Kismet might have only opened this week, but it’s already drumming up a reputation for urging people out of their seats. On Thursday nights at the Turkish Cypriot restaurant above The Globe Tavern in Borough, musician Koray sits in the corner with an amp and a few plates of meze, plucking the strings of a kanun, a flat, harp-like Turkish instrument. “We’ve already had Turkish visitors up and dancing between the tables,” chef and co-founder Keiran Mustafa tells Broadsheet.
It’s just the kind of atmosphere Mustafa and restaurateur Dom Hamdy (Crispin, Bistro Freddie, Canal) want to create. Their new restaurant is their interpretation of a traditional meyhane, the taverns originating in Turkey and northern Cyprus, where generous portions of food, drink and conversation stretch late into the evening. “The best comparison for people in the UK would be a pub,” says Mustafa. “It’s a social hub. It’s where people go to socialise, have fun, drink and eat.”
Kismet has taken over the upstairs dining room for a year-long residency, following previous pop-ups by Khao Bird and Barang. “It’s intended as an escape,” Mustafa continues. “The fact that it’s in one of the busiest parts of London and you have to go up the stairs, above a pub, means there’s an element of it having to be discovered.”
Inspired by the time-worn character of Istanbul’s older meyhanes, the room features dark timber accents, low lighting and white tablecloths, with cosy handmade lace curtains obscuring the bustle of the market outside, and black-and-white photographs from Mustafa’s family albums on the walls.
Mustafa, who was previously head chef at Indian fine-dining restaurant Bibi, grew up in a Turkish Cypriot family. He says Kismet is a chance for him to explore his heritage while showcasing a more specific version of Turkish restaurant culture than is often encountered in London. “Turkish restaurant culture in the UK wasn’t necessarily representative of restaurant culture in Turkey or Cyprus,” he says.
Dishes arrive in waves, beginning with cold and hot meze before moving towards kebabs cooked over the mangal grill. “The best experience is to order lots of small dishes and graze between them,” Mustafa says.
Meze include zeytinyağlı taze fasulye, green beans braised in olive oil; atom, a combination of buffalo-milk yoghurt and chilli butter; yaprak ciğer, fried lamb’s liver; and bulgur köftesi, crisp, stuffed bulgur-wheat dumplings.
The latter are closely tied to Mustafa’s childhood. “My nana would gatekeep whether she was making them or not, and then always surprise me with them,” he says. “They take a long time to make.”
From the grill there’s kuzu şiş, skewers of lamb leg enriched with tail fat, and şeftali kebabı, a Turkish Cypriot kebab of minced lamb and beef wrapped in caul fat. They are served with dishes such as fried Cypriot potatoes, reminiscent of deeply golden home-style chips.
The £48 set menu offers a jam-packed introduction to the eatery, promising multiple meze before the breads, kebabs and dessert. Mustafa encourages grazing at dessert, too, with a trio intended to cover “all the bases”, including syrup-soaked baklava served tableside from a great silver tray, as well as an indulgent scoop of vegan pistachio ice cream and slices of fresh fruit.
Several types of Türkiye’s anise-flavoured spirit, raki, is available by the glass or bottle. And, following the meyhane tradition, regulars can buy a bottle and leave the remainder on a shelf for their next visit.
The short, snappy wine list spotlights predominantly Turkish producers, including Sevilen (a prominent family-run Turkish winery) and female-owned Aegean winery Kuzubag. Kismet also has its own Basketcase lager, brewed with Coalition Brewery and named after the men said to have carried particularly enthusiastic Istanbul drinkers home in human-sized baskets.
For now, Kismet is set to stay in Borough for a year. Hamdy and Mustafa hope it might eventually find a permanent home, although they are not forcing the decision. “Kismet will decide for us in terms of its fate,” says Mustafa. “It feels really at home in that building, but we would like to see it find somewhere permanent. We’ll see how things unfold.”
Kismet
The Globe Tavern, 8 Bedale Street, SE1 9AL
Hours:
Tue 5pm–9.30pm
Wed midday–3pm; 5pm–9.30pm
Thu to Sat midday–3pm; 5pm–10pm
Sun midday–4pm
