The Turkish Craft Brewery That Was Born in Bangladesh

The northwestern border city of Edirne and its surrounding region is one of the more open-minded and easygoing in Turkey, famed for its fried liver, grilled meatballs, and some of the country's best wine and rakı, the ubiquitous anise-flavored spirit. People here love to eat, drink and have a good time. This is no small part due to the cultural impact of the city's pivotal location at the edge of southern Europe and its storied, multicultural past. 

Approaching Edirne on the main road from Istanbul, two of the four minarets of the majestic 16th-century Selimiye Mosque dominate the horizon. The complex is recognized as the masterpiece of Minar Sinan, the celebrated Ottoman architect who designed some of the most iconic structures in Istanbul and throughout the empire. 

“Faded glory” are perhaps the best two words to describe this small city of 200,000, which was the second capital of the Ottoman empire before it was moved 150 miles to the east to Constantinople after its capture by Mehmet the Conqueror in 1453. 

Unlike 97 percent of Turkey, which is located in Anatolia, Edirne is nestled in the remaining 3 percent that is part of Thrace, a region spread across the northeastern edge of Greece, the northwestern corner of Turkey, and the southern half of Bulgaria. The fields of Eastern Thrace leading up to Edirne are lined with sunflowers, and the Maritza River divides the Greek and Turkish borders. 

Just a short walk away from the city center, patrons can sit at a number of cafes that flank the lush banks of the expansive river, sipping cold draft beer while gazing out at views of its impressive  19th-century bridge. The atmosphere, geography and culture of Eastern Thrace is much more akin to the Balkans and Southern Europe than most of Anatolia. 

40-year-old Edirne native Alper Özyakalı, an industrial engineer by trade, spent 15 years working abroad in countries including Jordan, Morocco, Egypt, Vietnam, Cambodia, and most recently a five-year stint in Bangladesh. When hiring a textile engineer from Turkey several years ago, Özyakalı knew it was going to be a short job search after he found out where one prospective candidate grew up. 

“I asked him, 'where you are from?' and when he said 'I'm from Edirne' I said 'OK, no need for the interview, you're hired.' I've worked a lot with people from Edirne and they are very honest, honorable, they don't lie, and they work hard,” Özyakalı said. Turkey is known for the close cultural bond and strong identity that people maintain with their home province, and Edirne is no exception. Knowing someone from your hometown can be immensely beneficial. 

Unlike the party-friendly Edirne, booze doesn't exactly flow freely in conservative Bangladesh, where it is primarily confined to members-only social clubs and licensed shops. 

“It's expensive. A 12-ounce can of beer is $4 or $5, and the places you can buy it from are limited. In fact, in Bangladesh, just to carry alcohol in a bag you have to have a license,” Özyakalı said. 

Özyakalı warned his new hire—who has asked to remain anonymous because he is still currently working in Bangladesh—about this fact and the other difficult conditions of living in the megalopolis of Dhaka, but he came anyway and eventually the two decided to take matters into their own hands regarding the scarce availability of beer. Özyakalı secretly brought all the materials required to make beer at home from Turkey, strategically spreading them across suitcases in order to avoid suspicion at customs, and the pair started quietly brewing at home in Bangladesh. Their first several batches were prohibitively sugary but they kept at it, researching and experimenting until it clicked. 

“Three to four days every week we were making 20 liters of beer in Bangladesh and it would get finished off right away. They were all better than the [batch] before. We were making it ourselves but we were making it well,” Özyakalı said of the period in which they hit their stride. 

While still in Bangladesh, Özyakalı and his co-brewer plotted opening up a brewery in their hometown. They began with a simple premise: to make 400 liters, drink some of it, and sell the rest. They officially established a company in their home country in late 2017, and the licensing and inspection process, a notorious headache in Turkey, dragged on and required them to prepare an 88-page feasibility report, but eventually in December 2019, the first bottles of Trokya hit the market. The name is a twist on the Turkish word for Thrace (Trakya). 

Their first effort, a citrusy, elegant 4.8% ABV pale ale called Dakka, bears a rather deceptive name. At first glance, it seems to be a reference to the contracted slang of the Turkish word “dakika,” which means minute. However, it is a reference to the Bangladeshi capital Dhaka, where Özyakalı honed his craft. The beautifully designed label features two outstretched hands embossed in golden foil above a intricate clump of roots, a portrait of Trokya's beginnings. 

The beers sold throughout January and February, but when the coronavirus pandemic hit Turkey in March, they shut down production. To make matters worse, 90 percent of Trokya's sales are to bars and other venues that were closed down for more than two months after the virus quickly began to spread throughout the country. Production resumed at the beginning of June when the government loosened the restrictions and bars and restaurants across the country reopened. 

Trokya's beers are currently available at 40 bars and markets in Edirne alone, and they are quickly spreading throughout the country due to distribution deals with wholesale markets. They have even gone international, receiving orders from Switzerland and Japan that the small team is working around the clock to fill. Özyakalı said that to date they had sold 70,000 bottles of Trokya. 

Mars, Trokya's red ale derives its name from the deep crimson hue of the beer, which is bold, with interweaving notes of caramel, coffee and chocolate, and it is delightfully drinkable at 6%. Its intricately-designed label features the same blend of stark black and white with golden flourishes—commanding, sophisticated designs that do justice to the excellent quality of the beer. 

I posted a photo on Twitter of these two bottles and the third Trokya effort, a commendable Belgian wit called Buğu, writing in Turkish in praise of the quality of beer and the labels. The tweet gathered more than 2,800 likes, and many people asked where they could find it in the comments. Özyakalı told me that he received a number of messages on Instagram after the tweet, a small indication of the excitement surrounding Turkey's growing craft beer scene. 

One one hand, being a craft brewer in Turkey is risky, due to the relentless taxes the government has imposed on alcohol every six months in recent years. The special consumption taxes on beer alone increased 365 percent between 2010-2019, and during that same period the government has brought in 87.3 billion TL (about $11.8 billion USD)  in taxes on booze. 

It has also imposed restrictive legislation including the outright banning of advertising of alcoholic beverages, forcing companies to market their products in creative ways without using the actual brand name or displaying their products. 

To make matters worse, the deflated Turkish lira has made it difficult to purchase malt and hops from Belgium and Germany that are priced in euro. According to Özyakalı, the only hops produced in Turkey all go to Efes and Tuborg, the country's largest producers. He aims to ameliorate this situation by purchasing a field in the province of Bilecik so that Trokya's beers can feature hops grown on Turkish soil. 

On the other hand, the craft beer scene in Turkey is still young, and there are only a handful of producers, so there is serious market potential. Faced with the prospects of weak purchasing power and low wages even in professional sectors, many people in their 20s and 30s are perpetual renters living paycheck to paycheck. Despite high prices, one must take the edge off at the end of the day, and bars in several districts of Istanbul are frequently full of those spending their expendable income on an evening shared with friends, laughter and pints of beer, trying to forget about the pandemic and the country's grim economic reality. 

Özyakalı says that he does not aim to stop with the three beers that Trokya offers, and that his goal is to help educate the country on craft brewery culture by churning out a different brew every three or four months, enabling people in Turkey to drink the kind of beer that has been readily available in America and elsewhere for many years now. They are planning for their fourth release to be a stout called Kuzgun (raven in Turkish). 

“They might like them, they might not. They might buy them, they might not. But they should taste them,” Özyakalı said.