This past weekend, we decided to try an Ethiopian restaurant with some friends. It was an interesting experience and I took some photos to show you. The lighting was subdued, so the photos are a bit dark, sorry.
They have a sponge-like sourdough flatbread called injera. We asked for forks, but it's normal to break of bits of the flatbread and use these bits to sop up the various stews and sauces.
At the end of the meal we wanted to try the Ethiopian coffee as we had heard their coffee is very good. I would compare it to a muddy Turkish coffee. It's served without milk and you can ask for sugar. They served the coffee in a type of ceremony where roasted coffee beans were passed around each table so we could appreciate the fresh aroma. Then small cups were brought out with burning incense as pictured below. The funny thing is we thought the incense was rock sugar and put some in our coffee. We even tasted it and realized it wasn't sweet. Then the girl told us it was incense and brought us some sugar. We had a good laugh about this experience.
We ate well, although I would have to admit it wasn't my favourite food. However, it was an interesting experience. One of our friends seemed to be really enjoying his food and ate his whole injera. He also loved the coffee.
This is a meat and vegetable combination platter. There is a tossed salad in the middle, surrounded by beets, lentil, peas, collard greens, beef, chicken, lamb, cabbage. The lentils and chicken were very spicy.
This is a chicken dish
This is a vegetarian platter containing peas, beets, collard greens, cabbage and spicy lentils. The tossed salad had hot jalapenos.
This is injera, a spongelike sourdough flatbread
Coffee is served in small cups with burning incense as part of the coffee ceremony
Incense
They have a sponge-like sourdough flatbread called injera. We asked for forks, but it's normal to break of bits of the flatbread and use these bits to sop up the various stews and sauces.
At the end of the meal we wanted to try the Ethiopian coffee as we had heard their coffee is very good. I would compare it to a muddy Turkish coffee. It's served without milk and you can ask for sugar. They served the coffee in a type of ceremony where roasted coffee beans were passed around each table so we could appreciate the fresh aroma. Then small cups were brought out with burning incense as pictured below. The funny thing is we thought the incense was rock sugar and put some in our coffee. We even tasted it and realized it wasn't sweet. Then the girl told us it was incense and brought us some sugar. We had a good laugh about this experience.
We ate well, although I would have to admit it wasn't my favourite food. However, it was an interesting experience. One of our friends seemed to be really enjoying his food and ate his whole injera. He also loved the coffee.
This is a meat and vegetable combination platter. There is a tossed salad in the middle, surrounded by beets, lentil, peas, collard greens, beef, chicken, lamb, cabbage. The lentils and chicken were very spicy.
This is a chicken dish
This is a vegetarian platter containing peas, beets, collard greens, cabbage and spicy lentils. The tossed salad had hot jalapenos.
This is injera, a spongelike sourdough flatbread
Coffee is served in small cups with burning incense as part of the coffee ceremony
Incense
5 comments:
Last winter I went to an Ethiopian restaurant with Son #1. I really enjoyed it. Sadly, we didn't have coffee. I'll have to try that next time I go.
Sounds like a great experience, I have never had Ethiopian food. The incense / sugar mix up is really funny, lucky you didn't have smoke coming out of your ears! Hugs, Valerie
thats so interesting, I've never eaten Ethiopian food, sounds yummy,, funny about the incense,, I could see me doing it.
Haven't tried Ethiopian food...but they looks really interesting and yummy!
what a fun time you must have had...always fun to try new places
happy to stop by
kary
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