(Editor’s Note: This review of one of our all-time favorite places first appeared on April 1, 2009.)
The no-frills Lades 2 presents diners with that age-old question: what to eat first, the chicken or the eggs? This restaurant – a Turkish version of the American-style greasy spoon diner – specializes in all things fowl, from chicken soup, to a variety of egg dishes and even a dessert that, we kid you not, weds a thick, milky pudding with chicken. Even the name – “lades” means wishbone in Turkish – follows the chicken theme.

Lades 2 is located on a side street off the busy pedestrian-only Istiklal Cadessi, in a lively area filled with cafes and small nightclubs specializing in Turkish folk music. Across the street is the original Lades, a more respectable joint that serves classic Turkish food to a busy lunch crowd (and worth a visit in its own right). Lades 2 has a more proletarian vibe, with tables of mostly unaccompanied men scarfing down their food in a kind of monastic silence, broken only by the waiters shouting to the two short-order cooks in the back.

The menu is basic. If it’s chicken you want, you can order the restorative soup – not far off from what you would get in a Jewish delicatessen in New York – which comes with little strands of noodle floating in it, or “tavuk yağda,” a stir-fry of shredded chicken and hot green peppers in a tangy tomato sauce. Eggs come two ways: fried or scrambled with sautéed onions, green peppers and tomato in a dish called menemen. Most patrons order their fried eggs cooked together with either sucuk (a garlicky Turkish sausage) or pastirma (dried cured beef) and even ground beef. It’s greasy goodness, served up in its own individual skillet.

Of course, no visit to Lades 2 would be complete without a taste of their excellent “chicken” pudding, called tavuk göğsü (literally “chicken breast”). You won’t be biting into chunks of bird in your pudding. Rather, the meat is poached and then pounded until it is nothing but wispy fibers, adding texture and the subtlest flavoring to the white pudding, which is served with a dusting of cinnamon. Don’t be scared about ordering it. After all, you know what they do to chickens in Lades 2.

Address: Sadri Alisik Sokak 14, Beyoglu
Telephone: 212-251-3202

In Turkey’s predominantly-Kurdish eastern provinces, breakfast is not just for breakfast anymore. Particularly in the city of Van, not far from Turkey’s border with Iran, the morning repast has been turned into serious business: the town is filled with dozens of Kahvaltı Salonu’s – breakfast salons – that serve a dizzying assortment of farm fresh breakfast items day and night.

In recent years this boffo breakfast has been working its way westward, with several Van-style Kahvaltı Salonu’s now open in Istanbul. Our favorite, by far, is Van Kahavaltı Evi (Van Breakfast House) in Beyoglu’s Cihangir neighborhood. The restaurant has quickly become one of the area’s most popular, and it’s easy to see why. The people running the friendly place – a crew of hip, young Kurds who seem to be members of the slow food movement without even realizing it – serve a mean Van breakfast, bringing in most of their ingredients, some of them organic, from back east.

The Van breakfast takes the traditional Turkish breakfast of cheese, tomato, cucumber and some bread and turns it up several notches. At Van Kahvalti Evi, along with the standards, your breakfast plate comes with an assortment of local Van cheeses (including a very tasty one that contains brined wild herbs), the heavenly kaymak, tangy cacik (thick yogurt spread) and murtuğa, a heavy wheat flour porridge that looks almost like scrambled eggs. Butter, jams, olives and some of Van’s famous honey round all this out – along with endless glasses of strong tea. One plate is certainly enough to feed a whole family. Along with the breakfast plates, the restaurant also serves fried eggs or menemen, scrambled eggs cooked with sautéed onions, green peppers and tomato. They also serve excellent gozleme, thin sheets of hand-rolled dough that are wrapped around cheese, potato or spinach.

Van Kahavaltı Evi can get quite busy on the weekends, when a line usually forms outside, so come early if you want to get a table. Or, better and easier yet, do like they do in Van and come later in the day have breakfast for dinner.

Address: Defterdar Yokuşu No: 52.A, Cihangir
Telephone: 212-293-6437