Salad. Onion. Sir?
Without doubt the best trio of words in the Turkish language. Although they are invariably half-heatedly uttered by an abundantly bewhiskered, grease-ridden gentleman with a chilli sauce flecked apron, they still hold a beauty which you'd be hard pressed to find elsewhere.
Even Gupta, the stalwart pillar of Indian dining establishments, is unable to evoke such voracity with his trademark 'Poppadoms, sir?' introductory patter.
And Su-Young, the purveyor of all fare Chinese, barely rouses interest with her hard-nosed 'You wan egg fwy wice? pitch.
Then of course we have Mario who, in this day and age, is customarily of Pakistani descent, with his 'is you wanting sausage-stuffed crust, bruv, is it, innit?' grammatically butchered banter.
Or perhaps Pauline with her chip shop 'salt and fackin' vinegar, love?' chit chat.
Nope. Nobody does it better than Ahmed. In fact, Carly Simon once wrote a song about him, and the lubricated fucker's true to every last note.
To cut a long story short, I went on a bike ride yesterday. A 60-mile bike ride. It was a harrowing, four-letter word inducing affair, but nonetheless it was completed and for a few glorious minutes I basked in the satisfaction of a job well done. But when the fading traces of endorphins eventually subsided, I felt a huge void sweep over me. Something was missing. The day was yet to be concluded.
It suddenly occurred to me that the void was where loads and loads of calories used to be, so without further ado I made haste to, first of all, the cornershop where I bought four cans of Kronenbourg 1664 (C'est magnifique!), and then onto Ahmed's place of business, which in this instance went by The Istanbul Grill.
"One large doner, please Ahmed"
"Salad onion, sir?"
"I fucking love you, Ahmed, and I want to have your babies"