Why choose
Black Sea fish?

An enclosed sea, a distinctive body of water

The surface water of the Black Sea is about half as salty as the oceans. Great rivers such as the Danube, Dnieper and Dniester continually bring it fresh water and nutrients; the dense Mediterranean water entering through the Bosphorus sinks to the bottom and stays there. This creates a thin upper layer of cold, low-salinity, nutrient-rich water, above a silent, oxygen-free depth. All the fish live in the upper hundred to hundred and fifty metres.

Within this narrow layer, the seasons are harsh. In winter, the water falls to eight degrees Celsius, and two plankton blooms occur in spring and autumn. The sea imposes two demands on fish: feed heavily in a short time, and build up fat reserves for winter or migration. The character of Black Sea fish — their fat, texture and aroma — grows out of this necessity.

Flavour follows the calendar

In fish, fat carries flavour, and fat comes with the season. The same species, the same sea, a different month: a different fish.

Anchovy spends the summer feeding on the northwestern shelf, fattens up before its autumn migration and, as the cold arrives, moves south towards the Anatolian coast. At the start of the season, the fat content of its flesh approaches twenty per cent; by spring, it falls to just a few per cent. “Anchovy season” is not simply a tradition, but a window of peak condition.

Bonito enters the Black Sea from the Sea of Marmara in spring, spends the summer fattening up as it pursues schools of anchovy and sprat, and returns through the Bosphorus in autumn. It is at its fattiest from September to February. Istanbul’s lakerda tradition is built around this migration. A bonito that has spent the summer in the cold, productive waters of the Black Sea is a different fish from one that has grown in warm, salty water during the same season; Bosphorus fishermen have known this for centuries.

Turbot has a different story. Black Sea turbot is a distinctive form adapted to low-salinity water, recognisable by the large bony knobs on its back. It grows slowly, matures late and spawns in cold water. This slow development gives its flesh a firm, layered, white texture.

A shared judgement around the coast

Six countries surround the Black Sea, with many more culinary traditions. They have all treated the same fish in the same way: coating small whole fish in cornmeal and frying them. Hamsi tava in Trabzon, cornmeal-coated anchovy in Batumi, tsatsa in Varna, fried red mullet and boiled “rachki” in Odesa — the very Black Sea shrimp we offer. In Istanbul, large bonito, known as torik, is salt-cured to make lakerda.

This shared simplicity is more than a preference: it is a judgement. When a fish carries its own flavour, you do not need to add anything to it. Turbot being the most expensive fish on the counter along every coast is another expression of the same judgement.