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Damn, Ballard’s New Turkish Restaurant Sure Booked Out Fast

You can still try to walk in when Hamdi opens November 18, though

A man cuts pulls pieces of grilled chicken off of a skewer over a charcoal grill under a pop-up tent.
Chef Berk Güldal grills chicken over charcoal at a Hamdi pop-up at Fair Isle Brewing.
Jade Yamazaki Stewart/Eater Seattle

Hamdi, couple Berk Güldal and Katrina Schult’s wildly popular Turkish pop-up that’s about to become a restaurant in Ballard, shared some good news and some bad news on Instagram recently. The good news first: Last weekend, Hamdi finally set an opening date of November 18 and opened reservations for the rest of November through its website. The bad news: Apparently all the reservations filled up after just two hours. If you missed out, you’ll have to wait until the end of the month for Hamdi to open its next batch of reservations.

There’s a silver lining, though, for anyone willing to show up in person. Hamdi revealed a few additional details in its Instagram posts, including that the restaurant will be open Wednesday through Sunday (except Thanksgiving week, during which it’ll be open Monday and Tuesday instead of Thursday and Friday), have an outdoor heated patio for larger parties and/or walk-ins, and keep the 10-seat chef’s table for walk-ins too. So if you pop by 4012 Leary Way NW starting next Friday, you could get lucky with some of the best seats in the house.

Either way, if you haven’t been tracking Hamdi’s progress on Instagram — where the restaurant has also been showing off potential menu items like charcoal-grilled çupra (a type of sea bream) filet and collar with freekeh, fig, and bone broth — you might want to start, as this one’s bound to remain in high demand.

Hamdi

4012 Leary Way Northwest, , WA 98107 Visit Website