The Multiculturalist: Grace Yip

When Grace Yip met her husband Guner Buran while learning how to cook in Turkey three years ago, she did a lot more than just marry him—she brought back his culture and his mama’s cooking too. And now she’s sharing the delightful Turkish recipes that she learned from her mother-in-law in her third private venture to date: Turkish Anne (which means Turkish Mama in English).

For designer-turned-chef Grace, cooking had always been in her blood (her extended family in Indonesia is involved in the restaurant business), but it was only after her travels in Turkey that she decided to follow her true calling. When she returned to Hong Kong with Guner, the two of them set up an upper floor cafe called I Love Istanbul in Mong Kok, serving Turkish coffee and Turkish delights. With its success, the pair turned to Grace’s cousin-in-law Kelvin Cheung for help to open a second establishment, this time a private kitchen called I Love Bali (with its latest location being a floor-to-ceiling windowed establishment on Dundas Street). At I Love Bali, Kelvin’s mother-in-law and Grace’s own mother—both Indonesian Chinese—cook up different Indonesian specialties such as beef rendang and satay skewers in the Bogor (saucier) and Jambi (drier, more spice-oriented) styles, while Grace complements the already exotic menu with Turkish dishes like saksuka (eggplant with tomatoes) and yogurt chicken (a saucy yogurt-based chicken dish garnished with onions and Turkish spices). The reasoning behind this is that the spicier Indonesian dishes are very well counterbalanced by the yogurt and dairy-heavy Turkish dishes—which makes a lot of sense after this was explained to us, but would definitely appear random to an uninformed diner.

Since I Love Bali is still predominantly Indonesian by appearance and name, Grace wanted to have another venue to better flaunt her husband’s culture, and so Turkish Anne was created to serve complicated, more time-consuming Turkish dishes. Diners need to book at least a day in advance to sample delicacies including su boregi (a cheese-filled pastry) and manti (Turkish dumplings stuffed with lamb and other meats, along with onions and spices) in a Turkish home environment. Turkish Anne, located in a residential building on Pitt Street, is as eclectic and homey as it gets. The place serves as a children’s play center during the day (Grace and Guner’s beautiful toddler daughter, Asya, is the pinup girl for the center’s promotional posters), and converts into a true private kitchen with one long family-style dining table by night. With so many ventures under her belt, the very family-focused Grace gets help from Guner, Kelvin and other family members to keep things afloat. Her family’s various roots are what made Grace get into cooking after all.

I Love Istanbul: Unit 4, 13/F, Pokpolee Commercial Centre, A-1K Sai Yeung Choi St. South, Mong Kok, 6120-8006.

I Love Bali: 14/F, Hanway Commercial Centre, 36 Dundas St., Mong Kok, 5401-3402.

Turkish Anne: Flat 5, 5/F, Cheung Hing Building, 46 Pitt St., Yau Ma Tei, 5401-0025.