My husband and I went to Merhaba for our 5th wedding anniversary dinner. I am quite well acquainted with Turkish cuisine or I would not have wanted to go to Merhaba. The first experience was fine. I ordered Tavuk Sis, which consisted of marinated cubes of chicken. That was good.
The second experience was my anniversary dinner and I ordered the starters baba ghanoush and dolma. Both were great, they came with freshly baked bread. I also ordered a house red wine that I could tell was watered down, so be cautious when ordering as they may water it down.
For my entree I ordered the Iskender Kebap and it states it is, grilled lamb or chicken on a base of bread topped with tomato sauce.
What I got was lamb doner meat that smelled bad, on a bed of bread that seemed liked it was in the microwave for too long, even sitting in the tomato sauce it should have softened up some but hadn't. This is not was an Iskender Kebap is and for £11.50 (one of the most expensive entrees on the menu), this was total crap. The waiter asked how we were doing, I barely took two bites and already pushed it aside and said, I am not happy with this, where are cubes of grilled lamb? The waiter argued with me and said, "this is how they do Iskender in Turkey". Pretty ironic how I have been eating Turkish food in Newmarket at Turquez and always order the Iskender and I get cubes of lamb, I have also eaten Turkish cuisine all over the United States (which I have also Yelped) and always order the Iskender as it is my favorite dish for crying out loud, and it has never been prepared with hard to eat bread, some tomato sauce and stinky slices of doner meat on top. This is not what I ordered. Instead, of him offering to take it back and make me a happy customer, he proceeded to argue with me. We won't be going here again, I will be speaking to management today to share with them about my experience.
After speaking with management they apologized and have offered to make the Iskender Kebap the way I had hoped for it to be made, but they are now serving it with doner meat, but it does not state that on their online menu on their Facebook page and I did not notice that it said that in the description of their menu that they would be serving doner meat,or I would have not ordered it. read more