All by ourselves
Flurry of service fizzles and we are left all alone
SET UP & SITE: It’s a short walk from work to Queen’s Rise at 10.30 on a Wednesday morning. I walk faster than usual, because I really love going out for breakfast. But I love it even more in the middle of the week, when it seems decadent and entirely against the flow of the weekend brunch tide. It’s perhaps unfair to mention there aren’t any other brunchers at Ottoman Mezze. Or, in fact, in the entire Queen’s Rise complex. The morning we are there, Queen’s Rise is all sexy AF fitout, and empty chairs.
SUSTENANCE & SWILL: Nikki orders Breakfast in Turkey which is scrambled eggs, fried sujuk sausage — a dry, spicy sausage — olives, feta, honey, fresh tomato, cucumber and berry jam with Turkish pide ($24). I order Sujuk Saganaki — scrambled eggs with sujuk sausage, grilled tomato, fresh herbs and Turkish pide ($18). There are some really interesting-looking breakfast dishes, like Anatolian Bride Soup, and this on the mezze menu from 11am: Sigara Borek — cheese and potato filled filo cigars with labneh. We order a soy flat white ($5) and a pomegranate, apple and Turkish black tea ($5). The dishes are very pretty, and the tea is a triumph in presentation and flavour. My coffee comes with Turkish delight, which is just that.
SERVICE & OTHER STUFF: It’s just the two of us and we are keen to catch up and talk about what’s been going on in our lives. So we don’t mind the quiet. But then, the emptiness becomes amplified by an awareness we are getting too much service — the not reassuring or helpful kind. We are asked really nicely, three times within 10 minutes of being seated, if we want to see the menu/order a drink by three different wait staff. They are basically all over us repeating the same questions. Food and drinks are delivered. Then there is nothing. It’s as though in that first flurry of repeat questions, they have exhausted themselves and it’s like The Quiet Earth. Again, we were too busy talking in our velvet, peacock-blue booth bubble to fret about the mess all over our table, but I might’ve ordered another tea if they’d come back to ask. It’s a strangely empty experience. There is nothing about this I could violently criticise. But there’s nothing particularly memorable, either. I’m certain at lunchtime, the place comes alive. Also the menu is better suited to a crowded table, ordering plates to share. Then you could get an Efes Pilsner for $8, or a Turkish wine like Kavaklidere Okuzgozu, for $11 a glass. And the menu is just interesting enough to make me think I’d like to return and test that theory.