Turkish cuisine in the southwest is closer in style to Mediterranean cuisine, with a liberal use of olive oil and herbs. A cooking class at the restaurant in this complex of hand-crafted stone villas includes lunch – with a side order of panoramic seaside views.
Aslihan Mutlu is a highly-regarded Turkish chef who shares her culinary wisdom with the many visitors to this unique development of artists’ studios, workshops, and stone houses built atop a hill above Ortakent, twenty minutes west of Bodrum. With sweeping views of the Aegean, as well as the island of Kos and Gökova Bay, the houses are patterned after ancient Roman models when Bodrum was known as Halicarnassus.
An afternoon with Mutlu commences at a local market before heading to the kitchen. Guests sit at a table in front of mounds of fresh produce to learn some of the traditions of Turkish cuisine that Mutlu acquired from her grandmother who lived in a Greco-Bulgarian region of Thrace. Regional wines are poured and by the time baklava and mastica ice cream is served on a terrace overlooking the water, you might be thinking about opening your own restaurant along the Aegean.
