In the evolutionary process of the Istanbul fish restaurant, there was a moment in the late 1990s when the amphibious, shore-hugging boat restaurants crawled out of the Bosphorus and became land dwellers. Overnight, yellow Wellington boots became black loafers as seafaring grill men became restaurateurs and waiters.

We’re especially fond of Istanbul’s vibrant – and sometimes plain wacky – street food scene. Here we present three of our favorite street foods and the best places in the city to get them.

In a desk drawer at Istanbul Eats HQ is an envelope of leftovers from days when life was less sedentary: Tajik somoni, Kyrgyz som, Cypriot pounds, a wad of Macedonian denar and a small stack of Georgian lari. As with the last bite on the plate, it’s impossible to throw money away, no matter how unstable the currency. But the real value of having it on hand is that it makes a return visit seem likely, even pending. Our plans to return to Georgia were made, cancelled, rescheduled and cancelled again. It would seem our lari would never be much more than a filthy little memento, an IOU from the National Bank of Georgia for a khachapuri that would never be cashed in.