Cult classic Turkish sandwich stars at former Efendy chef’s new takeaway spot

The spiritual home of balik ekmek is Istanbul, but the famed fish sandwich has snared a local address at the sparkling new Sydney Fish Market. On Wednesday, February 18, Turkish-Australian chef Somer Sivrioglu opens Hamsi Street, a standalone takeaway venue where balik ekmek is the star of the show.

Sivrioglu’s earliest food memories include trips to Istanbul’s docks for balik ekmek. He watched fishermen grill the catch of the day (mostly mackerel) before carefully tucking them between bread or in a roll. Sivrioglu will stay mostly true to the Istanbul original, although he has replaced raw onion with a lightly pickled version, and he’ll include rocket pesto as well as fresh rocket. “They use whatever greens are in season in Turkey,” he said.

Hamsi Street, located next door to Sivrioglu’s recently opened Hamsi Taverna, will hard launch with mackerel as the centrepiece to the sandwich ($23) and longer-term plans to add a snapper version.

What is it about this humble sandwich that remains so enduring, and has Turkish taxi drivers and politicians queueing side-by-side with tourists? Is it Turkey’s version of the Bunnings onion-topped sausage in bread? Sivrioglu believes it’s that, and more. He points to its broader influence in haute cuisine, with Michelin-starred Mikla Restaurant, in Istanbul, producing a refined version with anchovy embedded in thinly sliced olive oil bread.

The newly opened Sydney Fish Market isn’t the only early 2026 action in the seafood sandwich category. In the eastern suburbs, 10 William St in Paddington is serving a fried ling sandwich for Friday lunches.

Stalwart Bronte Road Bistro has also rebranded and relaunched in recent weeks as Bronte Road Fish. A fish burger is included on the new menu alongside a tuna smash burger and prawn katsu burger, available for both dine-in and takeaway. Chef-owner Matt Barnett says the move to more casual dishes reflects the change in people’s dining preferences. “People have less time to dine. They want something quick, easy and delicious, made from good-quality ingredients,” he said.

For Sivrioglu, his previous ventures have used the sandwich as inspiration, reinterpreting it as a special with cured trevally, taramasalata and caviar. Now he wants to be truer to the original. Turkish-born Sivrioglu built a small empire of restaurants in Sydney, including Barangaroo’s Anason and the now-closed Efendy at Balmain, before he was plucked to present MasterChef Turkey.

Sivrioglu also operates an Efendy restaurant in Istanbul, where he became entangled in a legal dispute shortly after the restaurant’s 2022 opening, when a retaining wall to the property collapsed, with one person killed and another injured. Despite not being the landlord and the wall not being attached to the restaurant, the chef was among those caught up in the case. “It’s been a long process, but we’re confident it’ll finally be resolved soon,” he said.

The chef is now focusing on his business interests in Sydney, which include a possible local reboot of Efendy. “Still no site but [I’m] looking, [I’d] love to bring it back to the inner west,” he said. At Hamsi Street, his likeness now adorns cans of beer. “It’s brewed by Yulli’s, they are friends of mine,” he said. “We wanted to make a Mediterranean-style larger that goes well with seafood. There’s a bit of rice in it.”

The Hamsi Street menu is tight, but does include an Antakya-style hummus with burnt sumac butter, whipped taramasalata with lemon oil and cured roe, as well as calamari with chilli pepper. “We’re also going to do slider-sized Taksim sloppy burgers,” Sivrioglu said.

Located at the Glebe end of the Fish Market, the bank of steps right outside Hamsi Street offer plenty of seating.

While overfishing and environmental damage has led to less freshly caught fish straight from the Bosphorus, Sivrioglu has no such supply problems at Sydney Fish Market. He’s already tapped seafood wholesalers for a regular supply of mackerel, and hopes the success of balik ekmek doesn’t drive the price of the affordable species up in the way food trends have in the past. “When I was at Efendy [nearly] 20 years ago, beef cheeks were only $2 a kilo,” he said.

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