Why London Needed Another Turkish Restaurant
This one is refining a cuisine Londoners had relegated to late-night eats
There is an overabundance of Turkish restaurants in London: a kebab shop on every corner. This does not make them any less special or delicious after a night out, but it does give restaurants like The Mantl a boost in the vast array of Turkish fare choices.
The Mantl — Serdar Demir’s seventh food-focused venture in London — is on the busy Brompton Road of one of London’s posher neighborhoods, Knightsbridge. Flanked by regal Hyde Park to the north and the Victoria and Albert Museum to the south with the high-end Harrods department store in the center, the area is home to wealthy international residents, mostly from the Middle East. And while there is no shortage of international food to choose from — Lebanese, French, Italian, Japanese, Russian, even a Polish place on the western edge — it seemed a Turkish restaurant was missing.
“I always wanted to come to Knightsbridge,” says Demir, who eyed restaurant properties going up for rent in the area for nearly two years before one finally came available.
