Bartın pirinçli mantısı
Rice and meat mantı
Squares of thin dough wrapped around minced meat and rice, browned in a tray, cooked in stock and finished with melted butter.
Black Sea Region
Bartın
Bartın’s table begins with savory plates but saves the final word for its sweets. First comes pirinçli mantı, thin dough wrapped around minced meat and rice, browned in a tray, cooked in stock and finished with melted butter. In Amasra, fish meals open with Amasra salatası, a plate of many vegetables and herbs dressed with olive oil, vinegar and pomegranate syrup, and turbot is eaten in season, especially in Amasra. Then the sweets begin to arrive. Beyaz baklava, filled with walnuts and starch, is baked slowly so it stays pale before meeting cold syrup; it is a wedding sweet. Ağda tatlısı owes its white color and paste-like body to çöven root. İncir donduması brings softened dried figs together with warm buffalo or cow’s milk. Stretching from a tray of mantı to a sweet of figs and milk, this table is a good place to start getting to know Bartın through its sweets. Follow the line from çöven-white ağda all the way to incir donduması.
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Wooden houses on the Black Sea
Amasra’s harbour and a table of fish, salad and sweets.
Signature dishes
Explore a colorful coastal salad, a warming grain-based soup and a market tradition shaped by local produce.
Cornmeal Soup with Croutons
A smooth cornmeal and milk soup served with tomato-paste sauce and butter-toasted bread cubes.
Bartın yumurtalı ısput
Isput greens with eggs
Isput greens boiled, squeezed and sautéed with onion, then cooked with eggs.
Amasra salatası
Many-vegetable salad
A salad of many chopped vegetables and herbs dressed with olive oil, vinegar and pomegranate syrup, served before fish.
Bartın gözlemesi
Basil-milk gözleme
Plain gözleme cooked on a stone griddle over a wood fire, then moistened with milk boiled with basil, oil and black pepper.
Bartın kabak burması
Coiled squash pastry
Yufka spread with grated squash, crushed walnuts and sugar, twisted into rolls, coiled in a tray, baked and soaked in syrup.
Bartın beyaz baklavası
Pale walnut baklava
Walnut and starch baklava baked slowly so it stays pale, then soaked in cold syrup; a wedding sweet.
Bartın ağda tatlısı
Çöven root sweet
A white, paste-like sweet made from çöven root, sugar, citric acid and water.
Bartın incir donduması
Set fig and milk dessert
Dried figs softened and mashed with warm buffalo or cow’s milk, left to set and chilled.
Locally cooked
Fried Turbot
Lightly floured turbot steaks fried until golden, with sumac onions and lemon.
Local ingredients
Turbot
Raw European turbot cut into bone-in steaks for frying.
Isput
A leafy green cooked with eggs in yumurtalı ısput.
Guide not written yetÇöven kökü
The root that gives ağda tatlısı its white color and paste-like body.
Guide not written yetFood culture
Tel kırma uses fine metal thread worked into fabric with a specialized needle. The provincial culture directorate documents its motifs and uses in shawls and household textiles. The name refers to breaking the wire during the work rather than cutting it with scissors. Amasra also has a wood-carving tradition, including small serving and household objects. These crafts place materials and makers alongside food, giving the guide a broader view of daily culture.
A table of sweets
White baklava, squash burma, ağda and fig donduma all carry Bartın’s name.
Fish and salad in Amasra
In Amasra, fish meals open with a salad of many chopped vegetables and herbs.
What to bring home
- Bartın white baklava
- Ağda tatlısı
- Bartın tatlı böreği
- Hand-made boxwood spoons
- Tel kırma embroidery
History & landscape
In Bartın, history shows first in the façades of its wooden houses. These examples of Ottoman-period civic architecture stand in gardens enclosed by tree fences known as “Daraba”, and the Art Nouveau and Baroque patterns on their fronts reflect the woodworking art of the region.
On the coast, Amasra tells a story bound up with the sea. Named after Queen Amastris, the town has a castle built in the Byzantine period and seriously repaired under the Genoese and the Ottomans. It consists of two main parts, Sormagir Castle on Boztepe and Zindan Castle, joined by the single-arched Kemere Bridge, which also dates from the Byzantine period. The Genoese who ruled Amasra, then called Samastro, appointed consuls from Genoa, and emblems from that era appear on the castle walls. When Sultan Mehmet the Conqueror took the town in 1460, an old Byzantine church within the castle was converted into a mosque.
