Ottomanic fiasco: Bazar @ Amsterdam

aaw, I should have known the moment I entered the place: the dim lights, the exotic crockery, the "world cuisines" menu, and a sure giveaway: packed to the rafters with under-35 Dutch yuppies. The daily dining out lifestyle is making quick in-roads into the Dutch psyche, particularly catching on among the above mentioned demographics. A dinner out does not need a special excuse any more, it is just a matter of convenience as well as enjoyment.

But what is there to be enjoyed remains to be agreed upon. In Amsterdam it seems to be candles and cosy interiors over the food served every time. The dim lighting masques the content of the plates and the designer furniture makes the restaurant a sort of extension of your living room perfect for pursuing the Dutch national ideal of gezelligheid (conviviality in a warm,cosy and preferably dimly lit milieu).

Bazar on Albert Cuypstraat got it all covered: there is just enough light to read the menu, the plates and cutlery are exuberantly picturesque and candles are sticking out of all imaginable places.

Although it claims to be a wereldeethuis - a restaurant of world cuisines, the food is mostly Turkish, on the level of your average dinner in Turkey - never bad enough to be sent back to the kitchen, but always making you long for the moment when you finally got it over with your dinner. Like I wrote earlier, I have had much better Turkish food outside Turkey than in the country itself.
These icecream-like balls are Irfan’s starter (€10.50):

• zaalouk, -the best of the bunch, a kind of cold Moroccan ratatouille;
• humuz - aka hommous, flat as a used condom;
• haydari, aka suzme - plain strained yoghurt without a whiff of herbs;
• sarma - aka dolma, stuffed grape leaves, as forgettable as they always are;
• peynir ezme - a spicy-ish feta-cheese spread that acquires its pungent taste and lively light orange colour from the biber salçası pepper paste - served in one big blob, it just was too rich to have allure;
• sigara böregi - filo pastry stuffed with cheese, a good solid B;
• pide - very underwhelming, considered that the only people that could possible beat Turks to making bread are the French. You can get better in any Turkish bakery in Amsterdam any day, and aren't reataurants supposed to be better and more special than our daily home-made meals?

The attractively served on a huge colourful bowl Bizar Bazar (€29) was a meat platter consisting of a mixed grill kebab, that had apparently never been in the vicinity of either charcoal nor grill, most likely just hot plates:

• very chewy pieces of mutton disguised as lamb, ingenuously spiced up with salt;
• pieces of dry and bland chicken breast,
• pieces of even dryer and blander turkey breast,
• pieces of rather passable spicy chicken sausage
• interspersed with pieces of onions, bell peppers and aubergines

as well as

• lamb stew with almonds (and SALT!) à la Persienne - way too conspicuously cooked well in advance;
• fried chicken, tasting suspiciously like frozen "spicy chicken wings" from your local discount supermarket (I once did go through that traumatic experience!)
• two long and raw green bell peppers;
• a mound of rather nice rice;
• a bowl of semi-retired tabbouleh, chopped parsley with bulgur and tomato bits;
• a bowl of bizarrely tough pickles, think slices of wood,softened by immersing in vinegar;
• and a handful of soft and anaemic French fries.

Big beers were in fact half-pints, the service - friendly, yet very unhurried. We were relieved when the dinner was over and we could go home. Wouldn't any comment be superfluous?

Pro's: Beautiful plates and wall tiles.
Con's: Utterly bland uninspiring food. Snail-speed service.
In a nutshell: Bleh. You won't see us again.