New Afghan Restaurant Offers Delicious, but Expensive, Fare

So many of the dishes at Pawinda, La Jolla’s handsome new Afghan restaurant, have Indian names that one might suspect this place of being nothing more than an Indian restaurant in exotic Afghan garb.

The menu includes samosas, the ubiquitous stuffed pastries of Indian appetizer lists; raita, the wonderfully cooling mixture of cucumber, yogurt and mint; paneer, the soft cheese made daily in millions of Indian households, and tikke, the grilled lamb cubes of northern Indian cuisine.

The management explained, however, that these names and dishes are as common in Afghanistan as they are in the subcontinent, because of certain shared tastes and food resources.

The most important point, in any case, is that the food here is quite good; it sometimes is downright exciting.

Named for Nomads

The restaurant takes its name from the Pawindas, a group of nomads that historically traveled from summer pastures high in the Hindu Kush mountains to winter grazing grounds on the Pakistani plains. (Members of a Pawinda family own the establishment; they are among the millions of Afghanis who have migrated because of the ongoing war in their homeland.)

One would not expect a particularly refined cuisine to be developed under the difficult conditions experienced by a nomadic group, but such is indeed the case. Everything sampled at Pawinda had subtle and unexpected flavors, including some of the more familiar dishes, such as the tikke .

Perhaps the single most interesting fact about Pawinda is that it is such an elegant restaurant, and this in a city that has never demanded anything of its ethnic eateries beyond low prices and reasonably decent food.

But it comes at a price, though, and there may prove to be a good bit of resistance to the hefty tab that comes with a Pawinda meal. New restaurants do well to start out modestly, and increase their prices after they have gained a following. Entrees here cost $14.50 to $22.00, and could easily be at least $2 cheaper in every instance. A truly wonderful side dish called burani cost $5 for three slices of eggplant smothered in a creamy, marvelous garlic-yogurt sauce; the price was simply far too high. (It must be mentioned that entree plates include more than enough food, and side dishes are not at all necessary. They are good, though, and may as well be affordable.) Desserts range from $4.50 to $6, and again could be cheaper. If the dishes were made from exotic ingredients, the prices perhaps would be defensible, but such is not the case.

Chutneys Arrive First

One tends to forget the prices while eating, though. The first plate that arrives supports three small cups filled with chutney, one each of dark, luscious tamarind sauce, a mildly spiced garlic-yogurt sauce, and a rich blend of cilantro, walnuts and spices. Be careful to first take a plain bite of the dish at hand, though, to savor and understand its nature before anointing it with each of the three sauces in turn. Used discreetly, the chutneys provide a marvelously varied dining experience.

Meals also include large servings of fresh, hot nan, the flat, chewy bread also common in Indian cooking.

Among the appetizers, the shami kebab, or seasoned ground beef patties, sound interesting, but rather too like a couple of the entrees. Pakora echoes the Indian dish of the same name and is a kind of tempura of vegetables, dipped in a batter of chick pea flour and fried until delicately gilded. The samosas, available stuffed with meat or vegetables (plates can include a few of each, and should, because both are excellent) are a triumph of their kind, quite the best this writer has ever sampled. The tamarind chutney makes the meat samosas especially savory; try the garlic yogurt with the vegetable pastries. The final appetizer, kalejee, is a flavorful jumble of chicken livers sauteed with cilantro and plenty of garlic, and is so good that it should leave liver lovers hungering for more.

The menu offers several soups and salads, but meals include a choice of the house soup or a simple (and dull) green salad. The house soup, orzh , could be considered an Afghan minestrone; it is thick with spaghetti, kidney beans and ground beef, all swimming in a strong, tomatoed broth. A bit of cheese tops the soup, rather like Parmesan would a minestrone. The orzh is delicious, but ever so filling.

Spiced Yogurt Marinade

Lamb is the meat par excellence of Middle Eastern feasting, and at Pawinda the lamb tikke is treated in accord with its favored status. The trick seems to be the overnight bath the meat cubes take in spiced yogurt, which imparts an incredible tenderness and a fine undertone of flavor. Grilled quickly and served somewhat pink, this is an outstanding lamb preparation.

The second-place trophy probably would go to the chapli kebab, a dish that the menu far too modestly describes as “ground beef patties.” Enriched with spices, egg, onion and garlic, and crumbs or starch of some sort, the rounds of meat are fried to a beautifully crisp finish (they almost seem to have been breaded, although this is not the case). They are to a hamburger patty what caviar is to canned tuna, and at $18.50, they should be.

The seekh kebab, traditional from Istanbul to Bombay, is related in style to the chapli kebab, but less interesting. Seasoned ground meat is formed into sausage shapes, skewered and grilled.

Chicken appears in the form a cherg, a half-bird marinated in exactly the same way as the tikke, and broiled just until done. No reasonable chicken could ask for better treatment. Chicken also stars in the Kunar pulao . Pulaos, traditional dishes of rice baked with meats or vegetables and various seasonings, can be homely or company fare depending on the circumstances of the moment; other choices in this department include the vegetarian Pesharawaree pulao flavored with cinnamon and cloves, and the Afridi, named after another Afghan tribe and in this case built around chunks of beef.

Rice appears in nearly every Afghan meal and can undergo fascinating treatments. At Pawinda, plates usually include two excellent varieties, one plain but perfect, the other excitingly flavored with cardamom and spinach. Plates also include mixed vegetables cooked almost to mush, which apparently is the traditional way.

For dessert, the custard-like rice pudding cannot be faulted in any way, but the sheer khorma , a soupy date pudding topped with slivered almonds, is too exotic and remarkable to be missed.

PAWINDA

1110 Torrey Pines Road, La Jolla

454-9229

Lunch and dinner served Monday through Saturday; closed Sundays.

Credit cards accepted.

Dinner for two, including a modest bottle of wine, tax and tip, $60 to $80.