Having catered to star European footballers and Hollywood actors the exotic dishes of central Asia, internationally known Chef Ismail Kaya now tries his hand in the culinary fusion with Bengali cuisine.
"From dolma, fish to pilav and pasta and kebabs, Bengali cuisine has lots of similarities with certain dishes in middle east, while having their unique tanginess. "Fusion is a great possibility for the gourmet in every part of the globe, here, in Turkey everywhere, but you have to work on the similarities and divergence in tastes so that it doesn't look out of place," the internationally known chef, associated with Swissotel Izmir said.
Kaya, having one regret not to rustle up food for Raj Kapoor, whose films he got addicted to and picked up a smattering of Hindi, said, "Your shooting units are frequently seen in our country these days. Many of them had come over to my place. But I don't know their names except they were stars in their own land with quite a following."
The fusion variety food includes Karniyarik - Fried eggplants with a minced meat, onion, garlic and tomato, Lahmacun, Lahmacun, Kurufasulye - unfamiliar names but having distinct Indian flavour "as we two cultures have lots of similarities down the ages.
