Bodrum · Yalıkavak · Turgutreis · Gökova · Göcek
Chartering out of Bodrum usually means one of three things for food: the crew cooks and it shows, you eat ashore every night and lose the anchorages, or you bring someone who knows how to work in a galley. This page is about the third option.
Bodrum, Yalıkavak, Turgutreis and Torba
Göcek and the Gökova gulf
The galley, and what the captain agrees to
The service
We put a private chef on yachts, gulets and charter boats out of Bodrum. That covers three different jobs: cooking in the galley while you are under way, serving dinner at the berth before or after a leg, and provisioning the boat so the days we are not aboard still eat properly.
Before we quote
What is possible on any given boat depends on two things we cannot see from here — the galley, and what the captain will agree to. So we ask about both before we quote, instead of promising a menu the boat cannot produce.
Coverage
01
Breakfast, lunch and dinner produced in the boat's own galley across a charter. This is the version that depends most on the boat: a gulet galley is a kitchen, a sailing yacht's is a corridor with a stove in it.
02
A full dinner served on board while you are tied up — in the marina, or off a bay with a tender run. No sea state to work around, so the menu can be as ambitious as the table is.
03
Shopping the boat before you sail: markets rather than supermarket aisles, stocked and labelled so the crew can find things. On a week-long charter this is frequently the better value half of the job.
Most charters want a mix. A dinner at the berth on the first night while everyone is still finding their cabin, provisioning to cover the middle of the week, and a chef aboard for the two days that matter. That is a normal brief, not an awkward one.
Before a number
These five answers turn a charter enquiry into a real figure. If you do not know all of them yet, send what you have.
| What | Why it changes the answer |
|---|---|
| The boat | Make and length tell us the galley. A 30 m gulet and a 15 m sailing yacht are different jobs with the same title. |
| Guests and crew | Crew eat too. A menu for eight guests and three crew is an eleven-cover service, and pretending otherwise is how charters run short. |
| Route and nights | Gökova and the Datça side change the shopping run. So does whether you come back to the same marina each night. |
| Berth for the chef | Determines whether a multi-day charter is even workable, and whether the captain has to sign off. |
| Allergies and diets | Harder to solve at sea than in a villa. There is no second shop three miles off Orak. |
Bodrum, Yalıkavak, Turgutreis and Torba are routine — those are the marinas the shopping run is built around. Göcek and the Gökova gulf work with notice. Further afield we will tell you honestly whether the travel makes sense for what you are paying.
On price
The number depends on the length of the trip, how many guests and crew are eating, whether the chef stays aboard, and how much of the provisioning you want handled. Those four things move the figure more than the menu does, which is why a per-head rate on this page would be a guess dressed up as a price.
Send the boat and the datesEnquiry
It goes straight to privatechefbodrum@gmail.com. Charter weeks in July and August book early. If the dates are gone we will say so immediately.
Notes
On most gulets and larger motor yachts, yes. On smaller boats it depends on the galley and on the sea state, and the captain has the final word. We ask what the boat is before quoting so nobody promises you a three-course lunch in a swell.
Then we work around it. Food can be prepared ashore and finished on board, or served at the berth before you leave, or built as a menu that needs assembly rather than cooking. A tight galley changes the menu, not whether you eat well.
Yes, and on a charter week it is often the more useful half of the job. We shop the Bodrum markets, stock the boat for the days we are not aboard, and label things so the crew can find them.
Bodrum, Yalıkavak, Turgutreis and Torba routinely. Göcek and the Gökova gulf are workable with notice, because they change the shopping run and the travel time rather than the cooking.
It is quoted per charter, not per person. The number depends on the length of the trip, how many guests and crew are eating, whether the chef stays aboard, and how much provisioning you want handled. Send the boat, the dates and the headcount and you get a figure.
Only if there is a berth for them and the captain agrees. Day trips and dinners at the berth do not need it. On a multi-day charter it is usually simpler for everyone if the chef sleeps aboard, but that is a conversation with the boat, not a given.