Iftar at Assaha Restaurant

I think Ramadan this year has been kind on me, Alhamdullillah. It's already past 3 weeks and insyaAllah we will be celebrating Eid next week flies. Yay!

As a huge thank you, I planned to treat Ckn to Iftar at a restaurant. It wasn't going to be the first time that we ate out for Iftar. Early in the Ramadan, I treated Ckn to Iftar at the As Salam Rotana Hotel. That was a good place to have dinner and it really helped build Ckn's spirits. So where could we go this time then?

Recently we've been hearing a lot about this new restaurant called Assaha; our friends claimed that their coffee easily beats Solitaire (a local establishment with an international menu), and a colleague was heaping praises on it after failing to get a booking due to it being full last week (obviously a good sign of patronage). Naturally, we'd thought that this would be a good idea to pay them a visit (pun intended).

Much to our surprise, we discovered that this new restaurant was just a 5 minute walk away; we could even see the roof from our unit. I went there directly after work last Thursday to make reservations and they managed to squeeze the 2 of us for that evening's dinner service. Ckn thought it was a good idea to bring Ehsan along as he had been cooped up in the house for far too long.


...yes, I'll go with the house red please! (Notice the Lebanese spread)

I suggested to Ckn that we ought to go earlier to give us the opportunity to take some snaps of the unique building architecture. So we set off about a half hour before Iftar. As usual lil' Erica had to be left behind (more on that later!). I tried to cajole Ehsan to walk with us, but he firmly said no, so Ckn had to carry him all the way - I wonder if it was related to the new shoes he had on?

We found out that the restaurant was actually part of a Hotel, which shares the same design and theme of a traditional/historical Lebanese building. I guess they mainly used shale rock to construct their homes (don't ask what they use for cement - it looked like 'mud' and it had straw in it...God please let it be just mud...!). The crowd came in fast, as a company had booked their corporate event for that evening.


...so Baba just follow my handwriting and surely you'll get that promotion, ok?

When we went into the dining hall, the concierge said 'sorry but we're full' - I had to point out that we made reservations earlier. He still said no...until I pointed out my name clearly written on the booking sheet!. He relented and we got a nice table in the nook of the main restaurant - He wasn't rude or anything so it was OK.

Unlike Rotana, the Iftar here was going to be served from a fixed set menu. It was traditional Lebanese fair, which I had to accept at face value since my knowledge of Lebanese/Arabic cuisine is limited to Fatoush and tabouleh salads.

We started with parsley potatoes, chick pea humus (lovely), yoghurts, fish and tomato salad, green salad of jirjir, cooked veg that looked like sawi (but tasted sandy!), fatoush, chicken soup (nice) and puffy lebanese bread. Our entrees were a selection of small fried tid bits (imagine curry puff and spring rolls), chicken breasts baked in a tomato sauce and a briyani (with pistachio nuts & raisins) served with roasted kharoof (lammmb!). We finished with watermelon, and mouhallabia, a surprisingly tasty desert - akin to semolina pudding, but smelling strongly of rose water. Ckn couldn't finish hers because of the taste, but she was looking forward to try their umm ali. Unfortunately, they were not serving ala carte dishes until after the dinner rush.



All in all, I can say that we were impressed with the Assaha. The food was nice (a bit too expensive perhaps), it had a nice ambiance and the building was really unique - it wasn't tacky or gaudy. The staff were also efficient, for a packed house. We even planned to come again later that night with friends to sample their coffee (and umm ali desert!), but they couldn't make it in the end. So, you can say we're glad that we have an excuse to make another date with the Assaha soon!

p.s. So what about Erica? I guess she made us notice that leaving her at home was a no-no! Ehsan went to bed quietly enough, but Erica really made us work - she was crying non-stop and not drinking from her bottle! Only when we sat down in front of the TV with her on our laps did she behave herself, the cheeky lass! I guess all she wanted was a bineeded our attention... Sorry darling, perhaps when you're bigger and have gotten all your shots, ok?