A meatball house in Sirkeci's Hocapaşa quarter, founded in 1893 by Mehmet Saltuk after his migration from Filibe (Plovdiv), now run by the fifth generation of the family.
Meşhur Filibe Köftecisi was founded in 1893 by Mehmet Saltuk, who had migrated to Istanbul from Filibe (present-day Plovdiv) during the Balkan exoduses of the nineteenth century, setting up shop in Babıâli, then the centre of the Ottoman press. Today it continues at its address on Hocapaşa Lokantaları Sokağı in Sirkeci, run by the founder's fifth-generation descendants, Duygu and Cem Umut Erpak. Its own official site states plainly that it has NO OTHER BRANCHES — a distinction worth noting, since Istanbul has other businesses trading under similar 'Filibe Köftecisi' names (such as Tarihi Filibe Köftecisi in Esentepe), unrelated to this founding family operation. The menu is short and deliberately narrow: piyaz (bean salad), the house köfte sold by weight, hot sauce, buffalo yoghurt, a yoghurt-based dessert called revani, and sütlaç. The entire range runs on meat and dairy, and nothing in the sourced material mentions alcohol or a pork product. With more than a hundred and thirty years behind it, the shop is counted among the oldest stops on Sirkeci's historic restaurant street.
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