When I find myself hungry in Galata, my first instinct is to leave immediately. Being poor, and disinclined to overpay for subpar imitations of European classics, it seemed like common sense that just about any other neighborhood would have more to offer. Upon taking to my heels and making good my hasty escape though, I came across a pide place with no tables, no chairs, and lots of customers. Wait a minute, this seems promising.
Yöremiz is its name, and baking is their game. They make three things: lahmacun, crispy thin dough with a meat topping, and served wrapped up with parsley, lavaş, which is just a big flat bread, and pide, the boat-shaped crusty stone-oven-pizza of my dream.
You know you can trust a bakery when they have a stack of wood outside to feed the fire. And when there is a line out the door of people waiting for their takeaway orders, with the cashier standing crowded in the same doorway smoking a coffin nail, and enough flour on the floor to resemble a cocaine factory, dinner time is looking up.
Strange events occur in the 5 minutes I wait for my pide. The usta chases an apprentice boy with a curved cleaver, shouting something about respecting his elders, and the phone rings with take away orders no less than 4 times. I try to get a glimpse at what is happening up the mysterious stairway, but fail.
I see my kuşbaşı kaşarlı pıde slide out of the oven onto the cooling rack a few minutes later and admire the gooey cheese and mince melted and glimmering in the setting sunlight that filters uneasily through the grease hazed windows. Kuşbaşı though, is not just mince – it has peppers, onions, and tomatoes in it, almost like a tomato sauce.
The pide is sliced and stuffed into a Styrofoam box (what a strange way to serve a pide), I pay my 7 TL (what a deal!) and wander out among three generations meandering home for dinner, in search of a peaceful place to stuff my face. There is an electric box conveniently placed at the top step along a stretch of steep sidewalk which works as a table and I eat my lava-hot pide, get my hands gross, and, ironically, use a Domino’s Pizza flier nicked from the adjacent doorway as a makeshift napkin.
ADDRESS: Lüleci Hendek Caddesi No #18 (or thereabouts) Tophane, Istanbul
PHONE: 0212 249 8272
Louis Herman is a contributor for Yabangee. He keeps a blog about the restaurants and food culture of Sirkeci, Istanbul, at www.sirkecirestaurants.com.
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