Yeni — Restaurant in London

Fantastic, super awesome restaurant, with best food, best service, and best vibe.

Would I go back? Hell yeah!!! Why? Because this was simply theeeee best dining experience I had in London (and I've been to London, to experience the food over 7,8 times)

I've been to many of the it places and they were disappointing, but Yeni not only was the bear experience I had in london, probably one of the top 10 food experiences I had overall in my life.

That is how food should be.... it speaks to your soul! So where do I even begin? Somewhere between the outstanding service, awesome staff, tastiest food ever, and theeee best cocktail I've ever had, (and of course the gorgeous decor and awesome atmosphere), I can only give Yeni 10 out of 5! I highly recommend this place, even if you are not a foodie, this would be a dining experience you'll most likely always remember in your lifetime.

So here is what I ordered:

1. Snow pea salad with green apple, yogurt and mint. This wasn't something I was going to order but the bar tender so kindly recommended it and it tuned out to be my most fav dish of the night. It was absolutely amazing.... super tasty and very delightful.... the crispy fresh texture and the combination of tangy tastes was just soo great I wanted to order one more.

2. Hand made manti beer dumpling with yogurt (re-fermented yogurt- which is fermenting yogurt 2 times) The referee red yogurt was an absolute phenomenal! I've never had such a thing and I wish I could have more. It was super yummy, the only thing is the portion was a bit small, I just needed more of that tasty yogurt.

3. Vine leaf-wrapped beef (with some awesome tasing stuffing which I don't remember now)

This was also supper yummy and I tried not to eat it fast so I could enjoy it more. It has some nice Smokey flavor/taste, not sure if it was pepper or?? But it was really delicious

4. for desert, Kadajifi fritters, mastic ice cream, candies orange with fresh oregano leaf

The mastic ice cream was very interesting and unique, and it's combination with the candies orange and specially fresh oregano leaf was just perfect!!!! The Kadajifi fritters were my least fav, but the whole combination was great and they all went well together.... it's just that in general I don't like deep fried dough because it tastes like doughnut

5. cocktail: Passion fruit, chili and mezcal (sour & Smokey) OMG! FINALLY I found a place that can make me cocktail to my liking ... This was absolutely the best cocktail I've ever had because I like tangy and really sour and spicy drinks, without any sweetness and everywhere I go, in all the countries, there is always sugar involved! This drink had so much character .... it was super fun, absolutely delicious, and definitely to my liking. I asked for extra sour and a bit more chili and the bar tender made me just exactly what I asked for. This was so good that I ordered 4 of it Money well spent, absolutely!

Oh Yeni you are definitely my most favorite place, there is only only thing I don't like about you, and that is: You are not in Toronto, or anywhere in Canada! Can't wait to have you there or anywhere in North America.... if not, I will need to visit London every now and then, to have the best dining experience

Everything except the desert was 20 out of 10. Desert was 9 out of 10, but probably because I don't have a sweet tooth and am not a desert person.

Please note, the pics don't do the justice; my camera does not take good pics and there was...

I CAN STILL TASTE IT …

Our last meal in London was one of the best.  What a perfect choice Yeni was. And we found it completely by accident.

Wandering the Soho streets on our last afternoon we spied the wide open window & happy guests.  Curious, we took a quick peak at a menu decided to be adventurous. So glad we did.

Yeni is the inspiration of chef-owner Civan Er showcasing modern Turkish cuisine using open fire cooking & the finest ingredients. The menu is designed for sharing & that is exactly how we like it so we chose dishes that were not familiar but intriguing.  Every single dish was delicious, the flavours complex & unusual & as we thought a dish couldn’t get better than the previous … it did!

Tava bread two ways - spicy carrot and walnut tarator (think tahini) & 2nd with smoked butter. Mad skills in making something as simple as smoked butter so delicious you want to smear it all over is something …

Mammole artichoke, fava beans, chili, coriander, mint, sesame - such a perfect way to serve artichoke and the spread was so fresh. Eating it with full leaves of mint was perfect.

Orkney Scallops, spicy almond muhammara, salty fingers, burnt butter. Scallops fired perfectly & a wonderful spread somewhat like hummus & the cutest little green fingers also called sea jellybeans!!

Yeni Manti dried aubergine, double fermented yoghurt - this was the most beautiful dish I’ve ever had put in front of me & the flavours were so perfectly balanced making for a rich, but not too rich sauce & the perfect Turkish eggplant dumplings.

Nigel enjoyed a green apple ginger tonic & east London gin & I had a lovely Turkish rosé.

Later we discovered that Yeni is in the Michelin Guide! “Anatolian-inspired cooking from experienced chef-owner Civan Er, who made his name at acclaimed sister restaurant Yeni Lokanta in his home city of Istanbul. Daily changing menu of vibrant, gutsy, flavoursome sharing plates; techniques are rooted in tradition, with dishes cooked over oak in the Josper oven.”

Any description should emphasis wonderful, delicious, healthy & intoxicating food with gracious service. I know we...

I had the lunch set menu yesterday priced at a whopping £24. It was horrendous. It was listed as Kofte, buttered pilaf, greens and harissa. The three tiny pieces of kofte were scarcely thicker than 1cm, but still somehow managed to be almost raw on the inside. Absolutely no flavour or spice to them whatsoever. When I told the waiter in an attempt to be polite that they were "quite pink on the inside," he just sneered at me and said "they are medium rare" – so I had to then ask to have them cooked well done, and he then whisked my plate away without a word of apology. Rude. (Minced meat of any kind should not ever be served rare or medium rare due to high risk of food borne illness!).

The tiny portion of rice pilaf (roughly 4 tablespoons) was no pilaf at all. It was literally swimming in grease, with zero flavour. (Pilaf is a method of cooking rice where the grains are first toasted in fat with aromatics like onions and garlic, then simmered in broth or water. This technique results in fluffy, separate grains that are infused with flavour.)

As for the harissa, it was no harissa – it was literally a giant tablespoon of actual tomato paste. I am actually outraged at this!!! The audacity of trying to pass this off as harissa!!!

The so-called "greens" were nothing but a tiny, tiny bowl of iceberg lettuce with one small piece of watercress, all absolutely drowned in cheap, white vinegar.

This was not a meal. It was daylight robbery. With the bottle of sparkling water, it came to £29 ($39.38 USD). For that price, you expect competence, flavour, and at the very least, edible food.

I left genuinely angry — not just at the food, but at the arrogance of serving something so poor while treating customers with such contempt. An absolute hate crime!!!

I could get a more flavourful kofte, rice, some ACTUAL greens and fresh veggies from the corner Turkish kebab shop for a tenner!

Avoid...