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Today on the Bite Tonight: Z Shawarma King

Located on Southfield Rd in Allen Park, MI is Z Shawarma King. Offering Middle Eastern traditional dishes as well as burgers, fresh shakes, and a fruit juice bar, Z Shawarma King has become my new favorite place. Most of their sandwiches are available on french bread, also! See how they ranked.

Atmosphere: 3 out of 5 bites

Quality/Taste: 4 out of 5 bites

Price: 4 out of 5 bites

Service: 3.5 out of 5 bites

Wow factor: 3 out of 5 bites

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Fattoush Salad: Romaine lettuce, tomato, cucumber, carrots, red cabbage, toasted pita, and a lemon juice and olive oil dressing.Fresh ingredients with a light and satisfying dressing. One of my favorite salads! The toasted pita really adds a nice crunch to the veggies.

fatousch salad

Falafel: Ground garbanzo beans, garlic, parsley, onions, and spices. Crispy outside with a tender, moist inside. Full of flavor and delicious. I love the fresh and pickled veggies on the side.

falafel

Grape Leaves: Stuffed with ground meat, rice, lemon juice. Grape leaves are one of my favorite dishes because they taste good and they are good for you. The lemon juice really brighten up each stuffed grape leaf. The meat and rice mixture was well seasoned and moist.

Grape leaves

Chicken Shawarma: White meat chicken breast with garlic sauce, pickles and onions wrapped in a pita. The chicken was moist and flavorful. The pita was fresh and soft, with a nice chew. The pickles are the perfect condiment without taking away from the grilled chicken.

chicken shawarma

Z Shawarma King is a great choice if you are looking for vegetarian options without sacrificing flavor. Fridays and Saturdays they stay open til 2 to cater to the late night munchies. I just love this because usually the only places that are open are fast food joints or bars. The next time you are craving Mediterranean food, but don't want to make the drive to Dearborn, try Z Shawarma King. Service is good and the prices are very reasonable.

Today on the Bite Tonight: Zakey

The next stop on my Traverse City trip is Zakey located on E Front St. right downtown. There are not many Middle Eastern restaurants in Traverse City, so Zakey is the place to go when you have a craving for culture. Zakey features belly dancers and unfortunately not during our lunch visit, but we still dined. See how they ranked.

Atmosphere: 2 out of 5 bites

Price: 2 out of 5 bites

Quality/Taste: 3 out of 5 bites

Service: 3 out of 5 bites

Wow Factor: 1 out of 5 bites

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Hummus: I really liked that the hummus came topped with pickled veggies and chick peas. I just wished there was more of it!

hummus

Cucumber Yogurt Salad: Diced cucumbers topped with plain yogurt, olive oil, and fresh herbs. Tangy, fresh, and crunchy.

cuke salad

Lamb Shawarma with a side Fatoush salad: I'm more of a "chicken shawarma" kind of gal, but I stepped out of the box and went with lamb this time. It was pretty good, but I was missing the pickles and garlic sauce in this shawarma. The salad was fresh and delicious.

lamb shawarma

I liked that Zakey has their own thing going on, but being so close to Dearborn, I am a little biased when it comes to Middle Eastern food. I thought the food was good, but not the typical shawarma that I am used to. Service was good, but the food was pricey for the portion size. If you get a chance, stop in and see the belly dancers!

Located inside Park Bar Behind the Fox Theater lies a small little counter cranking out some of the best shawarma's in the area. Normally I order to go, but this trip, Tiffany and I grabbed a seat. With a menu consisting of Middle Eastern favorites, burgers, gourmet dogs, and sides, Bucharest Grill is the hot spot after any concert, Tiger's game, or night on the town. We stopped in for lunch and it was pretty busy.

How they measured up:

Atmosphere: 3 out of 5 bites

Price: 4 out of 5 bites

Quality/Taste: 4 out of 5 bites

Service: 3 out of 5 bites

Wow Factor: 2 out of 5 bites

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Chicken Shawarma: Grilled marinated chicken, tomato, lettuce, pickles, garlic, and spices wrapped in a pita. First, the shawarma is huge and all for $4.50 plus tax. Second, the chicken is perfectly seasoned, grilled, and still juicy. So moist that the juices will drip from the sandwich and onto my hand. It's a beautiful thing. This time, the pita was a little wet from it's contents but when you eat it as fast as I did, it doesn't matter. Next, the pickles! Skinny, slightly sour, but still crunchy. I don't know what it is about these pickles, but they are my favorite. Lastly, the garlic sauce can be a little overwhelming so I often get mine on the side.

Tip: Beware because they charge you $0.25 cents to get your sauce on the side. This boggled my mind, because actually getting it on the side is a smaller amount than what they slop on the wrap. I brought this to the attention of the woman who took my order and she only said they charge to get it on the side versus on the shawarma. Isn't that backwards?

"New" Cheese Pie Turnover: Crispy pastry crust loaded with feta, asiago, and muenster cheeses. I was disappointed when this was brought to our table and I'll tell you why. By the description I expected a pastry crust similar to phyllo dough. What I got was basically pita bread or a tortilla. It tasted delicious, but it was more like what I would expect a quesadilla to taste like. And it even came with a side of sour cream just like a quesadilla!! On the other hand, muenster and feta make everything betta so it turned out to be good.

If you haven't been to Bucharest Grill, you are missing out. The shawarmas are seriously the best around. They're so good that I have even stopped in on my way home from a long night. I'm not normally a person who eats alone, so this is kind of a big deal. Bucharest Grill is opening a new location in Corktown so stay tuned. They also cater and deliver for your every need.

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Tee, her mom, Pat, and I decided to stop in to Shish Garden for dinner Saturday. Located on Allen Rd. in Woodhaven, MI., this place offers some of the best Mediterranean food around.

Lentil Soup: Hearty and thick. With each bite you get freshness and brightness from the lemon. Really good.

Chicken Sajji Sandwich: I describe this sandwich as the Chicken Shawarma's zesty, white meat, cousin. The Sajji sauce was garlicy , slightly spicy, and had tons of mouth watering flavor. The spices really came through. This is my new favorite sandwich. You have to try it, it's awesome. The Sajji sauce was so good I switched from dipping my pita bread in the hummus to this sauce.

Chicken Kabob: The chicken was charred, yet still moist and juicy.

Grape Leaves: Light, lemony, and fresh. You can really taste the quality and care put into each perfectly rolled grape leaf.

Our visit was a success. The manager even came over to our table when he heard I was going to do a write up. He was very nice and friendly. Tee knew one of the servers and he brought over an order of hummus on the house which was an unexpected surprise. He was also very knowledgeable, giving us tons of suggestions and even bringing us out different sauces to try. The food was so flavorful and delicious. I don't think I've ever tasted so many different spices at once, but they all blended well together. The service was perfect and the whole staff at Shish Garden really made us feel at home. I'm not sure if my food writing had anything to do with it, but unlike other places, they really stepped it up. I will definitely be back.

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