Zizi’s Cafe

AMAZING. The food, the service, the owner are all great. As close as it gets to authentic Turkish and Middle Eastern food in Chicago. The lahmacun (Turkish pizza) as well as all the kebabs/​salads are very tasty. You can also see the kitchen from the seating area, — very clean place. The owner gave us complimentary tea and dessert, which was super nice, but we would’ve become regulars even if not. Highly recommended.

Very tasety food! Fresh meat and ingredients, hot pita bread, very delicious taste. The service was fast and our waitress was very friendly. We ordered Hummus, Haydari (my first time trying it with walnuts and it was amazing), Lahmacun (very crispy and fresh), Iskender and Beyti. Portions were very big. Beyti was my favorite! For desserts, we tried Kazandibi and sutlac (Rice pudding), both were as perfect as our main dishes.

Price was good for the amount of food my boyfriend and I ordered (around $ 40).
Friendly staff we were warmly greeted when we walked in. And I saw the owner greet many by name or personally greet newcomers. If you dine in you choose your own seats. We saw many people come in for pick-​up.
We were served this carrot dip with bread when we sat down. Not sure what was in it but it was not to our taste. The bread as other reviewers said was delicious.
Food:
Ordered the combo platter
I would order this again loved trying all the different types of foods. We really enjoyed the ezme.
Falafel
I wouldn’t order this again it was too mushy in the middle but did have a nice crunch.
Chicken Döner Kebab
We were undecided about the rice or couscous and our waitress was awesome and did half of each! :) The meat was a nice combo of white and dark meat and everything on the plate with it was cooked well and wasn’t oily.
Overall, we’d eat here again as it wasn’t busy, the staff was friendly and food was decent (and not oily). Points off for Falafel and bathrooms.
Baklava with tea (highly recommend getting with tea to balance out the sweet baklava). Not as flaky as we’d have liked but the honey flavor with the chocolate swirl on the plate was perfect.

Delicious! I’ve ordered twice, once with delivery to Lakeview and once to Lincoln Square, and both times they arrived earlier than estimated and the food was still hot. (Okay, tonight it was more «warm» than hot, but it’s also –8 outside.) Both times I’ve had the chicken doner sandwich which is delicious with the blend of meat seasonings and yogurt sauce. And the bread… oh man, the bread. I don’t know why or how, but it is so good that I ordered extra this time. If I had to find a fault, I’d say that the sandwiches are messy and hard to eat because of the size and cut of the bread. Making them pita style with fillings jammed inside might mean less time cleaning up spills and more time snarfing down the deliciousness… but that’s about the only fault I can find with what I’ve ordered. Next time I’ll try the baklava. Because baklava.

The food here is good, but before you take a date (as I did) you should know that it feels very much like a cafeteria. (Cheap plastic tables, open metal shelves for the kitchen to put the food out on, etc.) The servers were nice, and they brought us some complimentary flan that was delicious. The bread was also good.
But fundamentally this is a grab-​a-​bite place (or a pickup-​and-​take-​home place). Most of the other patrons seemed to be girls who had been to yoga together and were still in athletic gear. Good food, but not a place to spend an evening, which I did not understand based on the other reviews.

I don’t expect much from a salad but I can eat their Turkish feta salad with chicken EVERYDAY. I order for delivery and it gets delivered in less than 30 minutes. Chicken is always seasoned perfectly and it comes loaded with greens and giant pieces of veggies that makes me believe I’m being healthy for once. AND DONT GET ME STARTED ON THEIR HOMEMADE BREAD. It’s always so warm and oh so fluuuuufffffyyyyyy, yaaaassss. I’ve also tried their chicken doner (order extra yogurt sauce cuz you’ll regret it if you don’t, it’s just super delish) and hummus comes in this giant container filled with fresh veggies. Red lentil soup is a little too minty for my taste but I’ll still eat it if it’s in front of me, not cuz I’m a fatass but cuz it’s still delicious and comes with that soft amaaaaazing homemade bread. Just take my money, Zizi’s café!!!

Today I told some friends visiting from out of town that it’s my life goal to bring everyone I know to Zizi’s. Not only is it convenient to where I live (and arguably super convenient and worth it for anyone who may get to the Brown line — as it’s less than 5 minutes from the Diversey stop), but it’s also delicious and BYOB. In the summer, there are a couple of outdoor tables, and I’ve never had to wait for a spot in the dining room. I recommend ordering the combo appetizer that comes with grape leaves, hummus, and a variety of salad/​dips to eat with their fresh, homemade bread that everyone appropriately raves about on here. I don’t love their hummus, but I think everything else is so very flavorful that more than makes up for and maybe even complements it it. My boyfriend loves the eggplant spread that is very very smoky. If you’re dining in, you may get a complimentary carrot spread appetizer with that warm bread. The spread is a bit garlicky and very fresh.
For the main meal, I recommend the Zizi’s Favorite Pizmahmagun Wrap with lamb or, if you’re wanting vegetarian, the Eggplant Tower is very good. Of course the kebab or doner sandwiches are classically great too, and you can see into the kitchen area where they cook the meat rotisserie style and prepare everything before you. I’ve seen criticism of the fries, but I like the skin on fries and think they are seasoned fine. Really, I’ve enjoyed everything I’ve tried at Zizi’s but find myself going back to the favorite wrap. Join me in my quest to bring everyone to Zizi’s, and you will not be disappointed.

I’m really glad I got to try this place since I’ve been having a craving for Turkish/​Mediterranean food since coming back from Turkey. I ordered Zizi’s favorite wrap and the portion size is quite tremendous. While it was satisfying and I liked the meat, it fell quite short of what I had in Turkey (look up Durumzade — a shrine should be made for that restaurant). It was savory but I wished there was more vegetables and flavor inside the wrap.
The fries are average and could have used more seasoning.
Still, it’s a nice environment and it would be a great place for a quick lunch. They were relatively empty when I came in the early afternoon.

Wow! We had an absolutely delicious dinner from here. We ordered delivery and our food seemed to come so fast, within 30 minutes which is great for a Saturday night.
We started with the lahmacun. We loved the spices on it. Then we got the kofte platter and chicken doner kabab to split, one with rice and one with couscous. The kofte were fantastic! The flavor was spot on and reminded me of my grandmas kefte. The couscous was very tasty with an almost sweet tomato taste and small zucchini slices. I kept going back for more. We both really enjoyed the chicken. It had a great crispy flavor and paired great with the rice. The vegetables on the side were also wonderful. Zucchini, potatoes, sweet potatoes and tomatoes. They were so tender and very flavorful!
Everything was wonderful and we will definitely order again/​venture in to the actual restaurant. So excited about this great find!

The food here is very good, and the owner is very friendly. They happily accommodated my party of eight and also were happy to ring us up separately. Since the food is Turkish, the menu is a bit different that your standard Middle Eastern place. I love their Begendi (ask for it, because for some reason they don’t call it that on the menu, though that’s the way it’s listed on GrubHub) — chicken or beef on a bed of eggplant dip, with Turkish bread. They also serve Pide, which is like a thin, flat calzone (although without the tomato sauce). The one with cheese and sucuk (a kind of hard sausage) tastes a lot like a pepperoni pizza. Cigar Borek, fried filo dough tubes filled with feta cheese, are also excellent.
I’m only giving them three stars, though, because they claimed that they could give me a decaf latte, and there was no way it could have been decaf, because I was wide awake ALL NIGHT! That really messes a person up, so only three stars for them. If you don’t need to worry about caffeine, consider this a four-​star review.

This was my first meal here in Chicago. Very cozy and cute family run business, and the staff members were so friendly. The Eggplant Tower was good and flavorful, although slightly on the greasy side and made me quite thirsty. My friend got the quinoa salad which was massive and looked very healthy. They were so friendly to us and they gave us a rice pudding on the house! It reminded me of my mom’s rice pudding and really had a good ending to the meal.

Good hearty bread abounds at Zizi’s Café, from the pita and spiced carrot-​yogurt spread that came first to the cubes of crusty bread lining our Iskender Kebab platter. The storefront on Sheffield is unassuming but the restaurant is actually quite spacious and we were staffed by a kindly young woman who dealt with our indecision with good grace. We eventually got the starter combo platter — an impressive array of textures and flavors — and the Iskender platter which I was a little disappointed by — the lamb and beef was good but not as lively in either flavor or texture as I would have hoped for from something supposedly freshly grilled. I also couldn’t taste the contribution of the spicy walnut butter. Nonetheless, this was a nice quiet place with good food to have a late afternoon lunch on Saturday and I would come back to try other items on the menu.

Oh hell yeah! That Adana kabab roll is the bomb! The meat is juicy and succulent. I was in Istanbul earlier this year and the Adana kabab comes pretty darn close to the real thing! Get it now.
The complimentary carrot dip for starters was so good that we asked for seconds!
Bonus — this is a BYOB spot. Ambiance is casual.

Zizi’s is amazing.
Pretty much every Sunday night I order a caesar salad with chicken for take out. It’s always available right when I walk in to pay and the salad is one of the best I’ve had. The croutons are absolutely amazing, dunno if they’re tossed with garlic, parmesan, or what, but they’re superb. The caesar dressing is homemade and it’s fantastic, definitely distinguishes itself from most other dressings.
But the highlight — the chicken. Whoever thought of taking chicken doner and putting it on a caesar salad was a genius… a mad genius. It’s superb. I could eat that chicken forever.
I’ve also had their kebab plates which were very good. Pretty much got the sample platter the first time that had all their meats — the chicken, doner, meatball, kebabs, and even salmon. Everything was very good. Sizable portion as well so I took maybe ¹⁄₃ of it home. I’d definitely get it again. Some of the doner was pretty greasy, but that’s the only complaint and it’s a minor one.
The bread deserves a mention as well, not entirely sure what the bread is, it’s like a pita but stuffed and more fluffy on the inside. It’s great and the hummus they have pairs with it perfectly.
Highly recommend Zizis

Really 3.5 stars. We had the Zizi’s favorite wrap, which was quite good. Loved the lamb and beef doner. The fries were pretty limp, which was irritating. However, they do provide free garlic bread and carrot spread that are both very good (almost a meal in themselves).

Food — — -4.5
Ambience – 2.5
I would have given it 5 stars, had it not been for the soggy french fries served with my amazingly delicious Chicken Doner sandwich. (Just FYI, Zizi’s french fries are made from «real» potatoes.) Too bad they weren’t served hot, right out of the fryer. The chicken, was perfectly seasoned and cooked. The veggie garnishes were fresh & crisp. The Lebanese bread it was served on was to die for.
Unfortunately, as one astute Unilocaler put it, «they haven’t spent much… on the décor». But that’s OK. I’m here for the food, not the décor. A simple bud vase with a few fresh flowers is always a nice touch, but when every table has a vase of drooping flowers, that’s not cool. It would be better to have just a napkin, silverware & salt/​pepper shaker. 86 the flower idea!
The solution is an easy fix. With food as good as this, order online for delivery or pick up.

Nice low key turkish restaurent. They havent spend much on table chair or décor. But they are what they are, serving good food and above average service, nice cheerful staff. Everything we ordered was flavourful and tasty. I was little disappointed with hummus — it was plain ordinary. for entrée ordered sikander platter which was super– it was spicy, tangy and well cooked chicken. The best part for me was the yummy dessert — the yogurt parfait.
will surely go next time as there are more item on the menu that i want to try.

If you like Mediterranean, Zizi’s Café is worth visiting for three reasons:
1) The food is fresh.
2) The restaurant has a relaxed, family-​owned business ambience
3) They have a BYOB policy! And the owner is sweet enough to put your unopened beers in the cooler while you eat.
As far as food highlights go, the complimentary carrot spread and homemade bread is delicious! «Carrot spread» sounds strange, but it’s essentially grated carrots mixed with a yogurt sauce. SO GOOD. I also loved the red lentil soup — deliciously spiced! I wasn’t as impressed with the falafel, but it came with a nice yogurt sauce, so that helped.
Everyone here is very friendly, so if you have questions, don’t be afraid to ask! They will make sure you have a great time here. :D

Stopped by for dinner with some friends. Complimentary carrot appetizer and homemade bread. The carrot dish is a cold shaved carrot salad with non-​acidic dressing. I couldn’t figure out what the carrot dish was but it was great especially when eaten with the bread. I ordered Zizi’s kale salad with a side of chicken. The salad was made up of chopped kale, garbanzo beans, pickled beets and portobello mushroom and tossed in a red wine vinaigrette. The salad was fresh and crisp and the chicken had a ton of flavor. My only complaint was the dressing was a tad too acidic for me. Nonetheless I finished the entire salad. My friends ordered a variety of dishes and they all enjoyed their dishes and complimented the taste and flavor.
Overall, nice place for casual meal and to catchup with friends. The entire meal took nearly two hours and we never felt rushed. We had about 7 people in our party and even though they couldn’t provide individual checks they allowed us to pay individually at the register. It’s BYOB, affordable, and steps from Beercade and Diversey Brown Line.

Meh.
Everything was fine, nothing special. I ordered the combo. Salmon though wasn’t to my liking; weird extra fishy/​deep see spoiled fish taste.