Little Antep: Exploring Istanbul's unlikely culinary gem in Güngören
Güngören's Köyiçi neighborhood, informally known as Little Antep, is a hotspot outside the center of town featuring excellent restaurants serving the specialties of Turkey's gastronomical capital
It was a crisp, chilly evening toward the end of April when I deboarded the Üçyüzlü metro station and made my way south toward the Güngören neighborhood of Köyiçi, known as Küçük Antep for its restaurants and shops serving and selling the dishes and products from Turkey's culinary capital. I had a lingering sinus infection and thought that a spicy bowl of beyran soup could do the trick. I walked into Hakkıoğlu, which prepares perhaps the best beyran outside of Antep. The young man behind the counter asked if I wanted it spicy and garlicky. Of course I did.
Served alongside a generous plate of arugula, lemon wedges, and fresh flatbread, this soup (which some Antep residents will argue is not merely soup but a meal on its own) was piping hot. Like every time I order it, I ended up burning my tongue. A pile of rice and shredded lamb is doused with a broth spiked by spicy red pepper flakes and liberal amounts of garlic. My nose started to feel better.
There is no easy way to get from where I live in Kurtuluş to Küçük Antep via public transportation. No matter what, it takes either two buses, or two metros plus a 20 minute walk, and I prefer the latter because at least I'm guaranteed to not get stuck in traffic. Güngören is both Istanbul's smallest and most densely-populated district, and it takes just over half an hour to walk the length of the district from its northern borders with Bağcılar and Esenler to its southern border with Bahçelievler. The neighborhood is located equidistant between the T1 tramway and the M1 metro, the former is downhill so sometimes I use that to head back home. I've been coming to Küçük Antep since 2015, when I started regularly writing food stories for Culinary Backstreets. My first article was about Hizmet Kardeşler (directly across from Hakkıoğlu) which specializes in excellent lahmacun and oven-baked tava kebap. On the other side of the perpendicular street is Hamo'nun Yeri, which for years was probably the only restaurant in Istanbul making nohut dürüm, a wrap of fresh tırnaklı ekmek flatbread stuffed with soft, savory chickpeas that have been boiled in bone broth and topped with parsley, onions, peppers and spices.
Hamo'nun Yeri is run by Sakıp Gül and his family, who own the bakery next door that produces the right out of the oven tırnaklı ekmek that is used in their wraps. We asked Gül if the secret to delicious chickpeas is the fact they are cooked in bone broth, which renders an otherwise vegan dish not suitable for herbivores. He acknowledged that his chickpeas are cooked in the broth, but that the secret is that his mother makes them. As I sit down to enjoy one, Gül's mother pops in and greets me with a smile. Despite offering a regionally-specific dish not widely known outside of Antep, Gül has a wide range of customers who come to enjoy what is traditionally served for breakfast in Gül's home district of Nizip. They start at 6AM and years ago they would sell out early, but now they also serve wraps of braised lamb liver and are open well into the evening.
The most popular restaurant in the area is Bağdat Ocakbaşı, which renowned Turkish food critic Vedat Milor once referred to as “the grillhouse of my dreams.” This spot is so busy that they had to open a second branch just a stone's throw away on the edge of the neighborhood. The içli köfte and açık ayran are to die for, as are the dürüm, served in the same fresh slice of tırnaklı ekmek and topped with green onions. Served alongside are fiery roasted red peppers and there are at least half a dozen spices in cute silver containers that one can choose from. I've taken multiple friends to eat here, and it's worth the hour-plus commute.
This might be Küçük Antep, but the owner of Bağdat Ocakbaşı is from Urfa, and one of the grillmasters, Mehmet Dündar, who has worked there for 30 years, is from Malatya. “There are people from around the area who come in, but not many,” Dündar said when I asked him about the neighborhood, adding that they have many customers from Izmit, Izmir and Ankara. The restaurant has reached a level of fame that is a destination that attracts people from all over Istanbul and Turkey. Dündar kindly treats me to their delicious içli köfte, çiğ köfte, and refreshing açık ayran. I sit in the middle of the restaurant around a fountain where one lone goldfish swims. Occasionally Dündar will throw morsels of liver to the fish, which quickly chomps it down.
The shops that lie adjacent to these beloved restaurants feature rows of the dried eggplants and peppers of varying levels of spice that are used to make dolma. The sign of one store insists that ALL of their peppers are spicy, and I have no reason to doubt that. Across the street adjacent to a dessert shop, a written warning from the apartment building next door firmly discourages people from consuming the sweets in front of the building's entrance. A firm that doubles as a bus company and baklava maker brings the iconic dessert from Antep to its small counterpart in Istanbul daily, by bus of of course. On this Saturday evening, Hizmet Kardeşler and Bağdat Ocakbaşı are packed with families enjoying their dinner. Vendors on the street try to seize this opportunity by selling balloons and illuminated toys to children. Other solid kebab joints include Çetin Usta and Beleş Ocakbaşı, while Kilisli Hacıoğulları serves up the specialties of Antep's neighboring province of Kilis.
On the edge of the neighborhood is Acaral Turşucusu, a tiny pickle shop open since 1975 that is run by Taha Ufuk, a fourth-generation pickler. In addition to his own wide array of pickles and pickle juicy, a spicy glass of which we quickly down, there is a shelf with every possible different type of vinegar one can think of. He's been around here before the area resembled a miniature Gaziantep.
“Most of the people are from Trabzon, Kastamonu, Sivas and Malatya. The restaurants are Antepli (of Antep) in nature, but Güngören is not Antepli,” Ufuk claimed, adding that most of the area's Antepli residents started arriving in the late 1990's. Next door to the pickle shop is a fish seller and next to that is a patisserie, all of which have been there for decades. Three years ago, Ufuk made a shocking discovery at a cemetery. “Our families' graves are side by side, cake baker, fishmonger, pickleman! The shops are side by side, and the graves are side by side!” he exclaimed. Ufuk asks if I'm in English, and I tell him no, I'm American, maybe you remember, I stopped in here several years ago and we talked. At that time, he gave me a religious book, which I can't say I've read. Maybe one day. You look English, he tells me, despite my rebuttal. He then pulls out a book called “The Confessions of an English Spy,” and I'm sure he thinks I'm a British spy. I would still stop in again for his excellent pickle juice.
Resisting the urge to stop in another shop for a plate of baklava, künefe or ice cream, I make my way down the hill to the tramway. Instead of taking that, I head toward Bağcılar, passing through street after street and row after row of apartments. Güngören is Istanbul's smallest and most densely-populated district. I board the M1 metro from the main square in Bağcılar, with the hints of garlic and spicy red pepper lingering on my tongue.
Note: This article was originally published in Turkish by Apéro on June 1st, translated from the English By Reyhan Ülker.