the dead of winter, but then I thought, "what better time than now to share a story about the middle of summer?"  It'll give us something to look forward to - less than six month until 4 July 2012!  Enjoy!




I consider it a bit of a coup that most of the people attending my 4th of July BBQ in Kalkan were British.  What I hadn't anticipated though, was the moment when all assembled guests hummed the US National Anthem for me.  For someone missing her homeland, having such a thoughtful group of friends around me on such an important day (did I mention that the 4th of July is also my half-birthday?) was a treat.  So, how does one hold an American 4th of July barbecue in Kalkan for a bunch of Brits and Turks?  Like so.


First, a little food shopping:

For some special ingredients:

Clockwise from top left, mini croissants, mini hotdogs, blue cheese, AVOCADOS.

Then, visit this guy, for your meat:

Bulent of Bulent's "Et Ve Tavuk Galerisi"

Run around Kalkan, sufficiently convincing people that you are crazy by asking where you can find something red, white, and blue to wear:

Found the dress at Vasila & Brako and the necklace at a jewelry shop just down the street from V&B.

Next, install yourself in your kitchen and chop, cook, mix, add mayo, strain, chop again, cover, refrigerate, rinse, and repeat until you end up with this:

Salads!  Including:

Watermelon, Tomato, and Blue Cheese Salad; Potato Salad; Bean Salad (brought by a lovely guest)

And:

Pasta Salad; and the winner of the evening, Corn and Avocado Salad

Then, fire up the grill, grill up the meat, and try to convince people that they should be eating the kofte (mini lamb burgers) and mini hot dogs like this:

Like mini burgers and mini hot dogs!

Check to make sure that glasses are refilled and move on to.....dessert:

Fruit Salad; Baklava; and HOMEMADE CARROT CAKE (which, luckily, wasn't finished on the night so we got leftovers!).

And, finally, score some of these:

So you can do this:




Hope everyone had a Happy 4th!

Collected in Kalkan Restaurants

A little something to warm you up as temperatures start to dip.


Food on fire:

Lamb at Iso's.

Oh, you want video?  We can do that too.

Steak at Coast.

Ways to Help

Our thoughts are with all those affected by the earthquake in the Van province of Turkey.  Survivors are currently desperately in need of shelter and aid with winter not far away:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-15470596

If you would like to make a donation to help the survivors of the Eastern Turkey earthquake, here are some links that you may find useful:

International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies: donations can be made from many countries to the Disaster Relief Emergency Fund.

ShelterBox: donations will help ShelterBox, working in conjunction with Turkish Red Crescent, provide shelter and aid to quake survivors.

Easy Entertaining - Kalkan Style

Impromptu barbecues (or planned ones, for that matter) are a great way to spend an evening in Kalkan, especially if you're staying with a group.  It's as simple as:


1: Making a trip to the butcher - who, most days, sells ready-to-throw-on-the-grill chicken skewers, lamb skewers, and lamb kofte (they look like mini-lamb burgers to me).  We like this guy:

Bulent, the butcher - located just past the Tesko roundabout.

2: Throwing said meat (or seafood - maybe you like seafood instead?) on the grill.  Even if your accommodation lacks a grill, it's easy enough to pick one up (along with coals and lighter fluid, and beer - what is a BBQ without beer?) at most supermarkets:

A selection of grills outside of Kartin Market.

And 3: Inviting over a group of friends, acquaintances, or those people you just met on a boat trip...


Besides feeding them and keeping their glasses filled, here's an easy way we've discovered to keep BBQ guests entertained.  First, grab an iPod - yours or someone's who's hopefully got a similar taste in music.  Then, sync it with one of these:

The Jambox from Jawbone, which you can also find here, among other places.  This nifty little speaker connects to devices with Bluetooth and will fill up a room with sound - we were really surprised at the amount of good sound that comes out of such a little speaker.  Tiny and light enough to fit in your hand luggage (though it slightly confounded some of the security staff when we took it into Dalaman Airport), we've discovered it's a great way to listen to our own music when we're on holiday.  And it makes entertaining in Kalkan just that little bit easier!

Bringing Kalkan Home

I was trying to come up with some clever way to introduce this post, but after sitting here for a while, drooling over the pictures that I was trying to decide between, I decided just to post the pictures and go from there.

And because you can't really see everything that's going on there, here's another one:

And just in case you still can't tell, that is a waffle.  Covered in a (white) chocolate spread.  And bananas.  And caramel ice cream and chocolate chip ice cream.  And caramel sauce.  In a word, delicious.  In more words, I want one right now.


However, since I'm currently not in Kalkan, I am not able to wander over to Fener Cafe (AKA The Lighthouse Cafe, located on the harbour-front - you'll recognize it by the large green lighthouse) where the smell of baking waffles wafts over diners and passers-by, enticing them to order one.  So, instead, I'll bring a little of Kalkan to me with....


A waffle iron!  Here are a few options I've been looking into:
This one looks like it will do the job...
But, oh how much do I want this one.

Fener Cafe, by the way, serves way more than waffles - more to come on that later...

A Turkish Find

Remember the goats?  OK, so there has been some discussion as to whether they are goats or actually sheep, but either way, I shot the video more for the sound of the bells than anything else.  It was a beautiful sound to wake up to.  However, it seems that those goats (or sheep) are only around Kalkan in the off-season, because I haven't seen or heard them at all in the summer.  So no pretty bells to wake up to.  But, at the Sunday Market, I heard the bells again.  Looking around, I couldn't locate any goats, or sheep for that matter, but I did find these:

Goat (or sheep) bells!  A little hard to see, I know - they're hanging next to the hammock.  As soon as I make it back to Kalkan, a set of these are coming home with me.  They'll be packed right next to my trivets.

Signature Dish: Ada Patisserie

A brief note about Signature Dish.  Kalkan has its 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 restaurants in Kalkan to discover not only what their signature dish is, but also how the dish is prepared, 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: Nuray (the first female chef to be featured on Turquoise Collected!)

This is Nuray's first season working in Ada's kitchen and she was kind enough to let us watch her whip up Ada's signature dish: Turkish Breakfast.


This whole concept of <insert country name here> Breakfast is still relatively new to me.  There is no "American Breakfast" like there is English Breakfast or Irish Breakfast.  And while I'm still trying to get my head wrapped around those (I just don't think the American palette was built to enjoy black pudding...), after watching Nuray prepare Turkish Breakfast (and then devouring it hot from the kitchen), I can say I've found a country whose breakfast I like in all its parts.


As with English and Irish Breakfasts, Turkish Breakfast varies from place to place and region to region.  Ada's typical Turkish Breakfast features the following items:

A little behind the scenes action of Nuray plating the (cherry, strawberry, and aubergine!) jam.

A note about the fruit and veg: if you go to Ada for Turkish Breakfast in March, you may not end up with the same exact fruit and veg you get in, say, July.  The reason?  Ada only serves seasonal fruit and vegetables - sourced from Kinik where the family of Ada's owner, Cihan (pronounced Gee-han) owns 10,000 square meters of greenhouses.  So, if you want fresh-squeezed orange and pomegranate juice - which, believe me, you do - you have to go in March.


Breakfast also features bread, including simits baked on the premises (post to come!).

This is all served alongside the main attraction - the eggs.

That's eggs, fried in butter and oil, with a type of Turkish sausage called sucuk (pronounced soo-jook).  




We have been trying for months and months, in two different countries, on two different continents, to recreate this dish, but without the Turkish sucuk, it just never comes out exactly right.  The sucuk has a slightly spicy flavor, and it also doesn't seem to release as much fat as the American and English sausages we've tested in our faux-Turkish Breakfasts.  Despite all of that though, we keep trying, because even without the exact flavors, the general concept of a Turkish Breakfast makes for yummy eating, day or night.


Ada Patisserie is located on the Kalamar road and, along with Turkish Breakfast, serves sandwiches and salads, coffees and teas, and tons of freshly baked (on the premises) baked goods.

Day Trip: Kaputaş Beach

A lot of steps...

About 188 (give or take a few - some are smaller than others).  But the pay-off?

Worth it.

Kaputaş Beach is about a ten to fifteen minute drive from Kalkan.  

Want to skip the steps but still want to visit this secluded beach?  Some of the boats leaving from Kalkan Habour will make a stop at the beach, depending on the weather - check with your captain.