On paper, it all sounded so good: a Turkish chef who trained under Yotam Ottolenghi but built his own brand working at Soho House opens his first outlet in trendy Soho. No expense has been spent on the décor, with some beautiful tiling and a lavish bar with countertop dining. Nonetheless, you can’t buy atmosphere and neither the food nor the service quite hit the highs we were hoping for.
Your reviewer was the second of our trio to arrive at Zahter. It being a sunny day, his promptest comrade had secured an outside table. This was great for people-watching – with a vista onto Carnaby Street – and proved an inspired choice. Your reviewer needed to use the bathroom shortly after his arrival, necessitating a walk through the – you guessed it – deserted interior. A brief survey of the scene screamed great for cocktails in the evening, but if you do want to dine inside, then you’re shunted into an upstairs space, without either the vibes or the view.
Maybe the food might make it all OK? Well at lunchtime, diners confront a ‘brunch’ menu, available apparently until 3pm. This creates the slightly awkward dynamic where a dish of poached eggs could conceivably sit alongside a plate of chicken wings. Charitably, there’s something for everyone. Unfortunately, we were given little guidance on what might be the appropriate amount or permutation of dishes to order across the six, slightly conflicting sections. As a consequence, we under-ordered initially and then over-ordered on a second round, an outcome clearly much better for the restaurant’s margins than its diners’ stomachs (not to mention wallets). Bread – a staple in most Middle Eastern cuisines – accompanied some, but not all, dishes and had literally to be begged for once it ran out. The same went for water. A jug for a table of three would surely not be an unreasonable request. At Zahter, it seemed so.
Fortunately, what we ate did generally deliver, although to say it wowed might be too generous a claim. A vibrant muhammara (a red pepper-based dip topped with pomegranate molasses) was the stand-out among the cold mezze. Citrus-marinated seabass, by contrast, was tasteless, with the identity of the fish species in question unclear. Baked aubergines were better, but the portion size inadequate. The same would go for our tiger prawns. At just shy of £22 for fewer than half-a-dozen, diners might justifiably feel short-changed. The promised accompanying Aleppo butter did not arrive. If one vignette were to sum up Zahter then it would be the moment a server arrived with one of our dishes and was asked – not unreasonably – by one of our group, which it was. He replied he did not know, since it was his first day. He promptly whisked the dish away, presumably so that he could verify its identity with his colleagues. Maybe it should have stayed in the kitchen…