Glorious Gourmet Gluttony - Turkey, Winter 2007 Part 3
(Almost) Everything I ate in Istanbul - Winter 2007 - Part 3 
A day later I found myself waiting for a friend in the damp cold of Taksim. When I realized I was next to one of my favorite restaurants from my childhood, "KONAK", I decided to get.. 
..some Lahmacun to go. It's officially one of my favorite things to eat: Almost wafer thin crust topped with onions, minced lamb meat, tomatoes and pepper flakes and parsley, which is then flash-baked in a coal oven. I finished this particular one in under 32 seconds. 
That same night my friend Ali promises me some amazing culinary experience and takes me to the backstreets of Taksim to find this hole-in-the-wall restaurant called 'Umut Ocakbasi". 
"Ocakbasi" is a certain kind of kebab-house where you can sit right in front of the grill where they prepare all the dishes AND have a nice chat with the 'grillmaster' . It's kind of like a Japanese Hibachi grill experience, except it's more of a 'working-man's-feast' sort of a setting.
The decor sublime in its rinkydinkycité. 
The grillmaster exudes..umm... grilling mastery... 
ome 'mezes' arrive without us asking for them, always a good sign. The fluorescent lighting fails to make the food look bad. 
Creamy feta cheese with cucumbers and tomatoes, 
Chopped, coal-roasted onions topped with olive oil and hot peppers, 
Fire-roasted eggplant salad, 
Cacik (thick yogurt, cucumbers, and lots of mint), 
Onion salad with sumac and parsley, 
And "Ezme", which is a freshly made tomato paste with onions, parsley and olive oil 
Cop sis arrives. 
It's small bits of lamb chunks skewered with giant metal rods and quickly grilled for a minute and traditionally eaten with lavash bread and lots of cumin. A few rods are also supposed to feature chunks of lamb liver, but our waiter informed us that we were too late for that days fresh delivery of liver. 
We finish the meal off with Adana kebap. Knife-minced sheep meat is spiced with peppers and quickly grilled over charcoal. The smoky gamey goodness of this classic dish is unexplainable in words, on a blog, facebook, or anywhere else where you're not actually eating this thing.
