Fried Skewer · Meyhane Starter
Midye Tava (Fried Mussels)
Photo: E4024 / Wikimedia Commons · CC BY-SA 4.0
The tarator served alongside is made from bread, walnuts, garlic and vinegar, the same sauce Istanbul's fish restaurants serve with fried calamari.
Mussels are threaded onto skewers, dipped in a light batter, and deep-fried until golden, then served with a garlicky walnut-tarator sauce for dipping. Istanbul's meyhane (tavern) streets, especially around Beyoğlu, sell them by the skewer as a beer-drinking snack.
Why it's made this way: The Bosphorus and Marmara Sea's mussel beds made shellfish a cheap street snack in Istanbul, and midye tava grew up alongside the city's raki-and-meyhane drinking culture as the fried counterpart to stuffed midye dolma.
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