We loved Turkestan Asevi so much we ate here two nights in a row. What brought us back was a house specialty called Gozleme, delicious flat bread rolled and baked on a large heated stone, then filled with minced lamb, a mashed potato mixture (my favorite), or feta cheese. Incredibly delicious!!! The restaurant featured a little booth decorated like an old-style Turkish kitchen in which a woman dressed in traditional Turkestan garb made the gozleme (also referred to as Anatolian pancakes, but they don't remind me of pancakes at all) fresh to order. The entire restaurant had a kitschy, touristy look to it, but don't be deterred by the giant electrified sign at the head of the restaurant's garden which blares "Authentic Turkestan Restaurant." Despite the initially comic touristic look to the place, the food and service is excellent, as is the live music (a smooth-voiced singer skillfully plays an ut for an enthusiastic crowd of locals each evening.
In addition to the fantastic gozleme, we were very pleased with the rest of the menu. My husband ordered a prix fixe meal, which included an awful lot of very delicious food for 14,000,000 TL. The meal included yogurt soup with potatoes, chick peas and bits of lamb; a delicious cucumber, tomato and pepper salad with a light lemon, vinegar and oil dressing; and a main course of mixed shish kebab, which consisted of lamb and chicken shish with kefta, a sort of fried lamb sausage. The dish was served with grilled tomatoes, tandoor-spiced rice, roasted potatoes, and fresh onion and tomato salad on the side. I had chicken shish that had a light hint of tandoor spices and delicious roasted potatoes and grilled vegetables. For dessert we were brought apple tea and baklava - delicate layers of filo dough with honey and walnuts. Everything was very, very good. The entire meal cost us 24,000,000 Turkish Lira - very reasonable. Like many restaurants in Istanbul, Turkestan Asevi does not serve alcohol.
The restaurant is tucked into the far corner of the Hippodrome, at the back of the Blue Mosque. Diners can choose to sit in the pretty outside garden or indoors under an elaborate "authentic Turkoman tent." From our table on the patio, we could look up and see the floodlit minarets of the Blue Mosque looming over us. The 10:24 call to prayer from this vantagepoint was positively haunting - we were close enough to the source for the muezzin's notes to resound in our chests. The service is friendly and efficient, and of course the staff speaks English with gusto. While the little open-air gozleme kitchen sounds a bit hokey, I enjoyed watching the skilled gozleme chef make the delicious treat, and she seemed to get a kick out of my love for her cooking. Thanks to Turkestan Asevi, I am now on a quest to find gozleme (the mashed potato variety, please) somewhere in New York - I'll keep you posted.