Montclair Ethiopian Restaurant

We have been wanting to try this restaurant for quite some time. It's called Mesob, which is a vibrantly colored woven basket upon which food is served. I've never had Ethiopian cuisine before, in fact, when I'm running down the list of food to try, Ethiopian food isn't on there. I chalk that up to the fact that it's not widely publicized and that there aren't that many restaurants of this type around. It's too bad actually, because the food was absolutely delightful.

We looked at the clock and it was about 7:15 pm, on a Saturday night. I immediately thought that we would not be able to get a seat. So we called over there and they said there was a 30 minute wait. I was disappointed but we went anyway. Three minutes later, when we got there, bottle of wine in hand, we were seated immediately. I'm not sure why we were told there would be a 30 minute wait... anyway, all was good. We were greeted with a strong, almost overwhelming, aroma of clove. It did not subside while we were there, but I think I ended up getting used to it.

They have a sampler platter for two on the menu, which seemed perfect because of course there were two of us and we had absolutely no idea what to order. They had a vegetarian sampler platter and a meat sampler platter. Given that I'm a [mostly] vegetarian and Rob isn't, we weren't sure how that was going to work out. They were very accommodating though, we were able to get the meat sampler and substitute some veggie dishes for the meat dishes so we could share most of the meal. Rob's meat dishes were a chicken, beef and lamb. The chicken dish was a little bit spicy and the other two were somewhat mild. On the veggie side, there was a portabella dish and lentil dish, both of which were very spicy; and a collard green dish and a chickpea dish, both of which were somewhat mild. All the veggie dishes were prepared vegan style, a healthful bonus.

As we waited for our order to come out, we talked about what we thought it was going to be like, while we looked around at the other tables, with seemingly experienced Ethiopian food eaters. A few minutes later, they bring out a giant plate with a spongy, pancake looking thing on it and a few other spongy pancake looking things on a plate - then they leave again. So Rob and I are looking at each other and the pancake and wondering what the heck we're supposed to do. Do we eat it now? Are we supposed to be waiting for something else? Was this an appetizer? We each took a small bit of the pancake and noted that it had a little bit of a sour taste and that it was somewhat chewy.

The waitress came back a few minutes later with our main dishes and proceeded to place each of the stew-like food on the big pancake. When she was done, I shyly let her know that we were novices and would like some help understanding the best way to eat the food. She let us know that the pancake was called "injera" and that it was both a utensil and a bread. We were to break a small bit of the injera and use it to scoop up the stew. When we ran out of the pieces of injera that she brought over, we were to eat the injera that was on the plate. Ok, that sounds easy enough, but we got forks just in case. Of course, we ate it all. I want to see if I can figure out how to make the lentil dish or the portabella dish. They were both so good, very spicy and flavorful.

We decided to split a halewa for dessert. This reminded me of Indian burfi. It was a sesame paste molded in the shape of a small slice of cake with pistachios on it. It was also very good, but very rich and sweet. A good dessert to split.

I'm very happy that we stepped outside of our comfort zone and tried this restaurant. I know we will be going back there.

*k*