Turkish delight
Lokanta is the place to go when you crave junk food but can't look another burger or fast-food abattoir in the face. Cheaper than Blue Cactus, more interesting than San Marzano and infinitely less morally abhorrent than Champions, this warm, up-market Turkish restaurant has arrived just in time for me to eat myself out of the encroaching winter blahs. Even the music is the aural equivalent of junk food; it will lull you or slay you depending on how well you tolerate the licorice rock of Heart and the Lucky Charms of Bobby McFerrin circa "Don't worry, be happy."
And I was, once we'd managed to score what a Lokanta true believer says is the best vantage point in the place. Apart, of course from a table on the upper level that allows you to practice the Olympic sport of long-distance flirting with the boys and girls around the bar using your Bette Davis eyes and a mirror suspended from the ceiling/wall. Insert gratuitous love shack reference here.
Settling into our round-cornered sofa/booth, we got our first look at:
Wine/cocktail list: Just as it should be. Red and white wines are in the zl. 50-zl. 95 range, with table wine available by the glass. There's also the Czech Budweiser on tap as well as a selection of foreign bottled beer.
Culinary high point: The pizzas. My sucuklu pide was basically a Turkish spin on pepperoni pizza: a lovely, chewy combination of the familiar and the strange, courtesy of the non-spicy but flavorful "spicy" Turkish sausage. The vegetarian was equally pleased with her cheese and tomato version. What make the pizzas so scrumptious are (a) thick crusts, (b) decadent heaps of magically ungreasy cheese and (c) simple, logical ingredient pairings. Forays into San Marzano's spinach and fried-egg pizza aside, I am not a big fan of "sophisticated" pizza toppings (i.e. shrimp and bechamel, or that yuppie catnip, pesto); if I wanted subtlety and gastronomic adventure, I wouldn't be ordering glorified cheese toast.
Culinary low point: The cold appetizers. The tomato and hot pepper dip was the Neve Campbell of salsas, and the dry, inert dolma made me miss Brama's tangy, textured version like a dear lost lover.
The rest: My tomato, cucumber and feta salad was entirely undressed, which meant the vegetables just lay there nervously next to each other not interacting, trapped in the legume equivalent of your worst morning after nightmare. The iskender a Lokanta specialty was a huge, oily mass of grilled kebab beef over cubes of equally slippery pita, with yogurt and anemic tomato sauce on the side. Nice, but would benefit tremendously from coming with dry pita on the side to help cut some of the greasiness along with the yogurt which is how I'll order it next time.
Service: Excellent, especially given the provocation of our stumbling in half an hour before closing and sending back a bad bottle of Italian table wine (the second bottle was much better).
Atmosphere: An inviting and multi-purpose hybrid of seraglio and Danish modern. The evening we were there, every conceivable type of diner surrounded the tile-inlaid tables: hand-holding and baby-encumbered couples, businessmen doing whatever it is businessmen do, braying largish groups, lone wolves, and Ginos on the make. This is one of the few Warsaw restaurants where you can dine alone and not feel like the first one voted off "Survivor," which says a lot about both the waitstaff and the decor.
Prices: Very reasonable. Dinner for three with wine came to zl. 161 ($35).
When to go: Anytime (they apparently have a breakfast menu), but especially whenever you need a plausible cure for any combination of light deprivation, homesickness, overindulgence, and heartbreak. #
