Inside Look: The Turk’s Inn, Brooklyn

Appearing almost as a mirage on the hiply unpolished streets of Brooklyn’s Bushwick neighborhood, the Turk’s Inn only becomes more surreal when you step in the doors. If it feels like the space is from another place and time, that’s because it is—literally. The Turk’s Inn was a supper club in Hayward, Wisconsin. Opened by husband and wife George and Isabella Gogian in 1934 (and later run by their daughter, Marge), the restaurant operated for 80 years in the tiny northern Wisconsin hamlet on the Namekagon River.

“The first time I stepped foot in there I was 15 years old,” says Varun Kataria, co-owner, along with childhood friend Tyler Erickson. “Tyler’s family cabin was just a few miles away. So every summer for about 15 years, we would stop in.” When Beatrice “Marge” Gogian passed away and the restaurant closed in 2014, with everything going up for auction, Kataria drove up from law school to meet with Erickson. “We didn’t have a plan for it, we just knew it was important,” he says. “We weren’t thinking we were going to open a restaurant and nightclub in Bushwick. It was just that the Turk’s Inn was a one-of-a-kind collection, not repeatable again. So it was our job to maintain the integrity of the collection.”

Rebuilding History

Kataria and Erickson bought every piece of Turk’s they could get their hands on, from the original neon sign to the family portraits to the hulking ship bow–shaped bar. “The guy who bought the house wanted to keep the bar, so we were fighting him for it. But the joke was kind of on us, because once we won the physical bar, we had to figure out how to get it out,” says Kataria. “It was the first of many challenges.” Nearly five years passed before the Turk’s Inn would once again open its door, this time in a somewhat more bustling location. “It was a way to bring Turk’s to the world stage,” says Kataria, on choosing New York City for the restaurant’s new home.

Neither Kataria nor Erickson had come from a background in hospitality—the closest being the years in high school and college when they worked for Erickson’s dad at the jazz club he owned in Minneapolis, The Dakota. “Growing up, Tyler and I were both musicians. But we loved food and beverage and the welcoming, hospitable aspects of the restaurant space,” says Kataria. This set a template for the rebirth of the supper club, where the pair knew they wanted to incorporate a live music element.

In 2019, the Turk’s Inn reopened, this time including attached performance venue The Sultan Room, rooftop space the Kismet Garden, and adjacent kebab kiosk for quick walk-up eats. “We wanted it to be like a casino where you could step in and never leave if you were having fun—a complete night in one go. And that’s kind of what the Turk’s Inn was,” says Kataria. “People would come from miles and miles around to make a night out of it.”

“We’re not a concept restaurant. We’re a real place that was tied to real people and the story that they lived.” —Varun Kataria

But it’s the main dining room that stands as both faithful recreation and living homage to the historic supper club. The bulk of the decor came from the original location, with replacements made where necessary—such as the carpet, which is an exact pattern replica—and a few updates, like an Obama plate added to the row of presidential collector’s plates. The aim is sophisticated irreverence, elevated yet eccentric, from the midcentury light fixtures to the porcelain decanters shaped like Elvis and the Pope. “Look in any direction and you’ll see something of aesthetic or historic significance,” says Kataria. “We’re not a concept restaurant. We’re a real place that was tied to real people and the story that they lived.”

Middle East Meets Midwest

The menu matches the atmosphere, with offerings like Wisconsin cheese curds alongside jeweled rice pilaf and lamb shank. The cocktails, meanwhile, effectively straddle the line between craft sensibility and playful experimentation. “It’s true to the spirit of the [original] menu, which was a little Middle East and a little Midwest,” explains Kataria. “It’s about highlighting the era of classics, but then riffing them to the East, which is a lot of what they did.”

The Turkish Delight emulates the signature candy in the form of a gin fizz with Campari and rosewater, while the Tahini White Russian ditches the dairy for a pillowy topping of sweet tahini-coconut whip. The popular house spicy marg (appropriately named The Margie) incorporates cucumber and coconut, while other originals like the Saffron Sour (rye, saffron liqueur, lemon, black pepper) add colorful punctuation to the program. “I wanted the cocktails to almost be an adornment for the room.”

While their 2019 opening date meant weathering some tough years through the pandemic, it’s nonetheless good timing for the Turk’s Inn, as a reverence for nostalgia is still fully on-trend. Their advantage, however, is that the high-low kitsch factor wasn’t manufactured, it was simply relocated. “The hospitality culture in New York certainly has a ‘coolness’ factor to it. And we weren’t aiming to be the coolest place. We were aiming to be exactly who we are, and hopefully that will be timeless,” Kataria says. “The Turk’s Inn was in operation for 80 years, which is a long time for anything to be in operation, let alone a restaurant. So we try to do things in a way that don’t necessarily conform to any specific trend. If you stick around long enough, the trends will circle back to you.”