Meze in the UK: what it is, how to order it, where to find it
Quick answer
Meze are the small cold and hot dishes that open a Turkish meal: hummus, cacık, haydari, ezme, stuffed vine leaves, aubergine in several forms, fried liver, halloumi and a dozen more. A meze table is meant to be shared slowly with bread and rakı, and in the UK a spread of six or eight is a full meal for two. Meze is also the best way to eat well in a Turkish restaurant on a budget, and the clearest test of a kitchen's care.
Calories and nutrition
- Calories
- 520
- Protein
- 14 g
- Carbs
- 45 g
- Fat
- 32 g
- Salt
- 2.5 g
380–700 kcal
Portion: A mixed cold meze plate share for one, about 250 g, with bread.
The olive oil in the dips is most of it; hummus and cacık are the lighter choices, ezme and aubergine dips are the richest.
Estimates for a typical portion, based on standard UK and USDA food composition data. Actual values depend on the recipe and the restaurant.
What meze is
The word covers everything served before or instead of a main: cold dips and salads first, then hot small plates. The cold standards are hummus; cacık, yoghurt with cucumber, garlic and mint; haydari, thick yoghurt with garlic and dill; ezme, a fine chop of tomato, pepper, onion and walnut with pomegranate molasses; patlıcan salatası, smoked aubergine; yaprak sarma, vine leaves stuffed with rice; and piyaz, white bean salad. The hot ones are sigara böreği, hellim (halloumi), arnavut ciğeri (fried liver), sucuk, kalamar and falafel. Turkish meze differs from Greek and Levantine in the amount of yoghurt, the use of pomegranate molasses and pepper paste, and the presence of smoked aubergine in three or four different guises.
How to order meze
Order a mixed cold meze plate for the table, which gives you five or six dips and salads on one dish, and add two hot meze. With bread that is a meal for two; with a shared grill it is a feast for four. The classic drink is rakı with water and ice, sipped slowly, but ayran and beer are common. Do not order individual mains until the meze is done; the pace is the point. In a good restaurant the meze come out first and the grill is timed to arrive as they run out.
How to judge it
Made in house, not from a tub: hummus should be smooth and taste of tahini and lemon, cacık should be thick, ezme should be hand-chopped with visible texture, and smoked aubergine should taste of smoke. Fresh bread that keeps coming is the sign of a restaurant that understands meze. A cold meze plate that arrives in thirty seconds from the fridge with plastic-tasting hummus was bought in. The best meze in the UK comes from restaurants whose menu is mostly meze, and from the Cypriot Turkish kitchens of North London that treat it as the main event.
Where in the UK it is done well
The Turkish Cypriot restaurants of Haringey, Enfield and Barnet have the longest meze tradition in the country, and the newer restaurants of Dalston and Islington built their names on it. The ranking below counts Turkish restaurants in our directory whose name signals meze.
How to order it
Order the mixed cold plate plus two hot meze for two people and see if you still want a main. Ask for the aubergine dishes specifically; they show the kitchen's skill. Keep asking for bread. Rakı is the traditional drink, one glass, with water.
Where it's done well
UK councils with the most meze specialists, by restaurant name, in our directory.
Restaurants near you
Search by postcode or use your location to find restaurants likely to serve meze near you.
Make it at home
Serves 4 · 20 min
Ingredients
- 1 large ripe tomato, deseeded
- 2 long green peppers
- half a red onion
- 2 tbsp walnuts
- a handful of parsley
- 1 tbsp pomegranate molasses
- 1 tbsp olive oil
- 1 tsp red pepper paste
- half a tsp pepper flakes, salt
- juice of half a lemon
Method
- Chop the tomato, peppers, onion, walnuts and parsley as finely as you can with a large knife; the texture should be a fine relish, not a purée.
- Mix in the pomegranate molasses, oil, pepper paste, flakes, salt and lemon.
- Rest for twenty minutes so the flavours settle, then serve cold with bread.
This is ezme, the meze that tests a cook's knife work; a food processor turns it to soup. Make cacık alongside by mixing thick yoghurt with grated cucumber, garlic, salt and dried mint.