Istanbul
I went to Istanbul a few weeks ago. I didn’t get to go to the Istanbul branch of Saf because it was out of the way, but I had some great food elsewhere.
Çiya in Kadıköy is a great restaurant, although the service is a little complex. The cold mezze buffet is self-serve (I think?) and has a lot of salads with pomegranate, eggplant, various greens, and dolmas, and you can order hot dishes at the counter or from your waiter (or maybe just from one or the other, I’m not sure?). I didn’t get to try kabak tatlısı (pumpkin in syrup), but I did get a plate of candied fruit (olives, tomato, eggplant, figs, and a plum, I think–ask for it without cream on the side if you want to avoid the mistake I made) at Çiya. I also had potato and spinach gözleme somewhere too, but I think it had butter spread on top.
The street food–popcorn, roasted corn, simit, pomegranate juice–was also really good.
The restaurants in Sultanahmet, where most of the major attractions for visitors are, seem kind of lame, but there is one with lots of good vegan cold mezze, Sultan Mehmet at Alemdar Caddesi 24.
The apple tea that seems to be common there is also good.
I also went to the big Carrefour in Kadıköy and got a few things: the ubiquitous condiment pul biber–also known as Aleppo pepper–which is a ground red chili moistened with a little oil; urfa biber, a darker ground chili with a fruity flavor; a big, inexpensive bag of sun-dried tomatoes; and Turkish red lentils, which seem to be like the red lentils I’m used to in the UK and US, but smaller and unsplit.
As far as non-food related stuff to do, I really liked Kariye Müzesi, a church with lots of Byzantine frescos that survived due to getting plastered over when the church became a mosque. It was a little hard to find, but one way to get there is to go to Topkapı-Ulubatlı metro station, then turn right and walk along the Theodosian Walls through an area in various stages of collapse and abandonment until you get to Mihrimah Sultan mosque. Turn right just past the mosque, and you should see signs directing you to Kariye Müzesi.
The Basilica Cistern, where they reused Medusa-faced blocks as column bases, is also pretty neat.
Knowing a little Turkish is definitely helpful; many people don’t speak any English, and while I learned a few words of Turkish, I still ended up communicating in gestures a few times.