Turkish Muse

Trabzon: Anıl Pide

It is a sad fact that not all Turkish food is good in Turkey. I'm sure it must be like that everywhere. There must be, of course, lackluster croissants in France and fair to middlin' paella in Spain. But I find it to be especially sad that one of my favorite Turkish foods -- pide -- is something I cannot seem to find in Izmir.

There used to be an amazing Konyalı pide place just by our house, but after it closed due to general incompotence, I spent months trying to find a replacement. And I never did. Most of the pide made at the places I tried in Izmir came straight out of the kitchen soggy and wet -- how do they even do that? -- and had far too much oil than necessary. 

As a result, I haven't had good pide in months and they were long, long months. And when we went to Trabzon I more than made up for that.

When we told the driver we hired for the day that we wanted to eat pide for lunch, he said he knew just where to take us. We followed his lead and he took us straight to Anıl Pide, just off Ataturk Alanı in the heart of Trabzon's centre.

I started off with the Yaprak Pide, which reminded me a lot of lahmacun (below) and Jeff ordered the kapalı kiymalı pide (closed meat pide, above middle-right). Both were excellent, though they didn't quite make up for a months-long pidesiz existence.

So in the evening -- after our driver had left us and he coudn't see our secret shame -- we scurried back to the restaurant and tried a few more options. I know it's unorthodox, but tavuklu pide (pide with chicken) is one of my favorite types of pide. Actually, it IS my favorite type of pide. It's just that it's kind of difficult to find on most menus so I normally end up going with karışık (mixed), which I always hope means I get a few obligatory tomatoes instead of a half kilo of ground meat.

But when Jeff ordered his pide (below) we realized the secret to the Black Sea's pide reputation: butter. Copious amounts of butter. And not just used in the actual cooking but piled in a melting spoonful on top.

I figured after all those months of not eating pide, any amount of butter I ate that day would be more than worth it.

Useful info: Anıl Pide, Ataturk Alanı No 8, Trabzon, Tel: 0462 321 05 40 / 321 05 41

Trabzon: Atatürk Pavilion

After spending the morning at the Sumela Monastery in Trabzon, we then headed over to the Atatürk Pavilion, an early 20th-century summer house originally built on the hills of Trabzon by a wealthy banker. 

I don't really go for Atatürk paraphernalia, which is what the former house is now dedicated to, but I'm kind of obsessed with 20-century architecture, particularly when it comes to houses, furniture and design, so I definitely wanted to see it.

It was only when we got there that I realized I had seen it, 12 years ago on a trip with Rotary. Duh. My long-term memory is pretty bad, but still. You'd think I'd remember something like this.

 

The house was built by a Pontic Greek living in Trabzon who ran a prosperous bank and used in the summer time. Surrounded with well-manicured gardens, the house would have been a lovely place to spend summers, I imagine, though I didn't see any place for swimming and think that would have been necessary for me at least.

After the forced population exchange between Turkey and Greece, however, the family who owned the house was forced to give it up, along with their lives in Trabzon, and move to Greece. The house was then given as a "gift" to Atatürk in 1924. He stayed in the house three times during his trips to Trabzon.

But as I mentioned, I'm far more interested in design and layout, and this gorgeous entryway coat rack immediately caught my eye.

They don't make them like that anymore, do they? Except maybe in Turkey.

The house was designed in a very clever way, grounded by a spacious circular central room which other rooms extended from, like spokes on a wheel. It made the house feel expansive and, I'm sure, with all the windows open, the cross breeze in the summer heat would have been lovely.

Also, isn't that pool table awesome? And those floor tiles?!

One of the handful of rooms on the ground floor is where Ataturk wrote his will. My apologies for the dark photo.

And immediately next to that is this awesome waiting room, situated to the immediate right of the entrance. I'd love to have one of these. "Wait there please, I'll be with you in a moment."

It was at this point, however, that the museum steward asked me to stop taking pictures as photography was forbidden. I attempted to steathily grab a few more shots -- particularly upstairs -- but he had one eye on me and one eye on his tour group so olmaz. That just means you'll have something to look forward to when you go see it for yourself!

As I mentioned in my Sumela Monastery post, we hired a car and driver for the day, so getting there for us was easy. It should be relatively simple to get there by bus from the city centre, however. The entry cost to the house was 2 TL. 

Trabzon: Sumela Monastery

When Jeff told me several months ago that he wanted to go to Trabzon for his birthday, I was less than enthused. Trabzon? I said. For your birthday?

There wasn't much I remembered of Trabzon from my first visit there some 12 years ago on a Rotary trip with other foreign exchange students. I remembered the Sumela Monastery and how gorgeous that was, of course, but mainly had a vision of a bland, grey industrial port town.

"Don't you want to go to Antalya or something? Somewhere we can really celebrate?" I asked.

Nope. So Trabzon it was.

I set about trying to make the most of our 48-hour trip by booking us into the Novotel -- it's the city's most Western hotel and I figured we could get a nice drink there -- and arranging a private driver to take us all over the city on Saturday, Jeff's actual birthday.

But clearly the star of our weekend -- and the reason we had travelled to Trabzon in the first place -- was the Sumela Monastery.

We first laid eyes on it from the car (above) on a 3-km road that switchbacked up a cliff facing the Altındere valley. Because we were in a car, we didn't have that much walking to do on the way to the actual monastery, not as much as I remembered from 12 years ago when we came by a large bus.

The walk up provided the perfect backdrop for a few portrait photos.

And then just a few minutes later, we saw it: the Greek Orthodox monastery built first in 386 AD and rebuilt by several subsequent emperors, used as a place of worship by generations of Pontic Greeks living in Trabzon.

What you see today is the monastery as it basically stood in the 13th century, when Alexios III (1349-1390), ruler of the Empire of Trabzon, poured money into its upkeep and expansion. 

The monastery's famous frescoes, however, weren't added until the 18th century. And I must say, the frescoes are amazing. Truly outstanding. Substantial restoration work has been done to the monastery and the frescoes are bright, vivid and clear. I've seen many smaller churches in Turkey with sadly faded and warped frescoes but these are magnificent.

My knowledge of Christianity has improved greatly having lived in Turkey these five years -- go figure -- yet I still have trouble determining what's happening in many frescoes and often turn to Jeff and say, "Who is that and what is he doing?" It's rather embarassing, really, though we did pick up a lovely book at the exit -- "The Unknown Frescoes of Sumela" by Ismail Kose -- that page by page, fresco by fresco, explains what each represents. A magnificent idea for a book. If only I had it while I was in the monastery!

We spent about two hours roaming the monastery, much of which is closed to visitors though there is definitely plenty to see. We even managed to shoot I dare say the absolute best self-portrait I've ever been able to do.

It was a fabulous start to Jeff's birthday and the weekend in general, and I was pleased to be able to go back and see the monastery a second time.

Useful Info: Getting to Sumela Monastery is remarkably easy with a tour guide. Eyce Tours offers daily trips to the monastery for 25 TL, which includes the entrance fee to Altındere National Park. Entry to the site is a separate 8 TL per person.