"I Already Know the Title of This Blog"

So says my husband this morning, waiting with bated breath for my [hopefully] scathing review of Al Waha. His suggestion is "We're Never Coming Here Ever Again. Ever." or something like that because that is precicely how Tim described this Afghani restaurant.

Having a Groupon that was set to expire in two weeks, I knew that this was probably our only option for dinner on a Friday night. We rarely eat ethnic food, unless you count Italian ethnic, mostly because Tim simply doesn't crave it the way I do. This is probably the case in many households where the woman will eat goofy shit and the man wants "steak." Anyway, Tim was happy to go to Al Waha because of the Groupon, and upon entering, I realized I had been inside this restaurant space before, under a different name.

The room was super warm-like 80 degree warm-fine by me. Service was quick too. The food, however, left a little to be desired. We started off with an appetizer of Sambosa which is Samosa with a "b" They were tasty and spiced right, but nothing extraordinary. We also ordered the Lebnah which was described as: thick, dehydrated yogurt mixed with mint, parsely, red pepper and olive oil. What I got was yogurt, which seemed fully hydrated and crushed red pepper flakes and olive oil. Nothing green and nothing like what I assumed to be roasted red pepper. Ok, moving on.
For the entree, I decided on the Al Waha plate; must be something traditional. I thought it was good, not great-it had ground beef mixed with some dried fruit and a pomegranate (spelled wrong) and tomato sauce. Tim loves a good chicken schwarma, so I talked him into ordering that instead of the beef kabob. Oops. It was salty chicken essentially with little spice or flavor. He left about half on the plate, which is uncustomary for my husband.

I also wanted to try a traditional drink, so I went with the Irfa Beljoze. At $3.50 I thought this must be something good. I ordered it with the appetizer and it came at the end of my meal, so hot I couldn't even pick it up. After about 10 minutes it was cool enough; tasted like cinnamony tea, which was fine except I don't like tea. I tried.

So, we won't be back. The restaurant tries to explain the culture of the dishes but unfortunately, the dishes fall short.

http://alwahastl.com/