There is a middle east restaurant opposite Great Eastern Mall in Ampang. At first, we thought it is a Lebanese restaurant. The restaurant is built on a traditional Malay style kampong house. There is ample parking space in front of the restaurant. On arrival, we found that it is an Iranian restaurant and there were not many patrons inside. We hesitated and in the end decided to give it a try.
Information were written in Farsi. Based on my little knowledge of Jawi, Ali Baba should be written as الي بابا in Arabic script. The 'A' in Farsi seem to be different.
At the entrance, there is a bed for you to enjoy your shisha.
Unlike Arabs, Iranians are believed to have a European origin. A long standing, and still unchallenged, belief of historians is that the people of Europe, Iran, and some people in India, with the exception of Hungarians and the Finns, have their ancestry in common. Based on historical evidence and supports from archaeology, historians propose the existence of a pre-historic tribal confederation, called "Indo-Europeans". Most of Iranians certainly look very European. The original religion of Persian was Zoroastrianism, Islam was imposed on them by the invading Arabs.
The funny thing is Ali Baba is not an Iranian character, but an Arab one. Ali Baba and the forty thieves were based in Bagdad, not Persepolis. The word kabab (کباب) is ultimately from Persian and originally meant fried not grilled meat. Another intersting thing is that this Ali Baba's Kebab Restaurant is built using bamboo not wood.
Do you smoke shisha? I tried it once. It comes with all sort of fruity taste like strawberry, orange, etc. I don't really like it. But, I guess the smoke after filtering through a pot of water should have less tar.
Kebab actually refers to grilled meat in a skew like those shown in the picture below. Those huge chunk of kebab hanging vertically and shaved into small slices that you commonly see in Europe is called doner kebab or rotating kebab which has a Turkish origin.
A plate of rice with mixed kebab costs RM37. Don't you think it is very steep?
The appetizer was a plate of raw onion rings served with chicken curry. It tastes not too bad you know. Actually, onion is a natural blood thinner. If you have very thick blood, you should eat more onion.
Salad Shirazi. Too sour for me.
Oliviyeh, which is essentially egg mayonnaise.
Lebanese bread. Haha! At least, it has got the name Lebanese.
The slender and long grain Basmati tasted wonderful with butter. Only Japanese think their koshihikari is the best rice in the world. It is certainly the most expensive. The kebab here is not too bad. I have eaten kebab in other Iranian restaurants that tasted horribly salty.
We were shocked when they served us two pots of tea. We were told that one pot is tea, the other pot is hot water. The next thing was to guess which pot is tea and which pot is water.
Middle East people typically drink tea in a small glass like this.
Tea was served with dates. We took as our desserts. It was sweet and soft like chewing gum. I ate one only.
The total bill came up to RM90+. It is indeed an Ali Baba Restaurant.
