Dining at Istanbul's Sirkeci Railway Station
to the old Orient Express Restaurant plus a recipe for lamb and chestnut stew
Next time you’re in Istanbul, being jostled by crowds of commuters and tourists, take my advice and head to Sirkeci station, a 15-minute walk from the bustling Eminönü docks, and then slip into the usually empty and blissfully quiet Orient Express Restaurant.
Once you’re inside, having passed the tracks and platforms, you can sit in peace amidst faded 19th-century glory, perhaps spooning comforting soup into your tired mouth, whilst admiring the restaurant’s high-ceilinged room with its paintings of locomotives. Then, afterwards, when you’ve been suitably calmed by the food, the setting and the low-key service, you can nip into the adjacent museum, a tiny space crammed with a century’s worth of artefacts all connected to Turkey’s railways.
A nostalgic, unique and charming restaurant, it is an ideal setting for this week’s Journeys Beyond Borders newsletter….
