Mezè

Located on 18^th street, it is difficult to find parking, so be prepared to pay about twenty dollars for parking Ian the nearby parking lot that is located a two minute walk away. Street parking is almost impossible.
We had a table in the outside patio, which was great for people watching while you wait for your food. The food was very authentic Turkish cuisine that was well prepared and very tasty. The service was also great and very attentive. I don’t think any of us in a party of four, had an empty water glass during our entire stay. Everyone in the party enjoyed the food and the drinks. Top it all off with a nice authentic glass of Turkish black tea!

This restaurant was my first brunch when I moved to DC. We had a table of 7 and the restaurant was very accommodating with reservations. We decided to do the individual menu instead of the $ 32 all you can eat brunch that was offered to us. I had the meze breakfast with chicken sausage, scrembled eggs, French toast, and wheat toast. Everything was delicious, except I did not like the chicken sausage (but I tend to get picky about meats). My friend had the same dish and finished all of hers. I really enjoyed that the French toast came with fruit and was very rich and delicious.
Besides the chicken sausage, the mimosas, bellinis, and bloody Mary’s did not seem fresh or original to the restaurant. (They used Bloody Mary mix and juice from a plastic container). Fresh and original is always a nice touch. Also, in order to get the bottomless mimosas, the whole table had to get them. Which was frustrating because those who wanted it were not able to do it because some only wanted to have one mimosa.
Overall I would return here though!

Loved, loved, loved the mojitos! Now I can’t speak on the food but the drinks alone are a reason to come back. It’s a really small place that apparently has been there for 15 years but I just noticed it today smh. It was really warm inside due to the fact that they had the door and door-​front window open. I saw that they had upstairs seating but I didn’t eat any food. The bartender told me that I should come back for the food because it’s suppose to be good. I think I will :)

Wow what a gem! Stumbled upon this place for their happy hour and was extremely pleasantly surprised. Their mojitos are their specialty and they offer them in many flavors. They also have $ 5 food specials which ranged from hummus and bread to little falafel bites! Would definitely come back for their dinner. It’s a great place to people watch and enjoy the sun on their patio!

Husband and I were looking for a nice place to enjoy some cocktails on a hot early afternoon. Meze was the only spot on the strip that had good music and a good vibe at that time. We sat outside under the shade of a small awning and tried a variety of mojitos and spreads.
I really enjoyed the pineapple and the watermelon Mojito. They were a bit on the sweet side, but very refreshing under 90 degree temps. The chicken, babaghanoush and hummus spreads were delicious with the warm bread.
Our server was friendly and attentive. We would give Meze 5 stars, but would have liked more food and appetizer options.

Nice stuff, and good food.
Try the the raki drink if you like to try different cultures food and drink.

Meze is like a second home for us, we go there AT LEAST every week, if not more often. This means a lot knowing that I am very picky about food and that my better half lived in Turkey for some time and is therefore very knowledgeable about Turkish cuisine. Here is why we love this place:
–The food: every dish is not only delicious but consistently delicious. Meze translates to Turkish style tapas: I love their Tavuk kofte which is a plate of ground chicken patties with mashed potatoes, Arnaut cigeri (calf liver the Albanian way) served with onions, cerkez Tavugu which would be translated to Circassian chiken and is creamy chicken and walnut spread, muhammara, lentil soup, mercimek kofte (vegetarian lentil based patties but oh so delicious). If you want bigger portions, ask for the mixed kebab platter, or iskendar Kebab (a plate originally form Bursa made of gyro meat on bread, yogurt and tomato sauce). Sometimes they have specials like Ali Nazik (ask, they may have it, it’s lamb or beef cubes on eggplant purée). I can go on and on and yes, this place has a spread of Ottoman cuisine in all its glory and diversity everything is so damn delicious, so you can’t go wrong. Oh their tea is good too, their dessert as well (especially the Kunefe) and I hear the place is also famous for its mojitos. Their happy hour is a bargain but even in regular hours, I find the prices reasonable.
–The service: well, DC is full with restaurants that serve delicious food but I have never been to a place with better service. Everyone genuinely cares about customer satisfaction. The owner is always there, he is quite but courteous and nothing escapes him; he observes everything and makes sure patrons are happy and satisfied. The manager is also always there, very kind guy, pays attention to every detail and greets every customer. The bartender is also very nice, makes great cocktails, if something goes past the owner (which is impossible), or the manager (also impossible), then it won’t go past him. Finally, the waiters and waitresses are attentive and also personable, they remember the customers and are hardworking young people from Turkey, Cote d’Ivoire, Serbia, you name it. Most importantly, the service is efficient, your water will be refilled continuously, your bread replenished and your food will be served in no time. The only place I have seen this quality of service was Istanbul!
— Location: you are in prime location, in Adams Morgan and if you sit outside, you can indulge in the sun, romantic conversation or some amusing people watching. The inside of the restaurant is well decorated and classy, there is a discrete TV screen with a slide show of old Istanbul pictures by Ara Guler and non-​invasive Turkish music will be playing in the background. I hear they even have live music sometimes. We often go on weekdays but the crowd has always been a grown up crowd without being boring. This is a place I would take my parents to if they visited but also my best friend from out of town. You will see families, couples, friends enjoying a mojito and suddenly, for a second, you will think you are in Istiklal street, in the heart of Istanbul.
Tesekkurler Meze!

Our favorite restaurant in town :) The waitstaff are superb and the food is to die for. The muhammara is the best we’ve had and their kunefe is perfect.

Very good all around. My girlfriend and I both had Mojitos and they were well balanced and flavorful. She got the Mango one and it was better than the classic, but the classic is still very good. Then we got the hummus with homemade bread and that was also very good. I had a unique dessert the waitress recommended and it exceeded my expectations. Service and food are great, I would highly recommend.

Such a great spot for a casual date night! We arrived around 6:30 and decided to take advantage of the happy hour specials, since everything was ~$ 5 until 7:00 pm. I had never tried Turkish food, so we ordered a variety of things for to try – a couple of dips that came with bread, some sort of fried rolls with feta cheese inside, stuffed grape leaves, and several wines. I particularly enjoyed the grape leaves and feta rolls, but the dips left something to be desired, and i found them a bit bland. We ordered a kunefe for desert, and it was delicious – the most authentic one he’s had outside the middle east, according to my date! It was super rich and I’m glad we shared it, because while it was tasty, I don’t think I’d want to eat an entire one myself.
Overall, a cute spot with good food. I’d be happy to eat here again.

Great place. Great service and food

Stopped in here on a Thursday evening for something lite to munch on and to grab a drink with my Beau. The ambiance was very romantic and classic. I loved the pictures on the wall. We sat at the bar. The bartender was very friendly and helpful with choosing something to eat. We weren’t too hungry so we shared a small plate of the Tavuk Kofte which included; chicken meatballs, mashed potatoes and grilled zucchini. It was pretty good. If we were hungry though, I don’t think that plate would have done the job. They do offer larger plates for a larger price.

Sunday brunch — I had the urge to have a nice filling American breakfast without feeling too guilty. Choose to eat at The Diner, next to Meze. But thankfully there were too many like me and a big waiting queue. So we tentatively walked two steps ahead, pondered at the menu of Meze, and decided to step in.
Pleasently surprised with my order of Meze Breakfast. The lady who attended us was sweet, the plate was well laid out. The food wasn’t too greasy, the French Toast had nice cinammoney flavor, coffee (with refills) was just right for me, I prefer lighter coffee. Being a Turkish place, they had turkey bacon and chicken sausage (no pork!). Both nice. My egg Scrabble was fine.
Overall Good experience.

This restaurant is so good! The food is delicious and authentic Turkish food that you really do not want to miss and the service is so quick and friendly! My friends and I stopped there around 9pm for dinner and I think we all fell in love! The food is divine and our waitress was so kind and sweet. Before I could even set my glass down, they were already refilling it! I ordered some meat stuffed in dough made in a yoghurt with a red bell pepper sauce and wow Definitely recommend this place!

Brunch was overpriced for what it was. Some of the food was good (dolma) while other plates were inedible (yogurt soup, some of the dips). The all you can eat/​drink option ($ 32 I think) must be used by everyone at the table, which is annoying. Booze refills were very slow and we repeatedly had to ask for refills even with six or 10 servers available. We requested a carafe for table which was denied. Would’ve made a lot more sense to do bottomless for $ 15 and get a safe menu item.
In the restaurant’s defense, any place that is slow on bottomless booze refills at brunch will get at most a two star review. The guy refilling the water was pretty fast though.

Went there tonight & ordered the potato puff filled with beef/​lamb (can’t remember the name of the dish) & it was delicious! The server was nice & recommended some customer favorites — tried the red pepper dip, also delicious. Rack of lamb is also worth a try! I will be back!

Came here for a friend’s birthday and I was excited to see all the Turkish dishes that reminded me of my trip to Turkey. I only ordered a veggie kabob and Sigara Böregi, which was basically a feta cheese filled egg roll. I was expecting the Sigara Böregi to be a thinner pastry and lighter, there was way too much feta cheese in it so eating the whole plate would’ve been too heavy. The veggie kabob was fine, the hummus it came with was very good. My friend tried the Manti entrée which we were warned that not everyone enjoys. It’s a classic Turkish dish but the description of beef stuffed dough in yogurt did not depict what it actually was. It was more of a yogurt «soup» with dumplings in it. Overall, it was good, but I would try other dishes if I came back.

Tried this place this week; I think entrees are over-​priced, the wine is kinda small pours, and the interiors are definitely needing some re-​imagining. I’d spend my money elsewhere, or order take out.

Great location, so convenient and affordable. I would recommend this place if you’re into mediterranean food. They usually run groupon deals.

had brunch here with a group of friends. The food itself was decent, but was nothing special (which was okay for the price). The portions were a fair size and the food came out relatively fast (however, we were the only people in the place at the time). I ordered the aphrodite (bagel with cream cheese and salmon) which had a unique tomato salsa on it. Most of the table ordered the eggs benedict and were content with their plates.

Casual dining, more for a happy hour, hummus and sigara boregi are good, chicken is ok, kefta is not recommended. Staff are very nice.

3.5 stars making it to a four cuz of the staff— I went there for a Wednesday happy hour. The appetizers are quite delish, i personally liked the sigara boregi (cheese pastry rolls) the most. If you don’t know the menu, I recommend you to start with a dip trio that comes with a very puffy and buttery home made bread. Their lentil soup is a small cup and it isn’t bad. The chicken salad (Çerkez tavuğu) tasted a bit American although not bad either. Gavurdağı (thinly chopped tomatoes with nuts and chives) wasn’t my favourite of all times, it lacked some flavour. They have a huge selection of mojitos and they are half priced in happy hour but I wouldn’t recommend them (I could barely taste the alcohol in it, but it could be a nice soft drink). Raki is a great ouzo-​like liquorice drink that can accompany your tapas in a smooth way. Kudos for our server who recently came from Turkey for his positive vibe, we were just happy with the service. I will give another chance to that place in future for the sake of some tapas and also because it’s the only Turkish restaurant in the neighbourhood.

I love this place. The prices are affordable and the menu lets you know exactly what ingredients are in each item on the menu. Also there is very little gluten, so alll those with celiac disease or have a gluten free diet, this place is for you. Portions are a little small but two items on the menu will be enough to fill you up.

A few coworkers and I headed here after work for Happy Hour on a Friday night and really loved it! The servers were all very friendly and helpful. They have a special until 7pm for half-​off (about $ 5) mojitos which is pretty sweet. There are lots of different flavors of mojitos — we especially liked the Tropical and Ginger flavors. Their food specials only go until 6:50pm, however, which is kind of strange but it is listed on the menu. The $ 4 plates were okay — the bread was most delicious but a very small serving. Luckily they just kept bringing us more and more! We all ordered the chicken meatballs plate and the best part of it was the mashed potatoes. I also liked the cigar-​rolled pastries. Lastly, our waiter very patiently split our check several ways which was nice. I’m looking forward to going back and trying more food and mojitos!

I took a chance on this place because my friend is vegetarian and this menu seemed to have many options. They have many options and my friend and I wanted to try a couple of plates each
Food
–Three dips we tried w/​house made bread included:
Babaganush (eggplant)
Cerkez Tavugu (shredded chicken breast)
Muhammara (roasted red pepper spread)
–Midye Tava (fried mussels) — came out on a skewer and it was definitely succulent and good.
–Deniz Taragi (scallops w/​eggplant purée and cheese) — this dish was not bad just ok.
–Mucver (zucchini pancakes) — just ok
Sigar — fried cheese roll was good
Honestly, the food was underwhelming and have been to other places that served better quality food.
2.5 stars

We stopped into Mezé around 9:30 on a Saturday night. We were seated right away and the wait staff was very friendly.
Mezé is small plates and that was great as it was late and did not want a large meal. We had the Baba ghanoush, Grilled Lamb, Shrimps and Lentil Soup. Everything was very good and had great flavors. The portion sizes were definitely small plate sized, but with the warm pita bread they served, we were good. We finished off our meal with Baklava.

This was my first time going to a Turkish restaurant. I wasn’t super hungry, so I went for the mucver (zucchini pancake) and a side salad. They were pretty good, but rather expensive for the size of the portion, even by DC standards. The service was pretty good and the waiters were kind and patient.

I personally liked the food, especially if you are sharing in a small group. The amount is not huge, however it’s filling and tasty. The place has a nice environment and the server (regardless the language barrier), was helpful. However we asked for a scoop of ice cream got half a scoop and were charged 5.00! Like it was one dollar less than the actual dessert. That’s outrageous and mind blowing.

I don’t usually write a review unless i go to a restaurant at least three times. I think that one time experience would not be enough to evaluate a restaurant.
Keeping that in mind, whenever I crave for Turkish or Mediterranean food, Meze is always my first option! Even though Meze is famous with its Mojitos, their food is as amazing as their mojitos. I would strongly recommend, Karniyarik (ovenbaked eggplant stuffed with beef, lamb and herbs), Fistikli Adana (Adana Kabop with pistachios) and Kabak Dolmasi (Oven baked stuffed Zuchinis).
Now, whenever people go to a Turkish Restaurant baklava is always a first dessert option but with Meze, try Kunefe, you would not regret at all!

I am incredibly impressed by the variety of vegan dishes they offer. They are decent-​sized and priced under $ 9. Do yourself a favor and try their dolma even if you’re not vegetarian — you’ll love it. On Monday all wine bottles are half of which is obviously a genius idea. They have a nice outdoor patio where you can sit in warm weather and enjoy people-​watching. My only complaint would be that once we had a waiter whose limbs didn’t cooperate with him and he kept dropping stuff so by the end of the dinner my t shirt looked like an abstract painting. But, being in a food coma, I was cool with that.

Delicious brunch. AYCE from their brunch menu and drink (mimosa, bellinis, bloody mary) for $ 32. Had their french toast which was super tasty — they use cinnamon swirl bread, their turkish omelette was also super tasty so I had two. I would come back for their brunch deal.

I took my boyfriend here for his birthday dinner and his birthday happens to be Valentine’s Day… so we took a risk on the prie fix dinner menu. I regret that I cannot recommend it.
The bread on the appetizer plate was stale – it was clear it had been sitting out for a long time – and the salad was wilted. I will say that our main courses – my chicken, his lamb – stood out and made me think that perhaps this restaurant would be of a higher standard on a different day of the year.
Unfortunately the worst part of the experience was the service. I had a 7:15 reservation and was told only when we sat down that we had to be gone by 8 for the second seating. This was printed on the menu – but an otherwise identical menu online had not included this important detail.

I informally get my friends together for a monthly «brunch club» and we call ourselves the Foggy Bottom-​less Mimosas.
I asked for recommendations for the month of November and a friend thought of this place. Since he is the vegetarian one in our group and we definitely try our best to accommodate to our veggie friends, Meze sounded like a good option.
Also since we scheduled it the weekend before Thanksgiving, it seemed appropriate to do a very non-​Americana Thanksgiving cuisine and Turkish sounded perfect.
It’s funny because it is in the A-​M neighborhood and we pass by this restaurant a lot and in all my years here, never really actually have eaten in Meze.
Reserving was easy with open table and even when requesting initially a table of 10, they had time slots open. Once the day arrived, everything went seamlessly. Our tables were ready and even when our count bumped up to 16, Meze added a table without question or signs of annoyance.
We had one waitress the whole brunch whose name is GVERGANA and was FANTASTIC! Many of my friends also complimented on her friendly demeanor and service even after we left. Meze updated their brunch menu so it is all you can EAT AND DRINK! And they were definitely generous with the pours. I honestly never saw an empty glass since they were attentive enough to keep us refilled the whole time we were there.
As far as the food, it definitely is hard with a large party to accommodate everyone’s «needs» but all in all, everyone just belted out what they wanted and food came in and folks ate it up… everything from the small bites, hummus platters to the burgers and egg dishes were delicious and there were no complaints around the table.
I think what made it easy as well particularly in a large party is asking everyone to bring cash so you don’t have to deal with the nightmare of splitting the bill. The all you can eat/​drink is all or none which means your whole party must buy in… which makes the cost per person easier as well.
Brunch club was a success this month and credit goes to Meze and Gvergana for a memorable experience.
I’m surprised this restaurant has a 3.5 average rating… then again you can’t help those Unilocalers that are super critical or like to troll around and give bad ratings.
From me…5 stars. Thanks again!

So Meze offers a great ambiance mixed with great food. It’s at the heat of Adams Morgan which leaves the opportunity for more bar hopping.
However it’s a great place to hang out, and on the weekends the 3^rd floor turns into a lounge, and they throw a great party.
Staff is always warm and friendly.
I really love the mojitos. They have a great variety of them and are always innovating.
Try the cigara boregi! It’s better than what you find in turkey.
Manti is great too.
Come and enjoy this place as much as I have!

BEST FOOD IN DC. This is one of my favorite restaurants in DC. I have been here maybe over 100 times in the past four years. Authentic and high quality Turkish meze good for groups and sharing. The Turkish tea is the best in the DC area as is there kunafeh dessert. I would recommend the salmon kabob and the liver as well as the muhammara.
This place can be good for dinner or just for coffee and tea and dessert as well as beer and wine. The seating outdoors is great and the ambiance is beautiful. It’s a must go.