Mehmet Ayaz

Breakfast

A traditional Turkish breakfast of fresh warm bread, butter, jam, honey, olives, tomatoes, cucumbers, cheese, sausage, yogurt and eggs, served with tea, coffee, juice or milk. The crew may prepare a surprise some mornings, such as spicy sausage with scrambled egg, or a selection of traditional pastries — including börek, delicious savoury pastries of thin layered dough (yufka), filled with cheese, minced meat, spinach or potato, baked, griddled or fried.

Lunch

A lighter meal for the heat of the day, often built around vegetables — a Turkish table favourite, sometimes stuffed with meat. Dolma (stuffed green peppers, eggplants, tomatoes, courgettes or vine leaves) is a highlight: filled with a meat mix and served with a yoghurt sauce, or a rice mix served at room temperature. Accompanied by salads, pasta, rice or chips, and followed by fresh fruit.

Afternoon Tea

Served with biscuits or cake as the boat settles into a bay for the afternoon.

Dinner

The main course is fish or meat, accompanied by an assortment of meze (starters), followed by dessert and fruit. Fresh fish — grey mullet, sea bass, red mullet, sea bream, swordfish and more — comes from the surrounding coast, at its best grilled over charcoal. Lamb and chicken are firm favourites, and meatballs are prepared with minced meat, spices, egg and onion. Seasonal fresh fruit closes every meal: strawberries, cherries and apricots in spring, peaches, figs, watermelon and melon through summer, grapes late in the season, and citrus in winter.