Hello fellow food lovers! Summerlicious 2018 is here in Toronto, Ontario and I’ve been taking advantage and visiting some restaurants that I’ve had my eye on.
Banu is an Iranian Kabob and Vodka Bar located at 777 Queen Street West. It’s a nice sized restaurant which has an airy feeling thanks to its simple yet modern decor and focus on white and complimentary light and earthy colours. It has an open space concept and a beautiful feature that allows for one of the walls in the front of the restaurant to open-up onto the street. Creating a patio-like atmosphere.
For starters we had the vegan option, the Mirza Ghasemi. A smoked eggplant seasoned with roasted garlic, caramelized onion and tomatoes with a side of bread topped with sesame flakes. This is the best eggplant appetizer I’ve had in awhile! It’s composed of simple ingredients and was packed with flavour thanks to the smoking technique.
For our main dish we went with the Kabob e Koobideh. The picture shown illustrates two servings of the same meal. This is a beautiful plate of ground sirloin seasoned to perfection, juicy and served in perfect portions. It came with a side of fluffy basmati rice, traditional Iranian flat bread (pictured below the kabobs), and grilled tomatoes topped with fresh herbs. Once again, this meal is made of simple and fresh ingredients yet it was packed with flavour! It’s an entree that I think any meat lover would appreciate 🙂
For dessert I had the Baklava; a dense almond cake made with rosewater and pistachios. I’ll admit, I was a bit surprised as I ate this cake. It’s not your typical cake, it was dense yet still has elements of a cake; being sweet with notes of vanilla. Personally, I didn’t taste any of the rosewater flavour and I was ok with that. I wasn’t extremely wowed by this dessert as the flavour combination was a bit underwhelming. However, if you’re not someone who has a big sweet tooth this would be perfect to try. AND I think this would have gone perfectly with a cup of tea!
Let me know in the comment section below what your favourite part of a meal is! Appetizers? The entree? Dessert? Personally I’m all about a good and hearty entree!
xo,
Eseeri
