Eat Well
Balaban, met helvası and the rest of the Eskişehir table
Meatballs on butter-soaked bread under tomato and yogurt, a pulled halva that isn't the tahini kind, and a simit with its own protected name.
Not yet checked by the Smileys team — prices and hours may have moved.
Why do it?
Beyond çibörek, the city has a short, distinctive table. Balaban kebabı is its plate for a hungry lunch: small grilled köfte laid on cubes of pide, covered with tomato sauce and yogurt, with melted butter poured over the top — related to İskender in shape, but with köfte in place of döner. Met helvası is the sweet, and it is not the sesame halva most people know: flour is roasted slowly in oil, then pulled together with boiled sugar syrup by a team of hands until it turns into fine strands, and cut into short, fibrous sticks. It was registered as a geographical indication in 2017, and its name comes from 'met', an old children's game played with sticks — the loser, the story goes, had to make the helva. The Eskişehir simidi, crisp and heavy with sesame, joined the protected list in 2022.
The Smileys Take
Do balaban at lunch in a plain esnaf lokantası or a kebab house that lists it by name — order it for yourself, it's not a sharing dish, and come hungry. Buy met helvası by the box from a helva shop in the centre and eat it with tea; it's lighter than it looks and very sweet, so don't plan on more than a couple of sticks. A simit in the morning from a street cart is the cheapest good thing in the city. We name no restaurants on purpose — Eskişehir's food scene turns over fast with the student calendar, so ask in the group what's good this term.
Do it with people
Nothing is scheduled around this in Eskişehir yet. When a host plans it, it shows here — the calendar and hangouts are the places to look meanwhile.
More like this
There's always more Eskişehir.