Grubby: Taci's Beyti

Krista has summoned us to this Midwood (unknown BK neighborhood) Turkish place twice now and we have been sated and pleased both times. Wild stuff here. And perhaps the best factor: BYOB. I love being able to bring our own booze in. While during our first visit, someone yanked a bottle of Ketel from their mother's fridge but we opted for Austin's finest during our second visit: Tito's Vodka (made from corn!). This was of course accompanied by wine and Baltika beer.
Here's the deal: it is cheap and good and full of lamb. God is great.

So, our visit tonight was in celebration of Krista's 30th. She is oooooold. But really I've been loving the 30's big time, so...Krista, the fun just started!

I believe that tonight we were under the vision of Taci himself. His mustacheod countenance was sitting across from us at a table situated below a framed 8x10" of himself ten years younger. He didn't seem to mind that we remained at the table drinking for two hours past our last bites of food.

And now on to the food...

Lamb is the name of the game here. Entrees are almost all meat based. But let me first begin with the appetizers.
Your typical Mediterranean/Middle Eastern appetizers are present. Chopped cucumber/tomato salad (with farmer's cheese) was a big hit. Eggplant appetizers, less so. The grilled eggplant, a bit too smokey. The baba ganoush was as I normally see it. This was a green, seedy, chunky and eggplanty ganoush - good for some, but as someone who hasn't quite fallen for eggplant, not appealing. It was nothing like the creamy dip presented at Salut or some of the other places I've written of. The cheese rolls, or "cheese cigars" as they were called by Lisa, were high class cheese sticks - feta supplanted for mozzarella and phyllo dough in place of breading. Fantastic. My favorite appetizer: tarator - "a very special mixture of tahini, yogurt, sour cream, fresh garlic and parsley". Sublime seeded bread triangles were great for dipping.

Entrees were all meat based and lamb was the meat of choice. It really is all about the meat here. Gyro and doner kabob satisfied all. The gyro meat was choice. The Iskender Kabob is the tomato-ey thing you see below. I'm on the wall here with this. I love the idea of crunchy pita squares and yogurt served with your meat. But something about it didn't quite ring my bell...and it was the tomato sauce. Loved the meat, loved the pita, loved the yogurt but that sauce. It just seemed canned or phoned in I guess. I don't know - thoughts?
The Karasik Pide threw me for a loop. Described as three kinds of meat (sausage, lamb and pastrami) in a cheesy pocket, it arrived looking like a delicious calzone. And it was...to some. The curing of the pastrami and sausage to me seemed off. I just wasn't feeling it - really gamey, not spicy. Basically, it was a gamey hot pocket. The lahmacun was basically a pita with chopped stuff on top (tomatoes, parsley, onion...), not that outstanding, but others seemed to like it.


Taci's Beyti is good stuff. I'm certainly not down on the place, I'm just trying to seperate the great items from the good.
This place is especially good for big parties. It's fucking BYOB and cheap. Go and bring your vodka, please.

Info: 1955 Coney Island Ave, Daily 12-11pm