Enis and Elif Kacor are owners of Istanbul Grill with locations in Wilkes-Barre and Dallas.
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A look inside the dining room of Istanbul Grill’s Dallas location.
Istanbul Grill is located at 1206 Twin Stacks Drive in Dallas. The location originally opened in March of 2020, but had to close almost immediately due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
A ribbon cutting was held at the Istnabul Grill in Dallas on Friday.
DALLAS — For just over two years, Elif and Enis Kacor have served homemade Turkish cuisine on South Main Street in Wilkes-Barre as the owners of Istanbul Grill.
Now, it’s the Back Mountain’s turn to get a taste of what the Kacors are cooking.
A ribbon-cutting on Friday ushered in the next chapter of the husband-and-wife team’s business: a second Istanbul Grill, located on Twin Stacks Drive in Dallas.
“We’ve lived in big places all our lives, we wanted to branch out,” said Elif Kacor. “We’ve done pretty well in the Back Mountain so far.”
Istanbul Grill’s second location actually opened its doors back in March, but the COVID-19 pandemic pulled the rug out from under Elif and Enis almost immediately.
“We opened our doors and then, same day, we had to close,” Elif said. “It was very hard.”
The Kacors would bounce back from that bit of rotten luck, opening their doors again in both Wilkes-Barre and Dallas when Luzerne County entered the “green phase” of Gov. Tom Wolf’s COVID-19 recovery plan in June.
“We’ve had a lot of customers that came back,” Elif said. “They’ve been really wonderful.”
Elif and Enis cook up their cuisine in the mornings before opening their restaurant. Everything’s homemade, right down to the baskets of Turkish bread available at every table.
Istanbul Grill also offers a bit more of a cultural experience in the form of live music on Fridays and Saturdays. At Friday’s ribbon-cutting ceremony, music played and a group of belly dancers performed on the restaurant’s outdoor patio.
Jenny Hetro, the executive director of the Back Mountain Chamber, was thrilled at the latest addition to the Back Mountain’s business scene.
“I think that adding Istanbul Grill is a really great way for us to better represent how diverse this area really is,” Hetro said. “The response has been great, and people will get to step outside their comfort zones and try something new.”
The original Istanbul Grill opened up in March of 2018, just two years prior to the expansion into Dallas.
“We’ve done well in Wilkes-Barre, and a lot of our customers came from outside of the city,” Elif said. “Now we could reach new customers, as well.”
Although both locations employ a full-time staff, Elif and Enis keep plenty busy cooking and maintaining the businesses, hardly getting a moment to catch their breath.
But according to Elif, it’s all worth it.
“This is a seven-days-a-week job, it’s a lot,” Elif said. “But we love our customers and we love our food, and we’ve loved this experience. We can’t wait to keep going.”