We were planning prior to going to the chalet that we’ll go to AlKhafjy in Saudi arabia for dinner and we brought our passports with us just incase we decided to go through with our plans. And we did.

My cousin has told us about this place where some of our friends recommended, It is a Mandi restaurant (Mandi is a rice+meat dish originally from yemen) in Alkhafjy. The place isn’t very far from the borders, I think it was like 10-15 minutes away from the borders into saudi arabia.

When we arrived it was around 6:15 and the dish we’re here to try wasn’t ready and won’t be ready till an hour later, so we ordered chicken dishes instead.

^These are the seating areas. Total privacy and sore legs are guaranteed.

^We sat here.

We were asked to choose one of the 2 available dishes, the Chicken math’3oo6 (pressure cooking) or Chicken Mathby (Grilled Chicken). Since I’m familiar with these 2 dishes and have a history of ordering them a lot back when I was studying in the UAE, I decided to go with the Chicken Mathby, the lesser of 2 evils. Which turned out to be a mistake once the dishes arrived.

^The chicken Mathbi. (Whoever was behind the idea of adding spaghetti should be hanged by a rope made of spaghetti)

^The chicken Math’3oo6

The chicken math’3oo6 was by far the better choice, While my Mathby was so bland, the Math’3oo6 was very delicious. Thank God the amount they served was ridiculous and I had more than enough of my friend’s math’3oo6.

Then for dessert, we again had what we were told to try. Their Knafa was good. Had lots of potential of becoming great but the banana flavored cream was a total turnoff for me.

We were allowed into the kitchen and the whole staff was very nice and eager to answer all of our questions and (surprisingly) tolerated the camera.

^Harees

^This wasn’t the biggest one there

^This is where they cook the mandi.

So how do they cook the mandi? Well, they take a big jederfull of rice and put in a hole in the ground. The hole has either charcoals/wood or some other sort of heat source at the bottom, with the big jeder (pot) on top, then comes the meat or chicken in a metal grate on top of the jeder and then they seal the hole, letting all of the above cook until done.

Since the charcoals produce lots of smoke, they keep this hole in a secluded room and have the door shut most of the times. You can see how the walls are all black from the smoke. We were advised not to come near or touch the walls.

And we’re done 🙂

The place is clean and the food was delicious. For more information call Deerty restuarant at #7677778 (You should know the code)

 

This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 21st, 2009 at 6:30 am