Istanbul Eats

Istanbul -- In Turkish popular lore, the residents of Kilis, a town in Southeast Turkey near the Syrian border, are known for two things: kebab-making and smuggling. Read more

Istanbul -- In the former Soviet Central Asian republics, the boilerplate restaurant menu consists of plov, lagman, shashlik and samsa. Tired-looking Uzbek, Kyrgyz, Kazakh and Tajik establishments all serve up the same limp noodles and oily rice with a shrug – it’s their job. In the markets of Samarkand, Osh and Almaty, we found some exciting exceptions to this rule but, generally, restaurants in the region tend to successfully obscure the fact that Central Asian food, when cooked with passion, can be a riot of the senses. Read more

Istanbul -- Editor's note: We're celebrating Mushroom Week at Culinary Backstreets, and today's installment takes us to Istanbul's Belgrade Forest, where Turkey's leading wild mushroom expert has found some remarkable fungus specimens. Read more