The cabbage rolls, or lahana sarmasi ($17), at the new Turkish restaurant Esnaf aren’t like the ones my grandmother used to make. The recipe she used was handed down from her mother-in-law, a Ukrainian émigré. She pan-fried golumpki until the skins blistered.
The cooks in the busy Esnaf kitchen incorporate similar ingredients into their rolls but the results are more ethereal than the pungent ones I remember eating as a child.
Stuffed with beef and rice, the blanched cabbage skins take on a translucent quality, golden yellow in the light. The tender texture is closer to dolmas—a fork slides effortlessly right through them. Served with garlic yogurt, they’re flavored with herbs, tomato paste and olive oil. Rarely are cabbage leaves transformed into such a sumptuous dish.
Located just off El Camino Real in San Carlos, Esnaf has large front windows that allow sunlight and air into the space. Our server told us that Esnaf co-owners Cansel Tok and Sedri Gundogdu previously worked at Pranzi, an Italian restaurant in the same neighborhood. The cuisine and décor at their restaurant, which opened in June, is a reflection of their own heritage. The walls are washed in a pale, hazy sea blue. Basket lamps hang down from the ceiling to complement the tile floor and the woven backs of the dining room chairs.
Very quickly, we ate our way through a meze trio ($20), dipping sliced pita bread into hummus, haydari (yogurt dip) and girit. Both the hummus and haydari were whipped until smooth. Girit was new to me, and an unexpected pleasure. Comparing girit to a cheese loaf is a disservice. It’s closer to a farmer’s cheese that’s been flavored with fresh herbs and pistachio. There’s a nice salty, quasi-parmesan like tang to it. It would be a winner at any office or cocktail party.
My dinner companion who’d spent holidays in Turkey recognized the selection of pide on the menu. Shaped like open-faced, flattened calzone, our ispanakli pide ($15) ate like a cheesy spinach pizza. The dough was breadier than most pizzas but comparable. Essentially toppings baked into a crispy pita bread made with two cheeses: kashar mozzarella cheese and erzincan tulum. In addition to this vegetarian option, Esnaf serves pide with chicken, green peppers and tomatoes ($16), with beef ($17) or sausage ($15), or mushrooms ($15).
An order of meatballs, izmir kofte ($16), arrived in a small copper serving dish. The tomato sauce was pulpy, bright and acidic. Each meatball was seared to the bottom of the dish. When paired with yogurt and a torn piece of pita, it was a perfect little bite. Two appetizers and a pide was plenty of food for two but Esnaf also has a selection of grilled entrées on the menu, including steak ($29-$32), chicken ($28) and fish ($34).
The night we visited the kitchen had run out of pistachio baklava but one of the cooks had made pistachio gelato ($10) and topped it with shards of sweet halva. The gelato didn’t have an artificial green color. It could have been a cousin to green tea ice cream, both because of its pale color and subtle, sublime flavor.
Esnaf, 1105 San Carlos Ave., San Carlos. 650.394.0244. Open Mon to Fri 11:30am–2:30pm and 4:30pm–9pm, Sat and Sun 11am–3pm and 4:30pm–9pm. IG: esnaf.restaurant
