Halfway through our meal at Elyon, Chef Özgür "Ozzy" Yavuz said something that stopped me mid-sip. "This is your restaurant." Not a pleasantry. A declaration.
He built this place for us. All of us. Because English isn’t his first language, the words arrive without ornament or excess, and land with exactly the weight he intends.
Which makes what's happening on Vernon Avenue feel less like a restaurant opening and more like a gift.
Yavuz has cooked across Turkey, Europe, Russia, Saudi Arabia and Miami. He once hosted a television show in Turkey, trained in Japanese technique and Peruvian kitchens, and understands that the culinary traditions of the eastern Mediterranean were shaped by many hands, including Armenian communities in cities like Urfa and Antep. He carries that history with him. And he chose Glencoe to put it down.
"I guess it's my last station," he told me, with the certainty of a man who has earned the right to stop moving.
His life here is deliberately local. His kids are in school nearby. His middle daughter works the dish station at Elyon, learning from the bottom. His wife, Tugce Ozkan, runs the kitchen alongside him. In the morning, he walks to Hometown Coffee, where he knows the owners. He shops the village, then prepares for the evening.
“I love Glencoe,” he says. “The people are beautiful.”
Elyon is a chef's tasting menu, full stop. No à la carte, no decisions required. For $50 per person, including wine pairings chosen by head sommelier Hüseyin Kalkan, you surrender the menu entirely and simply receive.
A procession begins with cold mezes, each set on ceramics the chef shaped himself: silky hummus, muhammara lifted with pomegranate molasses, baba ghanoush carrying a quiet, smoky depth. The warmth builds gradually: truffle pide, kibbeh, dolma, arriving in rhythm rather than rush. Then the fire, chicken shish, Adana kebab and lamb over bulgur, before the meal resolves, as it should, with baklava and dessert wine. The table fills, then glows, the entire experience unfolding in amber light.
The lamb is the thing. Yavuz calls it the test of a Turkish chef. Just meat, fat, salt and black pepper, with no bread to bind it. Nothing to hide behind. The ratio of fat to lamb, the precision of the chop, held together by nothing but technique and nerve.
"Looks like it's easy," he said.
It isn't.
The room feels like him too. Warm, candlelit, circular chandeliers casting amber across wood tables. The murals are his own work, painted by hand in the quiet hours when he couldn’t sleep.
Near our table hangs Copper Genesis, a mixed-media work of copper, acrylic and ceramic Yavuz made himself. Hand-forged petals bloom from a surface of pigment, oxide and earth. Above them, ceramic plates he also shaped by hand, the final step in his story of civilization. First people, then technology, then fine dining, suggesting creation is a shared act. Fitting in a room he built for you.
When I told him it was the best dining experience I'd had in a long time, he nodded. Not with pride exactly, but with the satisfaction of someone who already knew.
Elyon, 667 Vernon Ave., Glencoe. Reservations at elyonrestaurant.com.