The House

House details that help before you walk in.

The house is three working parts, and they are worth separating before you choose a table. The grill is where shashlik and kebabs are cooked to order. The dining room is where those plates are actually eaten, either as a short lunch or as a shared spread. The kitchen line is the spit, the bread and the cold counter of salads, pickles and sauces. This page walks through each one, then lists the smaller details people ask about once they are already thinking of coming: extra lavash, doner carved to order, how a large party should ask for seats, and what the bread is there to do.

Plated kebab with salad, grilled bread and a glass of wine

Room-by-room notes

Grill and kebab

Shashlik, house kebabs and the mixed board are grouped so a first visit can start simply. A skewer plate is one meat, cubed, grilled and sent with lavash, a salad and a sauce. Lamb, chicken and beef are the usual cuts, and the one on the fire can change with the service. A kebab is minced meat, onion, pepper and herbs, grilled as a ribbon rather than as cubes. The mixed board is both ideas at once, plus grilled vegetables, for a table that wants to share. None of these is a fixed set. If a cut has sold through, the kitchen says so and offers what is still on the grill. Say whether you want the meat hotter, plainer, or without onion before the order goes down.

Dining room

Tables are set in two ways. A small table holds plates, bread and a drink, and it suits lunch or a dinner that does not need the whole evening. A shared table is wider, because the skewers, the flatbread, the salads and the sauce have to sit in reach of everyone. Window seats and the quieter corner are real, and they are also finite. They depend on the hour and on how many seats you need. Two people can usually take what the room has when they arrive. More than four, or a weekend evening built around the shared grill, should be agreed with the house first. A confirmed hour is held. A wish sent and not answered is not a table.

Kitchen line

The doner spit, the grilled bread and the cold counter sit where the cooks work, not as a display at the back of the room. Meat on the vertical spit is layered and carved to order, then paired with salad, sauce and bread from that counter. Pickles, herbs, onion and cabbage are there to cut the richness. Flatbread is warmed and herb bread is grilled beside the meat, not treated as a separate course you have to remember to order. If you want the sauce on the side, extra lavash, or the salad without onion, ask when the plate is called. The line will not guess, and it will not promise a kitchen free of wheat, dairy or sesame.

Compact house details

Skewers

Lamb, chicken and beef are cut into cubes, salted and spiced in the house, then grilled on flat skewers until the outside is charred and the centre is still juicy. The plate leaves with warm lavash and, usually, a grilled tomato or pepper from the same fire. Ask which cut is on that service before you build the meal around one of them. A meat offered at noon can be finished by the late seating, and the kitchen would rather say so than send a substitute without telling you. Order the skewer when you want to see the cut. Lamb takes the char at the edges and stays pinker in the middle if you ask for it that way. Chicken is cooked through. Beef sits between the two, and the house will say which way it is going before it leaves the grill. The skewer is the plate to choose when only one person at the table wants grilled meat, or when lunch has a hard stop afterwards. It does not need a second course. Extra lavash and a little more salad are the only additions most people ask for, and both can be added without rebuilding the meal.

Lavash

Warm lavash comes with the grill plates, and more of it can be added to a shared table without turning it into a separate order you have to plan. It is there to catch the meat juices and to sit under a piece of grilled pepper or a spoon of salad. Herb flatbread and toasted bread show up beside some of the larger plates. Bread contains wheat. If that is a problem at your table, say so before the plate is dressed, not after it has been set down. On a shared table the bread is also the thing people use to pick up salad and meat juices, so it disappears faster than it does on a single plate. Ask for a second round when the first is gone, not at the end of the meal when the kitchen has already moved on. If one person at the table cannot eat wheat, say so at the start and the house can keep that plate clear of lavash instead of trying to scrape it off later. The rest of the table can still have bread. One restriction does not have to become everyone's.

Doner

The vertical spit turns through the service. Doner is carved when the plate is called, not sliced in the morning and held. It is served with salad, a sauce and bread from the cold counter, and it can be wrapped or plated. The spit has a natural end: when the meat is done, it is done. If you are coming specifically for doner, especially late, ask the house whether the spit is still up before you travel.

Salads

Herbs, raw onion, pickles, cabbage and a chopped salad of tomato and cucumber are the counterweight to the char. They are not a garnish. On a shared table they sit in the middle so people can take what they want. On a single plate they are already portioned. If onion is a problem, or you want the salad kept separate from the meat, say so with the order. The kitchen can plate it that way. It cannot invent a version of the menu that was never cooked. The salads are sharp on purpose. Pickled onion, cabbage, herbs and a chopped tomato salad are there because grilled meat without them is heavier than it needs to be. On a long shared meal they are what keeps the second skewer tasting like the first. Take as much or as little as you want. If the table wants them in a bowl in the middle rather than already on the meat, that is an ordinary request. It is not a special menu. Say it when you order, in the same breath as the meat.

Dining room

One or two guests can take a table as the room allows. Three or four often can as well, outside the busiest dinner hour. Above four, the geometry changes: the shared grill needs space, and pushing tables together once you are at the door is a worse meal than a table that was set before you arrived. Call or write with the day, the hour and the number of seats. Wait for the house to confirm. Weekend evenings fill earlier than weekday lunch. When you write or call, give the day, the hour and the real number of seats. Include anyone who is joining after the start. A table built for four cannot quietly become a table for eight once the grill is already in the middle of it. If you are not sure of the final number, say so, and ask what the room can still flex. The house would rather hold a slightly larger table and release a seat than rebuild the room at the door. Confirmation is a reply from the house. A message you have only sent is not yet that reply.

Grill bread

Toasted bread and herb flatbread are served beside the meat, not marched out as a course of their own. On the larger plates you will see grilled slices with the sliced meat, tomatoes and greens. On the shashlik plates the bread is the lavash under the skewer. Both are part of the same service. Ask for more if the table is still eating. Do not expect a bread course before the grill, and do not expect the kitchen to hold bread back unless you have asked it to. Some plates bring the bread already charred at the edge, next to sliced grilled meat, tomato and greens. Others bring soft lavash that is meant to be torn. Both belong with the food in front of you, and both can be refilled. Neither is a starter you wait for. If the table is slow, the bread can wait with the salads. If the table is hungry, it should arrive with the first meat, not after. Tell the house which of those you are. The kitchen can time it. It should not have to guess from an empty table.

Doner on the vertical spit with salads and flatbread at the kitchen line

Sliced grilled meat with toasted bread, tomatoes and greens