We sit down with Ferhat Dirik, the restaurateur behind London’s Mangal II, to learn what it takes to update a restaurant for a new generation. Also in the programme: we meet Marina Marchese to flick through her new book, ‘The World Atlas of Honey’, and pop open the lid on the sweet stuff. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Hello and welcome to the menu, Monaco Radio's food and drink program.
I'm your host, Chiara Rimela.
Coming up, we learn what it takes to update a restaurant for a new generation.
Mangal means to barbecue, so it's a fundamental part of what we do.
Every dish we produce, we try to implement some element of grill cooking.
Also on the program, we pop open the lid on the world of honey.
All that here on the menu on Monocle Radio.
Family run restaurants mean something profound and personal to the people who grew up in them.
In hospitality, perhaps more so than other industries, so many of the institutions that we love in our cities belong to fathers, mothers and children who have poured their entire lives into the endeavor in London.
Mangal2 was originally founded in 1994 by Ali Dirik and was at the time the first Turkish restaurant of its kind in the city.
From its perch in the boisterous neighbourhood of Dalston in North London, it became a beloved classic for many residents.
Which is why Ali's sons Ferhat and Sirtaj's decision to mix things up once they took the reins took many people, including their own father, by surprise.
But having transformed into an accomplished modern Turkish restaurant, Mangal too has found renewed status in the capital, all the while remembering the roots of its success.
Now the brothers have written Mangal Stories and Recipes, a book to celebrate both the beginnings and present of the restaurant.
In it, Ferhat writes passionate odes to his neighbourhood, his father's commitment and his attachment to the space itself.
He joined me in the studio to discuss how tricky but important it is to manage generational handovers in the kitchen.
I started by asking him what Mangal cooking is and where Mangal 2 began.
Mangal means barbecue in Turkish, and my dad, Ali Dirik, he brought the first Ojak ba, which is an indoor barbecuing style that you find throughout Turkey over to the UK.
He opened Mangal 1 in, I believe, 1990.
Then he opened Mangal 2 around the corner in 1994.