Address: 25 Tsar Simeon St. (between Vasil Levski Blvd. And Rakovski St.)
Tel:  930 59 69
Working hours: 11am - 11 pm
Credit cards not accepted

Normally I wouldn’t touch food that drips oil. This, whatever it was, however, was delicious.

On a Monday night in late February I went to Mehana Kukeri, easily passed by in a residential neighbourhood, wondering if there’d be any people in the restaurant. Entering into the main room decked out in traditional Bulgarian crafts, pottery and wooden tables and benches, I soon saw that I needn’t have worried: the parterre, which would hold about 35, was full, as were half the tables on the ground floor. A man was playing soft jazz on a synthesizer near the back wall. For a Monday, the activity and warmth surprised me.

Choosing a seat near the stairs, I hung my coat on one of the hooks affixed to one of the wooden pillars in the middle of the room, a space that would hold about 40 people.
The waitress promptly brought a menu, and I waded through it, wondering what all the choices entailed. Some I was able to make out - various parts of the chicken and the cow, salads, some fish and a selection from the grill. In all, the menu covered at least four pages, not counting the mehana’s selection of drinks, notably rakia and beers.

Figuring that for a restaurant review I should veer from my typical love of vegetables and more vegetables, I chose stomna kebap, 5.40 leva, which was listed as including chicken filet, peppers, mushrooms, onions and lukanka sausage. To me, the work “kebap” says something grilled on a stick. It wasn’t.

When the dish arrived, I was surprised to see a little covered Troyan ceramic pot, a napkin folded over the handle-knob as a hot pad. Lifting up the lid, a fragrant steam arose, and I readily spooned some of the concoction onto my matching plate. The succulent stew-like dish contained a depth of flavours that I can’t name. It was incredible, with tender chicken chunks, slices of lukanka and sauteed vegetable pieces. Unfortunately, it was a bit too greasy for me, and I was only able to finish half of it. (The take-home container cost 50 stotinki.)

Service was attentive throughout - I never felt ignored or harassed - and the live music added a special touch.

The only thing, and I hate to mention it, is that when I went to the WC (and it was a nice one, though small), one of the other waitresses exited the stall and left the facility without washing her hands. Luckily, she wasn’t mine.

The second time at Mehana Kukeri was a Saturday evening at 7.15pm. Given the Monday crowd, I made reservations. They were unnecessary. Perhaps it was the holiday weekend.

My friend Devin was here from California. The restaurant doesn’t have English menus, and he laudably endeavoured to decipher the menu and order in Bulgarian. The waitress, who didn’t seem to speak English, took our orders for some beers - a Zagorka Special and a Kamenitsa Tumno, two leva each, and his order for svinski shnitzel (pork schnitzel), 4.60 leva, and sirene pane (pan-fried white cheese), 3.50 leva. When his orders arrived a short time later, I had decided on a shopska salata, 3.20 leva and pileshka sertsa s maslo (pan-fried chicken hearts in butter), 4.10 leva. Remembering the grease dripping off my previous meal at the restaurant, I asked the waitress to go easy on the butter. She said that they would be lacking in flavour, but when the hearts arrived - a good-sized plate of them - she seemed to have taken note.

Both the cheese and the pork were tender and skillfully fried, not greasy and limp, or hard and black.

Delicious. All the food was delicious - soulful - and there was no skimping on portion sizes, either. I say delicious because it was: not haute cuisine or worthy of artistic photography, just heartening and delectably simple.

The freshness of my salad, topped with a thick snow of sirene, the spices in which the pork schnitzel was dredged prior to its journey into the pan, the transformation of the cheese from its typical cool state to a velvety warmth, and the fun chewiness of the chicken hearts satisfied both of us.

Throughout, modern rock and chalga played softly on the sound system. The way the basement floor is divided into two smaller rooms makes for a more intimate setting.

The multi-aged groups at the tables next to us chatted softly, and while no-smoking placards were set on two of the four tables in our room, no one really seemed to be smoking, anyway.

Later on, Devin and I chose rakias by the close-your-eyes-and-point method, ending up with a pomoriisko spetsialna, 1.20 leva and a karnobatska muskatova, one lev,
Mehana Kukeri has an appealing-looking lunch menu, on which it offers soups along with a selection of chef-chosen traditional preparations. Soup is not available at dinner.

A nice thing about the restaurant was its authenticity. With Bulgaria’s recognition that, yes, its culture is worthy of preservation, mehana-type restaurants seem to be popping up, hoping to appeal to the tourist crowd. Here, Bulgarians dined.

The restaurant would be suitable for anything from lunch among friends to family parties.