50TL meal & drink for 2 – Zeki’s Cafe and Bar, Lapta

Hakan Aslihan and Nicky Paterson opened Zeki’s Cafe and Bar only last week and so I visited it to see if the rumours about the excellent food were true. The bar was busy and the customers were very friendly and seemed very happy to be there. This may appear to be a silly comment but how many times have I gone to somewhere to eat only to find it is quite sombre.

I had a glass of wine (5TL) and my two companions had draft Efes (4TL). I noticed that non-imported drinks were around 5/6TL and imported drinks around 8/9TL. The menu was not extensive and as a cafe the focus was on snacks, however the dinner menu had enough choice to make it difficult to decide what to eat. The prices were around 14-16TL and I chose the spaghetti bolognaise and my two companions chose chilli con carne and liver and onions. There were three areas set aside the eat: in the bar area, a downstairs dining room or an upstairs “chill-out” area. The “chill-out” area is an excellent idea in a bar for those that do not want to put up with the hubbub of a busy bar whilst eating.

The food came and without exception every meal was delicious. My partner even borrowed my spoon to finish off the liver and onion gravy which he said was “out of this world.” After I told Hakan that I was here to write an article for NCFP he kindly gave us a tour of the surprisingly large premises which included a games room with a pool table and two dart boards. There are also three TVs which show separate sports events so that if two popular games occur at the same time you can chose which to watch. There is a children’s playground and wireless internet access.

Zeki’s is open throughout the day and food is served from 12-9pm. We enjoyed ourselves so much that we will definitely be going again. To get there you must drive west past Alsancak towards Lapta until you reach Hotel Sempati on your right. A few hundred yards later, on the left, is a sign showing Zeki’s location.

This entry was posted on Friday, November 20th, 2009 at 12:04 pm and is filed under Restaurants. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.