I had heard of the Iraqi Restaurant in Lajpat Nagar, an information I had filed away for later use. But it took a couple of friends to lead me to it a few weeks back.
It is in Lajpat Nagar, near Khanna Market, in the residential area and I’m pretty sure I cannot retrace my way back to it. A little difficult to find but there’s never a dearth of people in Lajpat Nagar to ask for directions.
I have never even thought about Iraqi food, leave alone eat at an Iraqi Restaurant. It’s a no nonsense eatery run by a couple of students who were pining for home food and so the basic menu and the very basic quality of food was not surprising.
The kebab platter served with hummus and pickles was very good, infact I took some home and the kebabs were good the next day too. They were not sulking under the burden of heavy marinades and were a little charred so basically, light and flavourful meat.
The other dish we ordered was khubuz resting on chickpea and tomato gravy and topped with a piece of sheep meat, a roasted tomato and dried lemon. The khubuz (roti) had soaked up all the gravy and become soft and pliable. The piece of sheep meat had very little meat on it but the lemon was the revelation.
Apparently if you hang it out to dry it dehydrates and then you can eat it like a pickle, or use it for lemon tea. Delicious.
There are very few places in Delhi where you can get boiled black tea that doesn’t make you gag. This one was one such, perfect ending to a mild dinner.
The food was quite subtle in terms of spices, heat factor : super mild. Not the kind of food we in North India are used to. The menu does not showcase the best in Iraqi cuisine, but the raison d’etre of this little eatery is not that anyway. It’s meant to provide a taste of home to Iraqis in Delhi and pretty successfully at that.
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I want! I want! How do I get there???