The ambience at Jaan is fine if you can manage to ignore the takeaway division. Photo / Janna Dixon
Herald rating: * *
Where: 505 New North Rd, Kingsland
Ph: 846 6652
Open: Lunch noon-3pm; Dinner 5pm-late
Wine list: More than adequate
Vegetarians: Oodles of choice.
Watch out for: The waiters attention.
Sound check: Conversation-friendly
Bottom line: Overpriced takeaways.
As rising prices hurt household budgets, times get tough in the eating business. That crashing sound you can hear is restaurants going to the wall.
But, defying the trends, a Turkish place has just opened on the outer reaches of the Kingsland dining strip.
I've never thought of
Turkish food as being either good or bad, really. It has always seemed to me that it just "is", like Mt Everest or warrants of fitness. You don't assess it; you just eat it.
But it is always good value for money, right? Well, you learn something every day.
Jaan is the fourth link in an international chain: the others, in London, Istanbul and, er, Dunedin, are all called Pasha, but that name was already taken in this territory by Simon Gault's tapas bar/cocktail lounge in the Viaduct.
No expense has been spared brightening up the two-storey villa which houses the Auckland branch: the walls are warm maroon, the bare polyurethaned floors gleam, the loos are pristine.
Big windows in the north-west walls would doubtless have afforded expansive views if it hadn't been pitch-dark at 6pm.
The otherwise salubrious ambience is rather spoiled by the brightly lit presence of the business' takeaway division behind a shiny deli-style counter on the left as soon as you walk in - an odd design decision in a place plainly trying to do upscale Turkish. But the Blonde and I settled into a warm corner and perused the menu, which includes all the standards from hummus through to baklava with the obligatory stops at kebabs, falafel, chicken and a fish dish.
Our apparently Turkish waiter was given to striding about like a model on a catwalk and it took some time to realise that, to get service, we needed to bellow at him (my voice proved more equal to this task than the Blonde's delicate soprano) whenever he came near, which he did quite often because he strode a lot.
But once assigned a job, he accepted it with a bright smile and undertook it with a brow furrowed in intense concentration. The real problem was the food.
It came on large china plates that had been artfully dusted with paprika before they emerged (from a kitchen quite separate from the takeaway counter).
But to say that it was unremarkable praises it too extravagantly.
The dolma (stuffed vine leaves) and boregi (deep-fried feta-filled pastries) were fine if pricey, but the main dishes disappointed.
My adana kebab consisted of two thick strips of the minced kofta lamb you get in a doner kebab, "smothered" (a word used prodigally on the menu) in a tomato gravy and was only marginally better than foodhall.
The Blonde's moussaka contained slabs of potato, a legitimate inclusion in the Turkish version, but which quite outnumbered the slices of eggplant. The bechamel gloop holding the whole thing together would probably serve very well as a filler in a panel-beating shop. Both were accompanied by tabbouleh and a dry slaw.
The Turkish delight and baklava we had for dessert were great.
An upmarket spin on ethnic cuisine is no bad thing, but ordinary food on nice crockery in nice surroundings is still ordinary food. At best, Jaan's is no more than that.
