Çiçek Pasajı, İstiklal Caddesi No. 172, just northeast of Galatasaray Square (map), is a long narrow courtyard within a historic building.
The courtyard is lined with restaurants offering generally good food (including seafood) in pleasant surroundings.
The atmosphere in the historic building is congenial, the service usually competent and friendly, and the tradition of rather high prices and unexpected mystery price mark-ups not as prominent as at some times in the past.
The Çiçek Pasajı (Flower Passage) is the place some Turks bring first-time foreign visitors to Istanbul. If you don't have a Turkish friend or guide, try the Sevinç Restaurant.
Second- and third-time visitors usually go to the tavernas (meyhane) several streets away on Nevizade Sokak, which is perhaps a bit more "authentic," though also more crowded and chaotic. More...
Here are tips for other dining experiences in and around Galatasaray Square.
—by Tom Brosnahan
Çiçek Pasajı restaurants in the historic Cité de Péra building, Galatasaray.
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