The Flavours of Datça: Almonds, Honey and Olive Oil

Datça's food isn't showy; it's seasonal. The dry, sunny hills suit almonds and olives, the slopes of thyme and pine keep the beekeepers busy, and the sea on either side brings fish to the table. The result is simple cooking built on excellent produce.

Here's what to eat, when to eat it — and what to pack in your suitcase on the way home.

Almonds are Datça's signature crop. Orchards fill the peninsula's villages; the trees blossom at the end of winter, usually around February, and the nuts are harvested in late summer. Local almonds are sold raw or roasted, and you'll find almond biscuits and almond paste in shops around town and at the market.

If you're here in spring, look out for çağla — young green almonds, eaten whole with a pinch of salt before the shell hardens. The season is short, so don't hesitate when you see them.

The peninsula's hills are covered in thyme, sage and pine, so beekeeping has deep roots here. The two honeys you'll come across most are thyme honey — light amber and intensely aromatic — and pine honey, which is darker, less sweet and richer.

The Muğla region is one of Turkey's leading producers of pine honey, and the hives you'll spot along village roads are part of that tradition. At breakfast, local honey with butter or clotted cream is a fixture on the table. Crystallisation is a natural process in honey, so don't let a set jar put you off.

Head west from the centre and the olive groves grow thicker. The area around Yazıköy is known for trees that have stood for centuries, and simply wandering among their gnarled, twisting trunks is an experience in itself. The harvest begins in late autumn and runs into early winter — the best time to taste new-season oil at its freshest.

Cracked green olives at breakfast, olive-oil dishes at lunch, a generous pour over every salad: in Datça, olive oil is less an ingredient than the foundation of the kitchen.

Wild greens — otlar — are one of the best-loved parts of Aegean cooking, and they take pride of place in Datça too. In winter and spring, greens such as wild chicory, mallow and wild radish leaves are gathered from field edges and gardens, then braised in olive oil, simply boiled and dressed with lemon, or folded into börek pastries and gözleme flatbreads. In summer, samphire is a fixture on meze platters.

In lokantas — simple, home-style restaurants — ask what's in the pots that day: seasonal olive-oil dishes, stuffed courgette flowers in summer, or the greens of the day.

The fish restaurants around the harbour, and the waterside tables in coves such as Palamutbükü and Hayıtbükü, are the classic spots for dinner. In many places you choose your fish from the counter rather than a menu, so ask what came in that day and what's in season. Fish is usually priced by weight: agree the weight and the price before it goes on the grill, and everyone's happy. In summer it's worth booking a table for dinner, especially in the coves.

The meze that come first matter just as much: wild greens, samphire, octopus or calamari, and salads dressed with local olive oil.

The weekly town market is the easiest way to see the peninsula's food in one place. Alongside seasonal fruit and vegetables, village producers sell their own almonds, honey, olive oil, dried herbs and homemade jams. Ask where you're staying which day it's held, and go early — for the best choice and a chat with the growers.