Kofteci Metin

You could come to Kofteci Metin as a vegetarian and have a perfectly pleasant meal. The Turkish restaurant on a corner of Harringay’s Green Lanes makes a delicious, generous piyaz (a slick salad of plump white beans, fine raw onion, tomato, and parsley in a pool of oil), as well as wonderful grilled and mashed aubergine topped with feta. If you did that, though, you would be missing the point. Kofteci Metin is a self-proclaimed meatball enthusiast and a very good one at that.

The koftes are the only main on the menu and for good reason given the care and attention they’re grilled with. An Ottoman kebab here, with or without cheese, is as juicy as you’ll find anywhere in London—and six mixed kebabs with bread, grilled peppers, and tomato chilli sauce for under £20 is very good going.

The space itself puts the fun in functional and feels like it’s been fitted entirely from one Wish order after a few too many down the pub. There are neon lights, tiled walls, exposed brickwork, and an enormous fake Picasso. Friends settle in on big round tables, dates take a banquette, and solo diners get comfortable with an Efes and meatballs for one. It feels like a happy hodge podge inside and it works. Especially given the food is focused on doing one thing very well.