For Coskun Uysal, it was Yotam Ottolenghi who made it all better. Despite positive reviews from prominent food publications, Tulum – Uysal’s modern Turkish restaurant in Melbourne – struggled to get diners through the door in the early days.
“People expect rugs on the wall, dips and kebabs, it was hard. They would accuse me of not being Turkish,” he says.
Then in 2017, Ottolenghi paid a visit, along with the judges from MasterChef Australia. “After three dishes Yotam got up from the table and walked into the kitchen and just gave me a hug,” Uysal says. Soon after, Uysal appeared on the 2018 season of the reality cooking show. “Suddenly instead of trying to talk to 50 people each night I could talk to all of Australia at once and they listened. That was the turning point.”
The Istanbul-born chef’s culinary style is borne from his London training at the River Cafe and Jamie Oliver’s Fifteen, as well as running his own mod-Turkish restaurant in his home city. But above all he credits his mother – a chef herself – for her lasting influence.
“We have so many different regions in Turkey, some close to the Middle East, some close to the Aegean. There are so many different influences and styles. She knew them all,” he says. “Every night she would make three or four different dishes. I would eat all the different flavours from across Turkey.”
At Tulum, icli kofte – lamb meatballs – becomes a slice of pie stuffed with cumin-spiced lamb, and is served with a buttermilk garlic sauce. Mantar sote (sauteed mushrooms) becomes pine mushrooms with hazelnut butter, Turkish-coffee mousse, confit egg yolk and puffed barley.
“I take the basic things I learned from my mother, I don’t change the flavour … but it doesn’t look like Turkish food,” Uysal says.
Even traditional breakfast dishes are shaped under this lens. Cilbir is typically served as garlic yoghurt with poached eggs, but with Uysal’s imagination at Tulum it comes with crispy chicken skin, smoked yoghurt, burnt buttermilk and duck eggs.
Yet, while innovation and creativity are important to Uysal, tradition and ritual are equally valued. “We eat different food at home though and that food is for family.” Cilbir was the weekend breakfast of his childhood, and his below recipe is simple, quick and elegant. It can be made, if necessary, with fewer ingredients, Uysal says, but eggs and yoghurt are essentials – as is toasted Turkish bread.
Coskun Uysal’s cilbir (Turkish eggs and yoghurt with spiced butter)
(Pictured above)
Prep 2 min
Cook 10 min
Serves 2
60ml white wine vinegar
4 eggs
For the garlic yoghurt
100g full-fat yoghurt
1 garlic clove, grated
For the spiced butter
80g butter
1 tbsp aleppo chilli flakes
1 tsp sweet paprika
To serve
Salt, to season
2 tbsp parsley, finely chopped
Toasted Turkish bread
To make the garlic yoghurt, combine the yoghurt and garlic in a bowl, then set aside.
To make the spiced butter, in a small saucepan over a low heat, slowly melt the butter until it starts to sizzle. Add the chilli flakes and paprika and stir well to infuse with the butter – about two minutes. Remove from the heat and set aside, keeping warm.
Bring a large pot of water to the boil and add the vinegar. Reduce the heat to a simmer and crack the eggs into water, and poach for three to four minutes. Remove the eggs with a slotted spoon and set aside to drain on a clean cloth.
To serve, spoon the garlic yoghurt into a wide bowl. Place the eggs on top of the yoghurt and pour over the spiced butter. Season well with salt and sprinkle with parsley, then serve with toasted Turkish bread.