Restaurant: Turk Fatih Tutak
Location: Cumhuriyet Hacıahmet Silahşör Cad, Yeniyol Sk. No:2, 34440 Şişli/İstanbul, Türkiye. +90 212 709 56 79
Date: June 15, 2023
Cuisine: Modern Turkish
Rating: Awesome
This is Istanbul’s and Turkey’s long Michelin 2 star.
The space.
pickle juice with plum. This welcome drink tasted like… well a shot of pickle juice. It was pretty sour. Excellent, as I like vinegar, but intense. The plum was lacto fermented so as to have no remaining sugar. Very interesting.
Wine pairings.
A bit of crispy bread with cheese and meat on it. Excellent.
Fresh baked sourdough Pide. Lovely little “pita” bun.
trabzon butter, bitlis hizan honey, 2000 meter. The butter and honeycomb combo (served in the bone) was pretty amazing.
Special Turkish olive oil.
TT mussels dolma. The oyster shell was not actually made of oyster shell and was completely edible. Basically this rice stuffed oyster tasted like Turkish paella. Delicious.
A “salad tart.”
Egg inside an egg.
egg, morel mushroom, thracian cheese. Mixed up this was a scrumptious yolky asparagus cheesy mess. The “sauce” tasted like a cacio e pepe emulsion.
mackerel, new potatoes, horseradish, tomato. Had an almost Jewish deli taste to it with the mackerel and horseradish. A good bit of kick too. Intense and delicious.
caviar, artichoke borek, pea, spring tarhana. Lovely little vegetable/fish tart.
Raki!
red mullet, cheese that wasn’t cheese, and crispy rice.
It was served with this whipped fish-bisque type sauce. Really quite delicious together. Paired very well with the raki too.
Bonus manti. Amazing meat dumpling bite with the yogurt and spicy oil/butter.
“Perfect” penne butter. For our son: perfectly al dente with a lovely butter flavor and a hint of cheese.
We got to choose our special knives.
charcoal thracian lamb. Beautiful roast lamb with pepper and sauce.
Beets and peppers.
potato, buffalo milk. A great starchy “side.”
Pistachio bomb.
with lime cream.
Cherry cordials.
Tour of the kitchen
fermenting.
Dry aging.
Neat containers.
The oven.
White chocolate bonbons.
A gooey Turkish candy.
Charcoal ice cream — they love charcoal.
Wild strawberries.
Take home gift of their EVOO.
Overall, a very precisely executed and delicious meal with great service and wine pairings. TT desserves the 2 stars even by European standards. We did have some issues with our gluten free guest — as we had not planned ahead or checked and there was relatively little on their single set menu that didn’t subtly have gluten. They dealt with it very gracefully and it was totally our fault. They even sent someone out to buy penne and then the main chef made the benne butter himsefl! Like “a great burger” from the menu, only less fatal.
