AS A student in 1970s London, one of my favourite eating places was a Turkish restaurant at the naff end of Fulham Road. It was called, exotically, Wine And Kebab. And that’s exactly what it did.

The Turkish wine was remarkable.

The first three glasses were disgusting but the fourth was quite acceptable and by the time the bottle was finished it tasted like nectar. Well, that’s how I remember it. The food, however, was absolutely fantastic whatever one’s state of inebriation and it was dirt cheap too. Nothing will be dirt cheap in Fulham Road today.

It was in Wine and Kebab that I first ate meze – the Turkish version of tapas – and loved all those little plates of this and that – stuffed vine leaves, hummus, yoghurt-based dips, fried cheese, auberginebased veg casseroles, bean salad, mini-kebabs etc.

So when a little Turkish restaurant called Meze opened in Darlington’s Parkgate eight years ago, I said to Sylvia: “We must go there.” “You must be joking,”

was her terse response as we drove past. “There’s a man sitting in there in just his vest.”

To be fair, it was a boiling hot summer’s afternoon and probably most of the men in Parkgate that day were probably wearing just their vests, or even less. But she was adamant. She would not be darkening its doors.

Eight years on, and Restaurateur Bill and I are having a boys’ night out. We don’t have a problem with men in vests and I want to rekindle those student memories.

On the midweek evening we called, Meze was almost full but it is important to point out that this doesn’t mean very much given that the maximum number that can comfortably sit down to eat there is only 18. Mike Amos, erstwhile restaurant critic on That Other Newspaper, decided it was the North- East’s Smallest Restaurant and it is hard to think of anywhere more compact than the former shop unit on one of Darlington’s least desirable thoroughfares.

Certainly, if you are looking for a remotely posh night out, this isn’t it. Meze is basic. But it is utterly honest in the way Wine and Kebab was and the food is similarly uncomplicated, lovingly prepared by Turk Cem Eskia and brought to the table by his Geordie partner Pauline Robson.

Sadly, there was no Turkish wine. Pauline told us a long and complicated story about wholesalers in London and Leeds but the bottom line was an acceptable bottle of Minervois for just £10 – a modest mark-up these days.

Of course, we had to start with the meze – nearly all the starters on the menu it seemed – which came in tsunami-like waves which quickly swamped our little table and spread to the neighbouring one. The stand-out dishes were the Mititi Kofte (tender and aromatic minced pork patties), a ratatouille-type vegetable stew, and the Albanian-style lamb’s liver which was cooked through far beyond what most people would think sensible. But it remained tender-ish and the herbs and raw red onion garnish gave it a singular character. More forgettable was the greasy grilled garlic sausage and the “cigar fingers”

– slivers of puff pastry surrounding feta cheese which Pauline, with disarming honesty, described as smelling “like sweaty feet”.

They did taste considerably better than that but that’s all.

When ordering, Pauline had very helpfully said that if we were to do justice to the meze, we should share a main course and she suggested the mixed kebab – chicken fillet and lamb fillet and minced lamb, which came with bulgar rice, a mixed salad and grilled tomato. The meat was tender and distinctively flavoured by the charcoal grill, the rice had a nutty flavour and a fluffy texture.

And we hadn’t finished yet.

When booking the table, I had pre-ordered the rice pudding which I heard was something of a speciality.

Pre-ordering is necessary because it has to be cooked and cooled for it is served chilled. A very creamy and smooth caramel-topped variation of a dessert classic, Bill thought it could make an excellent crème brulee with the addition of appropriately textured topping and said so as Cem emerged from the kitchen (in immaculate whites it should be said, not a vest or singlet in sight) to talk restaurants, how he came to England and his passion for his national cuisine. As we finished our meal, it rather felt that we were eating in their personal dining room rather than a public restaurant.

This feast of flavours and textures cost just £43. I’ll return, with the missus.

Ratings (out of ten): Food quality 8 Service 7 Surroundings 6 Value 9