Quest for Quality Ethiopian - Lalibela - 9/24 - 7:30 pm

Since moving here from DC, REB and I have been hunting a replacement for our favorite Ethiopian spots.
We've teamed up with germuska and decided to try Lalibela, a relatively new spot that has had very little LTH coverage, but has been favorably received by Yelpers.

We're heading there on Wednesday, September 24 at 7:30 pm. Any interest out there in joining us?

Lalibela Ethiopian Restaurant
5631 N. Ashland Ave
Chicago, IL 60660
(773) 944-0585
http://www.lalibelaonline.com

Edit: Yep, that's North Ashland. Thanks.

Attendees:
RAB, REB
germuska
gastro gnome
BrendanR
figmolly, figjustin
happyeater
jesteinf +1
ronnie_suburban
happy_stomach (a little late, but still happy)
nr706 +1
tarte tatin
aruzin
Cathy2
GAF
G Wiv, Ellen

I'll bite. I'm always up for Ethiopian. Schedule permitting, I'm there.

I've never had Ethiopian and I've never had a bad LTH meal.
Two nevers make an always.
Please add me.
North Ashland ave, right?

Thanks for stopping by last night, we'd love to share a plate with you next Wednesday.

Ethiopian next Wednesday sounds lovely. Sign me up too please.

Happyeater

I'm in, +1

R & R,

Can you please add another R to the group?

Thanks,

=R=

I'd give Lalibela another go. Would it be OK if I joined you about 30 minutes late? I have class on Wednesdays in Riverwest until 7:30. I imagine I could make the drive up Ashland in 25 minutes or so. I'd trust the group with ordering.

Sharon

Wow, great response. We're already at 12 people. Very nice work LTHers.

I have a call into the restaurant, waiting for a return call from the owner. For now, I'm going to cap attendance where we are, at least until I know that they can handle a bigger group.

Looking forward to it...

Tentatively me +1 - waitlisted if necessary ...

Can you please also add me to the pending waitlist? Thanks.

Spoke with Lalibela owner, Irut. She has no trouble with our numbers, so I'm opening things back up. nr706 and tarte tatin, you're in.

We talked menu a bit and agreed to finalize the numbers, the menu, and the cost on Friday. One question: Do we have any vegetarians?

She's thrilled to have us, and assured me that we are in for a treat.

Updates to come...

This sounds great. Sign me up!

Good morning,

I'm bumping this thread for RAB. He will be talking with Lalibela's owner today to finalize the menu, the cost, and the number of guests. While we are already expecting a great crew, we can certainly accommodate (and would welcome) a few more diners - - so please post here ASAP if you would like to join us next Wednesday. Similarly, if you were planning on attending and it no longer looks likely, we'd appreciate knowing.

And, again, if anyone is a vegetarian, please let RAB know. Otherwise, the meat and veggies are likely to be served on the same platter, making delicious cross contamination likely.

Thanks,
Ronna

Hi,

Please include me.

Regards,

This sounds like it's going to be a great dinner. Ethiopian is a cuisine that I really need to learn to appreciate. If there weren't so many GNR nominees that I want to get to in the next few weeks, I'd be joining you for sure. I can't wait to read about your dinner.

I'd like to join in as well.

We're all set for dinner for 18 on Wednesday. I expect the food cost (including tax and tip) to be around $25 per person, give or take a buck or two.

Lalibela is BYO, so I will be bringing my own. I hope you do as well. Soft drinks will, of course, be available.

Look forward to seeing you all.

-Rich

RAB wrote:We're all set for dinner for 18 on Wednesday.

RAB,

If not too late for two more please add Gary and Ellen.

Thanks,
Gary

RAB wrote:Lalibela is BYO, so I will be bringing my own. I hope you do as well.

Any suggestions for an appropriate BYO to accompany this meal? Beer or wine?

Gary, you are in. Glad to have you.

tarte tatin wrote:Any suggestions for an appropriate BYO to accompany this meal? Beer or wine?

Beer is easy and safe and seems to go well with Ethiopian.

As far as wine pairings, I only have a little experience. It was the owner of a small, recently-defunct wine shop in DC that turned us on to our favorite Ethiopian dive. (Thanks, Franco, wherever you are.) For pairing with Ethiopian, he recommended big, flavorful whites like viognier, gewurztraminer, or riesling. We took his advice on the restaurant, but never the wine.

A few months ago at Ras Dashen, we were in the mood for a big red, so we byo'ed a California petite sirah. It was ok, but perhaps a little overpowering for the range of dishes we were sampling.

Hopefully someone with more wine knowledge can weigh in. I'm leaning toward beer, but could be persuaded.

Can we score some Tej?

I've got an idea for wine, never tried it with Ethiopian before. I'll see if I can pick up a bottle tomorrow before dinner.

Great time, thanks to RAB & REB for organizing ...

Hi,

I was wondering how an Ethiopian communal meal would be served to 20 people or so. I thought it was clever how everything was served to people in groups of four, which was just right.

Thanks again RAB and REB for making a Wednesday evening a vibrant food event.

Best regards,

Thanks to everyone who joined us last night. This was the first LTH event that RAB and I (mostly RAB) helped to organize and we appreciated the great company. The only problem with such a strong turnout, though, is that we didn’t get to talk to everyone as much as we would have liked.

As some of you know, RAB and I have been interested in trying Chicago’s Ethiopian restaurants, in an attempt to find something that’s close to what we enjoyed while living in Washington, D.C. We’d previously been to Ras Dashen and Demera, enjoying the former and finding the latter to be a disappointment.

Lalibela, suggested by germuska (who’d also not been), was a logical next stop. As much as I enjoyed the atmosphere and the company, the food simply didn’t deliver. Since leaving the restaurant, I’ve struggled with how best to comment on our dinner. While I have no problems expressing disappointment with busy restaurants that others enjoy (e.g. Kuma’s), I hesitate to post about a less-than-stellar experience at this family-run restaurant. We were the only party there last night, and thus, it’s easy to conclude that the restaurant is struggling. Based on RAB’s conversations with the owner in planning the menu, I have no doubt the restaurant tried. And, the owners clearly put a lot of thought and effort into the furniture and design of the space.

But, the food just wasn’t good. The highlight of the meal was probably the first bite - - a lentil-filled sambusa. Unfortunately, it was downhill from there. I didn’t find anything to be especially terrible (the meatball and the chicken were at the bottom of the list), but nothing shined, nothing will bring me back. Other than the sambusa, I liked the cubed lamb dish and the brisket. These two were tasty.

I found the salads and vegetable dishes to be pretty forgettable. The cold green lentil salad was interesting, but probably only because I hadn’t had it before.

In any event, it was good to get together with such wonderful folks. As I have been reminding myself lately (especially when family members schedule meals at places like Leona’s), not every meal needs to be a great one. And, great conversation surely makes up for a lot. Thanks again for joining us.

Next up: Ethiopian Diamond . . .

(edited at moderator's request)

I found the beet and potato salad to be excellent, and unlike any other Ethiopian dish I have had. I also enjoyed the Ethiopian steak tartare with cheese. Our side of the table was told that Lalibela's cuisine is from Southern Ethiopia and thus the cuisine has traces of Somali and Kenyan cuisine. Frankly for most of the other dishes, I couldn't taste the difference. Of the more traditional (e.g., Northern) dishes, I liked the various lentil dishes.

It has been a long time since I ate Ethiopian food in DC, but I found the dishes fairly comparable to other Ethiopian restaurants in Chicago: some dishes better, some not so good.

But any restaurant that can provoke such an outpouring of LTH love between Gary and Ronnie deserves some kind of award. It must have been something in the air.

Wait a second! What happened to that foto? Was I dreaming? Was it a nightmare?

GAF wrote:Wait a second! What happened to that foto? Was I dreaming? Was it a nightmare?

Not sure what happened but I thought it really captured a moment.

In any event, I enjoyed our meal last night very much. Thanks to REB and RAB (LTHForum Rookies of the Year? ) and Germuska for putting this together. Of course, the company was great and 20 people on a Wednesday night was a wonderful turn-out.

Having very little experience with Ethiopian, I thought the food was tasty but I'm not really sure that I could distinguish between good Ethiopian and excellent Ethiopian. I've never been blown away by this cuisine but I did enjoy most of what we were served last night. My only complaint, relative to other experiences with it, is that the dishes seemed pretty devoid of sauce, which resulted in the injera base on each platter not being the normally succulent trove that it usually is by the end of the meal.

I also loved the gigantic, tartan-clad thrones, even if they were a bit unwieldy.

Thanks again, to everyone who attended. It was a very enjoyable evening.

=R=

(hopefully, I'll post some pics soon)

I would echo much of what's been said already. I thought it was good, not great. If I were in the immediate neighborhood with friends I would go back (I definitely wouldn't make a special trip). I thought the cubed beef was a highlight. The chopped raw beef was cool only because I'm pretty sure the beef was actually reproducing as it was sitting there in the bowl. No matter how much I picked at that damn bowl, there was never any less beef in there. Very strange.

I'm also happy to have introduced a couple of LTH'ers to the concept of the meat sweats and, to a lesser extent, the rarely seen meat hot flash.