A taste of Turkey in Izmir

Nestled among the 500-year-old olive groves of the Kozak Plateau, about halfway between Istanbul and the city of Izmir in western Turkey, is Demircidere. A picture-perfect village of about 300 souls, Demircidere is unique for two reasons.

First, residents here still wear traditional handmade clothing: baggy pants, long-sleeve cotton shirts, colourful headscarves adorned with silver and gold to ward off evil spirits and multi-layered skirts.

Second, the farm work – whether it be winemaking, tending olive groves, harvesting pine nuts or herding cattle – is distributed equally by women and men, irrespective of how physically demanding it is.

The women of Demircidere are also involved in small-scale ecotourism projects like the Be My Guest Luncheon experience, a stopover on a luxury coach trip on Trafalgar Travel’s 14-day guided tour of Turkey.

I was sceptical when I disembarked at Demircidere to a reception hosted by a conga line of smiling village women dressed like extras from a Borat movie. A few years ago I found myself on an “authentic” village tour in Fiji that was so contrived I did a runner. Yet my preconceptions were blown out the window after our tour group of 30 broke up into groups of five for lunch in villagers’ homes.

My hosts – two lovely women called Zohre and Fatma – couldn’t speak any English, though it didn’t really matter. There was barely a moment’s silence and constant laughter as we moved from sign language, to charades, to word association in a touching and heartfelt effort to communicate with one another.

The meal kicked off with freshly baked sourdough bread and tarhana soup – a hearty broth made of wheat flour, tomato, onion and mint served with a big dollop of yoghurt. Next was screaming eggplant, a rich ragout-like recipe in which every ingredient with the exception of salt came from this village.

In between courses we grazed on black and green olives, feta gozleme (Turkish pancakes) and grape leaves stuffed with pine nuts, rice and spinach. For dessert, we had homemade baklava – baked filo pastry filled with crushed pistachios, walnuts, almonds and drowned in honey that actually melted in my mouth. Not a metaphor.

When it was time to go, we all hugged. “Gorusmek uzere,” our hosts said as we departed – “Come back soon.” No doubt they meant it.