Antalya Food: Local Dishes and Where to Try Them

What food Antalya is known for

The dishes most closely tied to the city are şiş köfte served with Antalya piyazı, hibeş, tahinli cevizli kabak tatlısı and yanık dondurma. A watermelon-rind jam, called karpuz kabuğu reçeli, also belongs to the Antalya table and appears at breakfast. Antalya is a resort city with plenty of mediocre food aimed at tourists, so knowing these names helps you pick the places that cook locally.

Piyaz and şiş köfte: the Antalya plate to order first

This is the pairing to learn first. In Antalya, ground beef skewers arrive not with a green salad but with piyaz: beans, onions and a sauce made with sesame paste, egg and spices. Order şiş köfte ve Antalya piyazı together and you have the city's signature plate, served in small traditional restaurants as well as larger ones.

For a cheaper, simpler version, look for a piyaz specialist outside the medieval quarter. Piyazci Ahmet near Kaleiçi was named in a 48-hour Antalya guide for its small plates and its ezogelin soup. Prices get out of date fast, so treat any figure you see quoted as a snapshot and check the menu board.

Hibeş, the sesame meze that starts a meal

Hibeş is an appetiser made from garlic, cumin, lemon and tahini. It comes as a small meze dish and works with kebab, fish or a rakı table. The taste is nutty and sharp rather than hot, so it suits anyone who finds other mezes too rich. Order it at the start of a meal and share it, the way a meyhane expects.

Kabak tatlısı with tahini and walnuts

Pumpkin dessert appears across Turkey, but in Antalya it is served with tahini and walnuts. The sesame paste softens the sweetness of the candied pumpkin, and the walnuts add texture. It is a gentler finish than baklava and pairs naturally with a glass of Turkish tea. Look for it on dessert menus in traditional restaurants and ask for tahinli cevizli kabak tatlısı by name.

Yanık dondurma, Antalya's burnt ice cream

Yanık dondurma takes its name from the slightly burnt taste of goat's milk, which gives the ice cream its character without tasting of goat. You find it in cafés across the city. Akdeniz Dondurma Salonu is the place to try it: order a scoop of the plain burnt ice cream under a fruit flavour such as strawberry or lemon, and use the glass cases to sample Turkish desserts too.

Street vendors in fez hats serve the same ice cream with a show of balancing cones and pretend drops. The theatre is part of the experience, and the ice cream itself is smooth. Pistachio and honey almond are good flavours to start with if you want something beyond the plain scoop.

Street food: simit, börek and stuffed mussels

Breakfast on the street means simit, the sesame-covered ring, and börek, the filled pastry. Çankaya Simitçisi and Tarihi Ankara Simit Fırını both serve these with tea, and the meat-filled börek is the one to try. Midye dolma vendors sell stuffed mussels by the piece; in 2022 a travel blog quoted a price of about 1.5 lira per mussel, which shows how far lira prices can move in a few years. For a fuller picture of street stalls across the city, see the Antalya street food guide.

Pide, kebab and meat dishes in the old town and beyond

Pide is the flatbread most visitors call Turkish pizza, and in Antalya it is worth ordering at a dedicated pide salonu. Can Can Pide Yemek Salonu was named as a favourite for pide and kebab in a 2022 food guide. For a meat-focused dinner away from the harbour restaurants, look at Gunaydin Kebap and Kesap Steakhouse, which the same guide recommends for grilled meat. Both are the kind of place where you order a few dishes and share.

Where to eat by part of the city: Kaleiçi, the harbour and Konyaaltı

Kaleiçi is one large restaurant terrace, with meyhanes serving meze and seafood. Ayar Meyhanesi combines lokanta-style starters with a seafood menu, and in a 48-hour Antalya guide its fish was quoted from around £8 per kilo. That figure is history, not a current price. Walk the old lanes around Hadrian's Gate and read the menus before you sit down.

Near the harbour and Atatürk Caddesi, Çitir Balik serves fried fish in a bun with a salad bar of toppings. The same guide quoted about £2 for a sandwich there, again as a historical figure. It is a quick lunch rather than a sit-down meal, and it fits a day of walking between the old town and the water.

Konyaaltı has the higher-end restaurants, including 7 Mehmet, which updates traditional dishes such as tripe soup and aubergine shakshuka. For a slower breakfast, Nar Beach offers a large platter spread of dolma, kaymak and similar items. Both are a taxi or tram ride from the old town, so plan them as a separate meal rather than a stop on a walking route.

How to order: lokanta, pide salonu, meyhane and market stalls

A lokanta is a traditional inn or canteen where cooked dishes are displayed and you point at what you want; it is the cheapest way to try several local plates at once. A pide salonu specialises in flatbreads, a meyhane in meze and seafood with rakı, and a market stall in single items such as gözleme or stuffed mussels. Knowing which kind of place you are walking into tells you whether to expect a menu, a counter or a tray.

The Liman Mahallesi Kapalı covered market, held on Tuesdays, is a good place to eat your way through the city in one stop. You will find gözleme made to order, ayran to drink and produce from figs to pumpkins. Go hungry and carry cash for the small stalls.

What a meal costs and how to read a menu

Prices in Antalya vary enormously between a market stall and a Konyaaltı restaurant, and the lira has moved sharply since the figures in older guides were published. A 2022 blog quoted about 200 lira for a meal for two outside the main tourist areas, while the 48-hour guide quoted £2 for a fish sandwich and small plates. Treat all of these as dated examples and confirm the price on the menu or board before ordering.

Simple etiquette: tea, rakı and sharing plates

Meals in Antalya often begin with tea rather than coffee. Turks drink tea from small tulip-shaped glasses, without milk, and a meyhane meal usually centres on a rakı table: a spread of meze shared among the group with rakı in the middle. Order several small plates rather than one large dish, and expect to pass them around. If you want a full Turkish breakfast instead, see the Antalya breakfast guide.

Which Antalya dish to try first

Start with şiş köfte and Antalya piyazı, because it is the plate most specific to the city and easy to find in ordinary restaurants. Add hibeş as a shared starter, finish with burnt ice cream or pumpkin dessert with tahini, and use a market stall or a simit shop for breakfast. Once you know the names, the menus stop looking foreign.