First Impressions

John: Copsey and I generally don’t agree on much, however, one thing we always agree on is this: being entertained by a belly dancer while you’re eating is never a bad thing. By some stroke of wild luck, we happened to find ourselves at Café Efendi on Ladies night. You may not know this, but my two favorite nights of the week have always been Friday night and Ladies night, so I was pretty excited. For any lady that eats at Café Efendi on Thursday nights, the restaurant offers half price house drinks and FREE belly dancing lessons. This is correct and not a typo, I am not making this up. Now, I’m not married, but this sounds like a brilliant place to take a wife/fiancée/girlfriend/non-blood related cousin through marriage for some fun. While you, the husband, sip on wine and eat fantastic Mediterranean food, you can watch the belly dancing lessons. Next time I’m at Café Efendi, I’m bringing 10 score cards. What am I going to do with them? I’m going to pretend I’m Dancing with the Stars Judge Bruno Tonioli and rate every belly dancer. As you can tell, I already love this place and I haven’t even begun to talk about the food.

Copsey: Readers will have to guess whether it was just a stroke of luck or a devious plan that landed us at Café Efendi on both Ladies’ night and belly dancing night. Certainly, the two go together – I know that my dancing improves in direct correlation to the amount of alcohol I drink. That’s a proven fact. I’m sure the same goes for half-naked ladies. 

John: A
Copsey: A

Appetizers

John: Café Efendi separates its appetizers into two categories: hot appetizers and cold appetizers. We ordered one of each and because our vegetarian readership grows by 18 percent weekly, we ordered a vegetarian appetizer also. The vegetarian dish was called Sarma.  It consisted of stuffed grape leaves with rice, pine nuts, currents and fresh herbs. Now my palate may be immature, but it tasted a lot like a pickle with a hint of rice, pine nuts and herbs. The closest thing to a vegetarian we had at the table was our friend Melissa. She loved the Sarma so much, she ate two of them. My favorite appetizer was the Kiymali Borek. This consisted of beef stuffed inside thin pieces of bread. It tastes exactly what it sounds like, and if you like beef and bread, you will enjoy this dish. If you are a vegetarian, you will not. Copsey, why don’t you tell everyone about the Falafel (which by the way is my new favorite word)?

Copsey: Falafel is such a fun word to say. It’s even more fun to eat. Crispy vegetable patties might not immediately sound amazing, but then you must not have had Efendi’s falafels. They also come with a tasty dipping sauce called jajik, which is a dip made of yogurt, garlic, cucumber and dill. Fun Fact: yogurt is a Turkish word. Since they invented it, you know Turkish yogurt must be good.

John: B+
Copsey: A-

Entrées

John: If you’re a big fan of ‘Kebabs,’ then Café Efendi is perfect for you, because every other item on their menu is a kebab (think shish, chicken shish, adana). Just so we fit in, we ordered a chicken shish kebab. We also ordered a rib eye steak, a Lamb Sautee and some Musakka. Usually chicken tastes like chicken, but the chef at Enfendi basted the chicken with some ridiculously good sauce. I can’t even describe what it tasted like other than it was some of the tastiest chicken ever. The lamb was equally succulent, there were four of us at the table and we almost had a belly dancing contest to see who got the final serving of lamb. The Musakka is a vegetarian dish comprised mostly of eggplant. I am not a big eggplant fan. I took three bites of this dish which is two more than I normally would have taken if I didn’t like it. Besides eggplant, you’ll also find tomato, onion, bell pepper and garlic in olive oil. Surprisingly, the worst dish was the rib eye. I never thought I would write those words. I still can’t decide if it was the worst because everything else was so good or because it actually wasn’t that tasty. Next time at Café Efendi, I’ll order only the rib eye and then I’ll update you.

Copsey: If you don’t like eggplant (which John obviously doesn’t), you might have trouble with the menu. Almost every vegetarian dish, of which there are many, has eggplant in some form. I’m not opposed to eggplant, especially not served as it was in the Musakka. It’s almost like a lasagna only with eggplant instead of pasta. Certainly a new and different taste. The Lamb Sautee was delicious. From what I know of Turks, they like their lamb, which really comes through in their lamb dishes. The sautee was tomato-sauce doused lamb bits served with mushrooms and herbs over rice. Simple and perfect.

John: A-
Copsey: B+

Desserts

John: My favorite movie as a child was Aladdin. My favorite song in the movie was “Friend Like Me.” My favorite line, “How about a little more baklava?” The point here, if I see baklava on a menu, I have to order it. Café Efendi’s is a pistachio paste layered with a thin pastry. It is also awesome. There are three ‘squares’ of baklava on the plate you are served. Nobody else wanted it, so I ate it all. Unless you are allergic to nuts, I think you will like it. Actually, if you’re allergic to nuts, I don’t think you can order our other dish either, the Burma (or is it Myanmar?). This dessert consisted of the thin pastry wrapped in crushed walnuts and topped with the pistachio paste. It was equally pleasing.

Copsey: It’s a Turkish restaurant; you have to order baklava. And they do it well. It’s very similar to the Burma in that it’s made with what must be a Turkish staple, the Yufka, or thin, layered dough. It’s crunchy like a wafer and, in dessert, is often covered in sugar or syrup. Yum.

John: A
Copsey: A-

Final Impression

John: I may inflate this grade by a half point thanks to the belly dancing. Any restaurant that offers free anything is a great restaurant in my book. When they offer free belly dancing even better. The highlight of the night is that Café Efendi had good food to go along with their fun times. The only real complaint I had is that my water didn’t get refilled as often as I like. It’s not like I was sucking it down either. However, I could have asked the server to fill up my water and I’m sure he would have, but I didn’t because I assumed an empty glass would be automatically refilled (which it was on the third time around). That is my one small minor complaint. That should not deter you from eating and belly dancing.

Copsey: If you didn’t hide your drink from the waiter, you might have been served more – my beer was filled each time I took a sip. That’s what I call service. There are indoor and patio tables available, which was nice; we sat outside in the cool evening, had a drink or two, ate some good food and watched the belly dancer at work (in a non-creepy way, I assure you). I think I like Mediterranean food. 

John: A-
Copsey: A