Don’t judge a book by it’s cover; this “tardis” of a restaurant serves fantastic, mouth-watering and full of flavour Turkish/Mediterranean grill food. Based in Liverpool City Centre, we loved dining here to celebrate my birthday and would absolutely recommend to book ahead as they were queuing out of the door to eat here!

After a bit of research, Ben booked this busy little city centre Turkish restaurant as a change from usually having Indian or Italian when dining out, and we loved it. The restaurant is very busy but comfortably packs plenty of tables in, able to fit more diners than you realise when you first arrive. Staff are friendly and attentive and you can see straight way how popular this venue is, and why – the amazing food!

A vast menu full of mouth-watering choices; meats, cheeses, breads, sauces all sounding divine, and all cooked in front of you in an open BBQ grill-style kitchen area. When we arrived there was a queue of people looking for a table here, with about a half an hour to an hour wait, so I am glad that we booked a table but this only made us more excited to be there as this was clearly a good choice.

For starters we shared between us; Sucuk – spicy Turkish sausage grilled on charcoal, served on a fresh salad and Hellim (Halloumi) – A Cypriot cheese lightly grilled, on a bed of salad. These starters were served with dips of a garlic yogurt and a spicy salsa. Really tasty dishes for us to pick at between us, both cooked really well and just enough to get us started.

For my main I went with All Nazik (mixed) – BBQ Char-grilled pieces of Chicken and Lamb served on a bed of fried Aubergine with a special sauce. This was served on a bed of rice and with a side salad. Everything from the meat being cooked and seasoned perfectly right down the fresh zingy salad was absolutely delicious and complimented each other really well, I couldn’t get enough. The portion contained large chunks of meat, I think the lamb was my fave. The aubergine sauce was a slightly unusual texture, almost a bit like tofu/scrambled egg but wasn’t unpleasant at all in fact it was addictive. The rice tasted slightly creamy somehow too, I think it was baked? A great meal leaving me absolutely stuffed but happy.

Ben went with the Meat Moussaka – a kind of Greek lasagne using layers of aubergine & potatoes instead of pasta, with a rich tomato-based ground meat sauce and baked to perfection. A well-loved dish in our house, this was a really decent authentic version served with rice and salad and tasting so good, full of flavour.

We washed down our scrumptious food with beers & cocktails (I could have been on holiday if I had have closed my eyes haha). A great little Independent restaurant within the city centre that isn’t badly priced either and is 100% recommended by me! We had a lovely afternoon and evening around Liverpool either side of dining here and we hope to return to this lively city again soon. To hear more about Elif and check out their full menu, visit their website here.

I hope that my review has inspired you to give this restaurant a try. If you have anywhere you recommend I should eat at, please leave a comment below. If you are a restaurant/food vendor and would like to collaborate with me in any way, please just email me at jensfoodblog@gmail.com!

Happy munching!

Jen

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