Saray Köz — Turkish food, Anatolian to be exact.
This Turkish place is perfect proof that the best grub is in the worst neighbourhoods.
For over a week I didn’t leave the house, laid low on my bed of woe by the flu, and the minute I felt better I’d had such a bellyful of moping about at home playing pocket billiards that here I am of an evening on a crossroads practically in the middle of St. Georg in Hamburg, wondering where to go and get something to eat.
I was thinking about a lovely little German place on Hansaplatz. They do a cracking vegan kumpir, that is a stuffed baked potato. In January 2025 a shooting ended in that place, one that had started in another place in St. Georg.
Hamburg is one of the three main ports cocaine comes into Europe through — after Antwerp and Rotterdam, and the biggest in Germany. And that means the Mocro Mafia, and that means a gang war.
That’s the sort of neighbourhood it is. So far there’s no shooting in the streets yet and no random casualties, no Kalashnikov bursts outside a metro station like in February ’25 at Clémenceau in Brussels, where the gangs are fighting over “selling points”.
No telling what the next year brings. If you fancy visiting Hamburg, get a move on.
And so I was pondering away at the crossroads opposite the porn cinema. And right next to some Turkish place.
And here’s a big plus. Especially from the point of someone with social anxiety like mine.
The whole menu up in the window.
A separate section in the menu — “vegetarian and vegan dishes”!
Brilliant thing, and my impression is it’s getting more and more common in Germany, especially in Arab or Turkish places. I’ve seen it in Berlin, a few times. Places have the vegetarian and vegan options put up where you can see them. And in Middle Eastern cooking those “options” are the backbone of the menu anyway, like hummus, falafel, tabbouleh or baba ganoush.
And that’s one of the reasons strictly vegan places are losing custom and going under.
If I went out with mates and some of them wanted meat, we’d pick Saray Köz, not an all-veggie place. It’s a great spot for all sorts of occasions, a date as well. Not suggesting anything, but if any lady happens to be in Hamburg, I’ve often got the whole day off.
In the vegan options — seitan kebab.
You’re not obliged to know, so I’ll explain: seitan is gluten, that is wheat protein, got by long and terribly *********** washing of the starch out of wheat flour dough. I’ve had a go at seitan a few times, never been fully happy with a single one of them, so all the more respect to cooks who work with this stuff.
And you really can do wonders with it.
And with it, Richtig Turkishe Mocca. My pursuit of happiness had come to an end. For that evening at least.
They had me totally with the coffee alone. I’d been traipsing round Hamburg for an hour, and it was Tippischenorddeutsches winter, that is around zero, blowing a bastard and wet. So strong hot coffee was one of those things that change your life and make you happy.
And here’s an important note when you’re ordering.
If, like me, you reckon it’s thin bread only — tortilla or Lebanese pita — then order DURUM. If the menu says “in bread” or “in pita”, as a rule that’s a great thick bap, and next to it the whole dish loses the point. Stuffed full of bap, the richness of the flavours won’t get through. Because a good falafel, and in fact a kebab too, has this about it, that it’s got a lot of different flavours, different ingredients, different textures. We put sauce in it so there’s as much of those flavours, those textures as possible — and that does a big part of the job.
And I can definitely recommend the Seitan Kebab at Saray Köz, warmly.
Nicely gentle seitan, not like any particular meat, but like some gentle one — a gentle bit of seitanison.
If I were to do anything differently, I’d mix up the veg a bit more, with pickles for instance. Turkish pickled turnip would go perfectly here, smacking you in the eye with its electric pink-purple. And it goes brilliantly with falafel and kebab.
And obviously, me being me, I’d add pickled jalapeños. Only that… With me those are the 2 basic seasonings I add at the plate: pickled jalapeños and sriracha.
The sarnie €9.50, coffee €3.90. Let’s say for two tenners, even less, you’ll eat a proper dinner and drink something hot or cold.
Menu’s varied, too long even. A long menu causes problems for various reasons, more waste for instance, or you need bigger storerooms and fridges. I don’t know how they manage it, but judging by what I ate, their Chef has got it sorted. Respect, mate!
And as it’s a proper Turkish place run by practising Muslims, there’s no alcohol.
What there is instead is a big choice of coffees (Turks, what do you expect) and alcohol-free cocktails.
And although as a rule, if there is one, I’ll have a beer with my dinner, this suits me fine, especially when I can get coffee served like that.
Another thing in their favour, from a purely professional point of view: in a very natural way, in a conversation I started myself, the waiter asked me if I’d leave them a review on Google. I’d been praising the Chef for the seitan.
From my experience that’s one of the more important bits of grassroots marketing work in gastro.
Not fucking about on Facebook and daft little reels on TikTok.
Reviews in places like Google Maps, Tripadvisor or HappyCow.
So on that front too, brilliant.
The place is generally the sort where some wild man, a scruffbag out of the woods, can walk in off the street and order a falafal to take away, and you could actually take a date there too.
Just reminding the ladies, just in case.
Waiting and front of house isn’t my department, but to my taste the service was excellent.
Makes it a pleasure to leave a tip.
Which I remind you to do likewise.
A paean of praise is what’s come out of this, so I’ll chuck in praise for the website at the end as well.
Just nice and elegant, no bells and whistles. But with the menu and the other information you need.
And I have got something to pick at. Because that site is a bit too elegant. There’s an option to book a table, but no information that you can also just walk in off the street and eat.
The route from the station to Saray Köz and then back to the station via Hansaplatz. On the corners watch out for ladies of negotiable affection. And in St. Georg generally, you’d better watch out.
The kitchen is my space for lifestyle medicine.
I'm not a dietitian or a doctor – I'm a chef, and a member of the Polish Society of Lifestyle Medicine. Nutrition is essential to a modern kitchen, and that's nothing new: working from Hippocratic dietetic principles was part of a cook's craft centuries ago. At Rude Kitchen I tie that tradition to modern science — and to lifestyle. Read more about how I bring cooking and lifestyle medicine together on the About page.