Tag Archives | review

Fatburger at Beirut City Centre

By on April 27, 2013 in Reviews

fatburger sign

Fatburger is the new burger joint in town and was among the places I’ve been waiting for to open at Beirut City Centre since I enjoyed trying it in Dubai last year.

Their menu is quite simple as they offer burgers, hot dogs, and chicken strips along with some other side items.

fatburger

Ordering is quite fun by the way since the cashier relays back everything to the rest of the team and they all end up shouting whatever you have ordered. Anyway, I ordered a single Fatburger and it tasted good as everything in it was fresh but I felt the patty was a bit overcooked.

Price-wise, Fatburger serves single, double, triple, and quad patty burger, at 9,500L.L, 12,500L.L, 15,500L.L, and 19,500L.L respectively, plus an additional 6,500L.L to make a meal.

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Best man’oushe in town

By on April 4, 2013 in Lebanon

Mankouche_NoGarlicNoOnions_Beirut1

If you’re not following No Garlic No Onions blog by Anthony Rahayel then you must be missing a lot. The blog features very interesting and detailed reviews of Lebanese and international restaurants and hotels, with tens of photos accompanying each experience.

Among some of the cool ideas he’s been recently coming up with lately is a quest to find the best man’ouche in town, which consisted of visiting several types of bakeries, the upscale, the dirty, and your regular neighborhood bakery to find the best among them. Read all about it here.

I know the winner in Anthony’s post might not have the ultimate man’oushe in Beirut since it’s practically impossible to visit every single bakery in the city, but you’ll at least get to learn how to judge a good man’oushe.

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The Hangout Gemmayze

By on February 21, 2013 in Reviews

Hangout Gemmayze

After blogging about their competition last week, The Hangout were kind enough to invite for a dinner two days ago.

The first thing you’ll notice when entering the place, is that unlike what its name tells, The Hangout is more of a fine dining restaurant than a place to really hangout at with your friends. It’s nicely decorated, spacious with indoor and outdoor areas unlike most of the places in the neighborhood, and the staff is quite friendly and welcoming.

We sampled the following items from their menu:

  • Onion soup (11,000 L.L)
  • Foie Gras (26,000 L.L)
  • Chicken rolls (13,000 L.L)
  • Pan fried mushroom with halloum (13,000 L.L)
  • Charcoal grilled sojok (14,000 L.L)
  • Beef Stroganoff (27,000 L.L)
  • The Hangout gourmet burger (24,000 L.L)
  • Fondant au chocolat (12,000 L.L)
  • Pain perdu (13,000 L.L)

The Hangout Gemmayze (1) The Hangout Gemmayze (2) The Hangout Gemmayze (3)

Given that The Hangout is still operating in soft opening stage, I found the food to be quite good. I totally loved the Foie gras, the chicken rolls, the fried mushroom, the grilled sojok, and their gourmet burger. I also overheard at an adjacent table that the salad bar is pretty good too. The other items were good as well, but I thought they could be improved a bit.

The Hangout Gemmayze (4) The Hangout Gemmayze (5) The Hangout Gemmayze (6)

For example, I would have preferred the onion soup to be a little thicker, and the beef stroganoff meat a bit tender. The desserts on the other hand need to be re-worked, and don’t get me wrong, they’re seriously not bad, but I personally believe a great dessert can turn an average meal into a memorable event, and that’s what one would expect from a place like The Hangout.

The Hangout Gemmayze (7) The Hangout Gemmayze (8) The Hangout Gemmayze (9)

Anyway, the overall experience was very pleasant, and the restaurant’s atmosphere alone can set you in a good mood even if you just went there for some drinks or wine at the bar. It’s definitely worth a try.

The Hangout Gemmayze (10) The Hangout Gemmayze (11)

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Top 10 Lebanese blogs

By on February 11, 2013 in Lebanon

Communicate Levant compiled a list of the top 10 blogs from Lebanon in their 2013 book of tens and your truly was among them!

Below is the full list along with scans provided by Joe from Joe’s Box showing what they had to say about each blog.

  1. Beirut Spring
  2. A Separate State of Mind
  3. +961
  4. Blog Baladi
  5. Marketing in Lebanon
  6. Gino’s Blog
  7. Toom Extra
  8. Joe’s Box
  9. Broffessional Review
  10. Beirut NTSC

Page 1 page 2

It’s worth noting though that limiting the best blogs in Lebanon to 10 is quite hard. If it was up to me, I would have included some other cool blogs like Ink On The Side by Sareen, Let’s Talk About Movies by Anis, and Ivy Says by Ivy.

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Hotdog & Beyond

By on January 15, 2013 in Reviews

Hotdog and beyond (7)

Earlier last week I was invited to the opening of Hotdog & Beyond‘s new branch in Hamra. For those of you who don’t know about it yet, Hotdog & Beyond is a new restaurant that opened back in August 2012 at Le Mall Dbayeh, obviously specialized in serving frankfurters as well as burgers. They opened second branch in Hamra just last week, and I was informed a third branch is set to open in Zalka sometime soon.

When I first heard about it, I personally thought Hotdog & Beyond’s items will be close to what we’re used to eat at places like Charlie’s or Freddy’s, but I was wrong, Hotdog & Beyond offers a totally different taste and experience.

hdogb1 hdogb

The restaurant interior is catchy and makes you feel like you’re walking into one of New York’s small restaurants. Seats are comfy, and there’s enough space between the tables. And what grabs your attention at first is probably the complimentary bucket of peanuts offered to you before making your order.

Hotdog and beyond (1) Hotdog and beyond (2)

Hotdog & Beyond’s menu has around 20 selections of frankfurters ranging between 9,750L.L and 16,000L.L, along with 10 selections of burgers starting 13,000L.L and up to 18,750L.L. The owners were generous enough and served us an item from each category including the appetizers and desserts!

Hotdog and beyond (3) Hotdog and beyond (4)

The appetizers are mainly platters of fries with different topping on them. We tried the Four Cheese Fries and Con Carne Fries, I personally preferred the latter which has spicy minced meat (tastes a bit like Soujouk) with cheddar cheese on top.

For the hotdog, I decided to try their signature sandwich, the HD&B, wich is made of fried hotdog, red pepper, mushrooms, onions, 4cheese & pesto mayo sauce. To my surprise, the hotdog was cut into pieces, unlike the other varieties that had the hotdog in one piece. Anyway, the sandwich tasted really good and seriously different than any other frankfurter I had elsewhere. Every bite I had was full of taste, and the bread was just perfect, fresh and soft.

As for the burger, I tried what I usually order at other places, the Swiss Mushroom Burger, which was mouthwatering and great as well! It can easily make Hotdog & Beyond one of the restaurant you will be considering when you want to have a good burger.

Hotdog and beyond (5) Hotdog and beyond (6)

Finally, and although I was full, the owners still insisted that I try 2 selections of their desserts, the strawberry cheescake, and a waffle with chocolate sauce, Nestle condensed milk, and scoop of vanilla ice cream on top. Both tasted good too, but I personally would have preffered the soft waffle to be crispier on the outside.

My overall experience was great, and I’m not saying that just because I got invited, but because Hotdog & Beyond are really bringing something new to town, and therefore it is totally recommended. Moreover, if they succeed at maintaining their good taste and service, I believe they will be serious competitors to big names in the market, especially that their prices are quite affordable when compared to other diners in Beirut.

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The french onion soup at Duo

By on December 28, 2012 in Reviews

duo abc

French onion soup is one of the upsides of winter for me. Most restaurants here serve it in regular soup bowls along with croutons, while few other serve it in bread bowl after scooping out the inside of it, and one of these restaurants is Duo (Downtown, Verdun, ABC Ashrafieh, and ABC Dbayeh).

I recently had Duo’s onion soup and found it pretty good. It was thick enough to my taste with the right amount of cheese on top of it, and the portion is relatively big and completely fulfilling. Totally recommended even though it’s a bit overpriced at 15,500L.L but worth the money.

Duo by the way is also quite famous for their rich salad bar priced at 22,000L.L.

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Nokia Lumia 900 hands on

By on August 13, 2012 in Reviews

Thanks to Nokia Lebanon, I’ve been uising this Lumia 900 device for a couple of weeks now and my experience with it has been very pleasant! The Lumia 900 is one the first Nokia devices running Windows Phone operating system (version 7.5) which I honestly think is as good as the currently dominating systems, i.e. Android and iOS.

Hardware:

Although the Lumia 900 is powered by a 1.4GHz single-core processor and 512MB RAM, I was surprised by how fast the operating system is. Scrolling and moving between application was so quick and smooth.

As for the design, well there’s nothing to complain about as the phone fits almost perfectly in my hand, with the volume, sleep, and camera buttons all situated on the right side.

Display:

The display is a 4.3-inch, 800 x 480 AMOLED ClearBlack screen, and I know that’s less resolution that what you may find on other competitive phones, but I say it’s not a deal breaker. Colors on the other hand seems pretty fine and well saturated for my taste.

Camera:

That was basically my only disappointment with the device. Knowing that the Lumia 900 has an 8MP camera with a Carl Zeiss lens, you’d expect the phone will take some really good photos, but unfortunately the camera under-delivers. I don’t mean the photos are disastrous, but they’re just not too good. Below is for example 2 photos I took with an iPhone 4S and a Lumia 900 for you to notice the difference.


iPhone 4S


Lumia 900

Battery life:

On my first couple of days using the Lumia 900 the battery was lasting for like 10 hours since I had 3G turned on all the time and was spending long time toying with apps. But on the next days I started turning off 3G whenever I had WIFI around me and the battery life improved significantly improved, so at around 11PM I’m usually left with ~20% battery remaining with screen brightness set to maximum.

Windows Phone:

My experience with the operating system has been very pleasant so far. It took me like an hour to get familiar with it and start downloading some apps to make full use of the Lumia 900.

Multitasking is supported and you will be able to view the open application by a long press on the “back” located on the left. Still, it should be pointed out that every time I tried accessing an application sunning in the background I would receive the application’s splash screen… which made me wonder if that application was really working in the background or not.

The experience Windows Phone offers with applications is very nice as well, and they almost all look so gorgeous on it, but still what I believe this operating system is lacking is definitely a wider selection of games and applications like what Android and iOS have.

One this you should be aware of though is that Windows Phone 8 (the upcoming version of Windows Phone) is around the corner and the Lumia 900 is not going to support it.

All in all:

No device is flawless, and that applies to the Lumia 900 as well, but am I willing to continue using it? Definitely yes. Especially that the main applications that I’m concerned with are already available and working very well for me (WhatsApp, Twitter, Facebook, Foursquare, WordPress, etc..), and I’m pretty pretty sure many more applications will be added to the Windows Marketplace soon.

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Chez Maguy Batroun

By on June 8, 2012 in Reviews

I decided to try Chez Maguy restaurant in Batroun after reading about it on several website claiming it serves some of the best sea food in the region.

The place is quite nice, it’s actually a small house (or a shack maybe) that was turned into a restaurant having a cool view over the sea since it’s located right on the coast.

During winter, I was told Maguy usually serves guests in her dining room, while in summer season you get to sit on the beautiful terrace by sea, but be aware of the mosquitoes when you’re outside, as they can really eat you alive!

Unfortunately the food was not as good as the restaurant’s setting. We were 4 people and among the order we made was 1Kg of mallifa, and below is the plate that we got, which is barely enough for one person! Anway, overall the food tasted quite average compared to other seafood restaurants, unlike what some articles on the internet claim.

We had another kilogram of fish with a couple of appetizers and drinks and our bill came to $120.

I don’t know how to provide you with direction to the place, but if you’re planning to go there just ask about Chez Maguy when you reach Batroun as everyone there knows where she’s located!

P.S: I know the review is missing a photo of Maguy, which is plain stupid from me!

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P.F. Chang’s ABC Achrafieh

By on June 4, 2012 in Reviews

P.F. Chang’s, the popular Chinese-American chain, opened in ABC Achrafieh around a month ago, and I decided to try it out last week because of all the positive feedback I heard from some friends who have tried it in Dubai.

The place has a really nice interior and is being almost always packed that you feel so lucky if you can get yourself a table, especially on weekends.

Anyway, back to food business, we were a group of 6 people and decided to share several dishes among which were Dynamite Shrimp, Chicken Lettuce Wrap, Crispy Honey Chicken, Mongolian Beef, Singapore Street Noodles, and a couple more seafood dishes.

The food tasted all great, and was much different that any other Chinese restaurant in town (especially Chopsticks). And best of all, the menu covers a variety of tastes from chicken to seafood to beef to vegetarian but is not dominated by the sauces you often encounter at other restaurants like sweet and sour, mushroom and others.

The appetizer I liked the most was the Dynamite Shrimp consisting of fried shrimp covered with yellow spicy sauce. It felt a bit too spicy for some, but it was really good! On the other hand, Mongolian Beef was my favorite main dish consisting of tender steak cooked with scallions.

And if you’ve got room for dessert at the end, try their Great Wall of Chocolate. It has 6 layers, and the below photo definitely doesn’t do justice to how big the portion is.

Overall, and even though it’s not the traditional Chinese cuisine we lack in Lebanon, P.F. Chang’s is definitely recommended to try at least once since it offers something totally new here.

Update:

Sareen brought to my attention that I forgot to mention how is the food priced at P.F. Chang’s. Here you go, starters vary between 9,000L.L and 21,000L.L (Dynamite Shrimp is for 21,000L.L), soups and salads are between 7,000L.L and 22,000L.L, while main dishes are almost all between 25,000L.L and 28,000L.L except for seafood dishes that are in the 30′s.

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Varouj Restaurant – Bourj Hammoud

By on April 26, 2012 in Reviews

Varouj is probably one of the best places I’ve lately discovered in Beirut. It’s a small restaurant hidden in Bourj Hammoud’s maze of streets and serves some really good traditional Armenian food.

The minute you step inside the place and get greeted by the owner who’s a relatively old man, you’ll be surprised by his character as he acts more like a dictator running his restaurant! But he’s not rude though.

There’s no menu for ordering there and the old man will just ignore you if you ask for it. Shortly after you get seated he’ll just come to your table and quickly list to you the available hot and cold dishes. We ordered Hommos, Fattoush, batata Harra, Mouhammara, Sou Boreg, Soujouk, Chicken Wings, Manti, and soft drinks, and although we tried to tell him which plates to bring first and which to delay a bit, he again ignored our request and decided to bring them as he pleases but didn’t disappoint us since he was serving us 2 dishes at a time that go really well together.

The food was so delicious that we wiped clean the dishes we ordered, all of them, and the old man was smiling every time he notices we finished a plate till the last bit.

Price wise, I have absolutely no idea how the pricing works there! We were not given a bill when we asked for it, he just immediately answered us “90,000 L.L”. That’s it all the 8 plates we ordered for exactly 90,000L.L, which is way cheaper that other Armenian restaurants like Mayass or Mayrig.

Varouj is TOTALLY recommended as the food is heavenly good, especially the Manti and chicken wings, next time I’m planning to try their little birds, frogs, and chicken liver. If you’re tempted to try it make sure you reserve beforehand as it only has 4 tables and always seems to be busy, their phone number is 03-882933.

I’m sorry I was unable to locate Varouj on Google Maps to show you where it is, so I appreciate if anyone can provide me with the coordinates to post a map of it. Here’s a map showing where Varouj is. Thanks to Roupen.

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