Kıyı Restaurant — Restaurant in Sarıyer

Great quality food, very poor service.

Let‘s start with the food. The starters were top notch - heavenly quality and extremely well-executed (Tarama to die for!). Mains (fried anchovies, fried red mullet) were also very good, but did not stand out in comparison to cheaper places (which might well be due to the fact that both fish were fried).

Now the service. We‘ve been to countless places around the world, from street food stalls to three star michelin restaurants, you name it. But never have we seen such blatant two-tier treatment of local vs. non-local guests. We usually don’t mind unfriendly/incompetent service if it’s (a) in a cheap place or (b) directed towards everyone. But here, both boxes were ticked. Prices are quite elevated, e.g., 4500 TLR = 125€ for 1 kg of red mullet, almost 10€ for a beer and mediocre-at-best wine list with hardly any bottle below 100€. Now this wouldn’t be too much of a problem since most of the reviews mention the price point and the (food) quality justifies this.

BUT. Service is simply unbearable. Senior waiters act incredibly disinterested towards foreign guests. At first, the waiter took ages to bring us menus, then to take our order although the place was half-empty when we showed up. While taking the order, he literally stopped listening mid-sentence and started arranging salt and pepper mills at the neighboring (empty) table. After the order was placed, the same senior waiter simply forgot about our existence while dancing around local high society tables, only leaving their side to run to the kitchen and get their food, outdoing himself. Now the junior waiter (i.e., runner) enters the scene. While seeming genuinely nice, he was the pinnacle of incompetence. Let‘s start with the language barrier. All other tables had olive oil and salt/pepper mills, ours didn’t. No biggie, unless it‘s impossible to communicate our kind request to the junior waiter. I understand we are in a non-English speaking country, but I would expect from staff in a Michelin-recommended restaurant to understand the most essential 10-word restaurant vocabulary to avoid these problems. Same unsurpassable barrier repeated when the Helva of our two-item (!) dessert order did not arrive, though. Repeatedly mentioning the Turkish (!!!) word for said dessert did not make anything click in the young fellas head. At the same time the senior waiter also did not bother to jump in, still being busy with the local tables, even serving them their food to the individual plates etc etc. On top comes the operational incompetence of the junior staff. We were still eating some of the appetizers, with parts of the dishes still unfinished and they already rushed in to snatch the plates from our table (although mains weren’t ready yet anyways and we were still in the process of finishing). Sorry, but this place really has a training issue with staff.

Last small comment on the ambience. Great location right across the street from the marina with great views from the second floor. Seating is rather cozy, not in a bothersome way though. But no attention to detail whatsoever: empty soap dispenser in the bathroom (arrived there at 5 PM), run-down plates with black marks, differently-sized and shaped water/wine glasses on our table. No big deal at all, still kind of weird for a place with this price point.

If you have a chance to go there with a Turkish friend, absolutely do so since you will probably have a great experience. If you plan to arrive speaking English, expect to be treated as a second-rate customer while eating...

I have been a regular and supporter for almost 20 years. No more. Do you want to be utterly ripped off and treated with disrespect at the same time? You are in the right place. Can't believe how much this once beloved institution deteriorated. Hell, you might even be TIPPED by the waiter, as it happened to me. Details below.

So four of us dined; 70c raki, mezes enough (but no more) to satisfy 4 normal sized humans (2f 2m), no fish. The bill was 2640 TL (almost $70 pp). Nearly all servings have shrunk considerably in size and for four they immediately charge 2 plates for what would have been 1 plate elsewhere. Liver was 260 TL, octopus 260 TL as well, 1 slice of (mediocre) feta 25 TL. A souffle shouldn't be 90 TL, nor a quince dessert 65 TL.

Naturally I called the waiter and complained about the bill, I said if this goes like this I wouldn't be coming to my beloved Kıyı again. I haven't asked for a discount, I never do, I just never come back if it is that bad.

Now comes the funny bit, the guy disappeared and came back after a while with 100 TL THAT HE LEFT ON THE TABLE! He said they couldn't change the bill but they could "do sth like that". Because I am a polite person I didn't say anything to him, went straight to management and said some pretty inappropriate things to them. I have been to a LOT of restaurants around the world, sometimes seen clumsy, inattentive or plain incompetent service but never been INSULTED THAT WAY. So as I said, NEVER...

Great fish restaurant in Istanbul or really anywhere for that matter. Our dinner for 2 cost $340 USD. We shared a seasonal salad, fried zucchini with yogurt and an eggplant salad as meze. We also shared a 1.7kg grilled turbot (kalkan), drank a bottle of wine and spilt a seasonal berry dessert. The fish was priced at 4.7 TL per gram. Yes there are no prices listed on the fish portion of the menu, but they will tell you what the price per gram is when you pick your fish. Being from the US, I can say that this is what we are used to in the US, Greece, Turkey & Italy amongst other countries when selecting whole fish out of the case at restaurants similar to Kiyi. That said, some.of these bad reviews are just idiotic. If you're so concerned about cost, why not ask before ordering when you see no prices listed. We speak zero Turkish, yet our waiter explained pricing without issue. He was concerned that our fish was too big so he even brought the chef over to confirm it was right for 2 people. We were dialed in on having kalkan anyway so that's what we were going to order regardless. All of that aside, everything we ate was outstanding with the ingredients truly being the star of the show. The kalkan was expertly grilled and everything that accompanied it was delicious in its simplicity. Kiyi is an excellent restaurant, and while fresh caught fish restaurants are expensive the cost at Kiyi was not unreasonable, especially given the quality...