Culinary in Istanbul - The Best Foods and Drinks

Eating in Istanbul is the real tour. You can stand in front of every mosque and palace on the map, but you will not understand the city until you have torn into a fresh simit by the water, argued with friends over whose neighborhood does the best lahmacun, and let a vendor scrape stuffed mussels into your hand one by one. Turkish cuisine grew up under the Ottoman Empire and carries the fingerprints of Greek, Armenian, Jewish, Arab, Kurdish, Russian and Caucasian kitchens, all of it filtered through Asian, Middle Eastern and Mediterranean flavors. Istanbul is where all of that lands on one table. Here is my honest, hungry guide to culinary Istanbul: what to eat, what to drink, and where I would send you first.

What are the best Turkish foods to try in Istanbul?

Start with the savory side, because that is where the city eats hardest. Some of these dishes sound alarming on paper. My advice is to ignore the description and just bite in. If everyone read the ingredient list first, half of them would never get tasted, and that would be a shame.

Kokoreç. Seasoned lamb intestines wound around a spit, grilled until crisp, then chopped fine with cumin, paprika and oregano and tucked into toasted bread. The spices tame the richness and the result is smoky, herby and addictive. It is the dish people are most nervous about and the one they come back for. At the time of writing a kokoreç sandwich runs roughly 150 to 250 lira depending on the spot.

Pide. The flagship of any self-respecting Turkish kitchen. A boat-shaped flatbread baked with cheese, spiced minced meat (kıymalı), or chicken, served as a starter or a full meal. The recipe is simple and the filling flexes with your mood. For a proper one on the Asian side, Karadeniz Pidecisi in Kadıköy turns out crisp-edged Black Sea style pide that locals queue for.

Lahmacun. Thin, light, crackling dough spread with minced meat, tomato, onion and parsley, then blasted in a hot oven. Squeeze on lemon, pile in some rocket, roll it up and eat it with your hands. It works as a quick street snack or a sit-down meal, and you can eat one without even being hungry.

İskender. Sliced döner over torn pide bread, drowned in tomato sauce, hot melted butter and a generous spoon of yogurt. Rich does not begin to cover it. If you are watching what you eat, look away. If you are not, this is one of the great Turkish plates.

Stuffed mussels (midye dolma). A street classic you will not find done quite like this anywhere else. The shells are packed with spiced rice, and the vendor splits them open in front of you. Hit each one with lemon and slide it straight from the shell. At the time of writing they go for around 10 to 20 lira a piece, and the rule is simple: eat where the line is long and the turnover is fast.

Pastırma. The sausage of the rich, as the old line goes. Air-dried, spice-cured beef coated in a paste of fenugreek, garlic and paprika. The name comes from bastırmak, “to press”. Eat it thin and raw, or fried with eggs for one of the city’s great breakfasts.

Çiğ köfte. Bulgur kneaded for hours with pepper paste, spices and herbs into dense, fiery little rolls. The original used raw meat, but almost everything sold in Istanbul today is the meatless version, which is excellent and vegan-friendly. Wrap it in a lettuce leaf with pomegranate molasses and a squeeze of lemon. Chains like Çiğköftem made it a national grab-and-go habit.

İçli köfte. A thin bulgur shell stuffed with minced meat, onion and spices, then fried. A crunchy outside hiding a savory surprise. I will not spoil the rest.

Dolma. Bell peppers, eggplant or zucchini hollowed out and filled with spiced rice (or rice and meat), then slow-baked. A staple of the mezze table and of Sunday family lunches. The vegetable versions, served cold with olive oil, are some of the best things you can order.

If this list has you planning a whole day around eating, you are doing it right. Our deeper Istanbul street food guide covers the where and how in much more detail.

Where are the best desserts in Istanbul?

Turkish sweets are a category of their own, and Istanbul does them better than anywhere.

Baklava. Paper-thin layers of buttered pastry, ground pistachio or walnut, and syrup, all of it almost as fine as cigarette paper. Done well it is light, not heavy, which is the whole trick. My pick is Karaköy Güllüoğlu, hidden under a stone arch off the Karaköy backstreets, where you eat in a quiet courtyard with a glass of tea. Order the classic pistachio, the şöbiyet (made with coarser ground pistachio for extra crunch), or the carrot-slice fıstıklı baklava with clotted cream in the middle. For more addresses, see our roundup of the best baklava places in Istanbul.

Künefe / kadayıf. Kadayıf is the “angel hair” pastry of the Levant. The famous version is künefe: shredded dough wrapped around stretchy cheese, baked, soaked in syrup and served hot under a snow of pistachio. There is also a sweet kadayıf stuffed with nuts, and a savory one for the mezze table.

Şekerpare. Soft semolina-and-butter cookies poached in syrup and crowned with a hazelnut or pistachio. Homey, sticky, and everywhere.

Turkish ice cream (dondurma). Maraş-style dondurma is unlike any other ice cream you have had. Beyond cream and sugar, the real thing uses salep, a flour milled from dried wild orchid bulbs that grow in Turkey, which gives it that famous chewy, stretchy texture vendors love to show off. Pistachio and Maraş cream are the flavors to get.

Sweet tooth not satisfied yet? We keep a running list of Turkish desserts worth trying that goes well beyond the classics above.

What should you drink in Istanbul?

The drinks are half the experience, and most of them cost next to nothing.

Çay (Turkish tea). Black tea served scalding in tulip-shaped glasses, all day, everywhere, often free with your meal. Ask for it açık (weaker, more water) if the standard pour is too strong for you. Refusing a glass when someone offers is almost rude, so just accept it.

Ayran. A salted yogurt drink, roughly one part fresh yogurt to two parts water, whipped until frothy. Cold, savory and the perfect partner for anything greasy: pide, lahmacun, köfte, you name it. It is also the unofficial national drink of Turkey.

Turkish coffee. Finely ground coffee simmered in a copper cezve and served unfiltered in a tiny cup, thick grounds settling at the bottom. It is a ritual, not a caffeine fix: sip slowly, take a Turkish delight on the side, and flip your cup for a fortune reading if the company is in the mood. For the proper experience, our guide on where to drink Turkish coffee in Istanbul points you to the right places.

Turkish lemonade. Lemon juice blended with the zest and fresh mint, sweetened and served ice cold. Summer in a glass, and a lifesaver in July when the city bakes.

How much does eating in Istanbul cost in 2026?

Street food is still where the value is. At the time of writing, a simit costs around 15 to 40 lira, a balık ekmek (grilled fish sandwich) by the water runs roughly 150 to 250 lira, stuffed mussels are about 10 to 20 lira each, and a kokoreç sandwich lands somewhere around 150 to 250 lira. You can graze your way through a full afternoon of tasting for a fraction of what a single sit-down meal costs back home. Prices drift with the lira, so treat these as a guide rather than gospel, and always favor the busy stalls with high turnover.

A perfect culinary day in Istanbul

Turkish food rewards a bit of planning, so here is the route I actually recommend. It crosses both continents and eats well the whole way.

• Start around 9 am on a mostly empty stomach. You will want the room.
• Take a ferry to the Asian shore. Feed the seagulls trailing the boat with bits of simit, the sesame-crusted bread rings sold at every dock.
• Spend the morning in the Kadıköy market, the liveliest food bazaar in the city. Taste your way through cheeses, olives, cured meats and honey, then sit down at Çiya Sofrası for regional Anatolian dishes you will not find on any tourist menu (book ahead on weekends).
• Walk over to the old Haydarpaşa railway station for the view, then catch a boat back to Europe.
• Wander Beşiktaş and Taksim. Stop for a theatrical scoop of Maraş ice cream, then settle in somewhere for a Turkish coffee and a plate of sweets.
• End the evening at a meyhane over fish, a spread of hot and cold mezze, and live music if you find the right room.

That single day will teach you more about Istanbul than a week of monument-hopping. To get to know a people, you really do have to eat the way they eat. If you want to keep going, our pieces on the famous tastes of Istanbul and the finest Ottoman cuisine in Istanbul are the natural next bites.