Bliss or Miss? | Dürüm

Location

London, UK

Food&Drink

Cherry Juice

Ispanak Boregi (Pastry Filled with Feta Cheese & Spinach)

Ali Nazik Kebap (Grilled Aubergine, Garlic, Yoghurt, and Lamb Beyti)

Keskul (Almond-based Milk Pudding)

Total

£21.35

Dürüm is not fancy, glitzy or glamorous. There is no ‘tasting menu’, no ‘amuse-bouche’ and no one will take your coat to the cloakroom. What Dürüm delivers is pure gastronomic, authentic ocakbasi bliss, from people who love and care about food for people who love eating it.

For those who are familiar with the term ‘ocakbasi’, it just simply refers to Turkish cuisine cooked on a fired grill and Dürüm deliver it perfectly. 

All dinner guests at Dürüm are laden with their delicious flat bread, which is incredibly moreish especially when accompanied by their homemade garlic mayonnaise and tomato and chill sauces.

Glancing over their menu, it proves hard to select just the right choice with 33 starters and 48 main dishes. Now this seems extensive and a large menu is always a warning sign for me because it rapidly diminishes any chance for freshness, however Dürüm’s palette of ingredients is actually very simple, with aubergine, green pepper, tomato, garlic, yoghurt, rice, chicken and lamb making up a vast majority of the menu. It is the multitude of flavour combinations that Dürüm present before you that makes dining choice tantalisingly impossible!

For starters I opted for their feta and spinach pastries, they were soft, warming delights and generous in their portioning. As you can see from the photos, the food comes with a no-frills attitude or presentation, just freshly prepared, deliciousness.

As usual I find it hard to decide what to choose to eat, and I find this especially difficult at Dürüm to select just the right combination of fresh ingredients for me. I let my love of aubergine guide me to the ‘Ali Nazik Kebap’, a yoghurt laden, meat-rich platter served on a bed of grilled aubergine.

Now, I must warn you to only think of venturing into Dürüm if you are ravenously hungry, because the meals are not dainty and you will not want to waste a morsel of the pure piquancy. 

Upon speaking to a couple of members of the wonderful staff, you not only get a feel for its family-run business environment, but the pure passion and enthusiasm for authentic quality that is a shared mantra throughout. Quality is the raison d’être and they do not appear to cut corners with this, with their meat freshly delivered every morning from local producers and every inch of their menu freshly prepared. The beautifully, vibrant and simple taste is the result and a taste that makes you hooked from the very first visit.

Uncompromising quality comes at a price, but Dürüm does not hurt the pocket, Dürum’s family run environment makes you feel looked after and they are truly generous in their portions and their discounting. Eating in the restaurant automatically earns you at 10% discount and the kind staff even gave me my dessert for free, which i just had to take home after hitting an almighty ‘food-wall’ after the previous two courses. My dessert, an all-time favourite of mine of ‘Keskul’ or a set milk pudding was beautifully smooth and comforting, with a sprinkling of cinnamon lacing the light, almondy milk.

Two people, three courses each and a £40 bill to show for it. Dürüm get it right and provide addictively delicious food, generosity, friendly customer service at an unbeatable price. Without a doubt, I award them a,

MY YELP RATING

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