Persian Version
At 3 on a Sunday afternoon, Raffi’s Place was totally jammed. Of course, this was halfway through the 12-day Persian New Year, so Persian Americans were there in droves. But clearly, if there’s a better place in Glendale for pilaf and kebab, Raffi’s customers haven’t heard of it.
The menu is simple--just a few salads and cold appetizers, and those luscious kebabs, all of which are served with grilled tomatoes, onions and bell peppers on mountains of fragrant basmati rice.
The kitchen is a real production line. Peer in the window at the far end of the patio and you’ll see dozens upon dozens of kebabs grilling over charcoal, plus huge bowls of roasted eggplant puree, hummus, tabbouleh salad and cucumber-spiked yogurt.
The first thing to arrive at your table is a plate of raw delights: basil, mint, onion slices flecked with parsley, radishes and imported black olives. On the side are squares of unleavened lavash bread and pats of butter.
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I like to start a meal with the creamy chicken and potato salad known as salad Olivier. The Greek salad is less memorable: just coarsely chopped iceberg lettuce, a few tomato wedges, a handful of olives and not enough crumbled Mizithra cheese.
The hummus and tabbouleh are both perfectly good, but I find the roasted eggplant puree and the fava beans (lobiya; spelled “loble” here) too oily, though the puree is good and smoky and the beans are pleasantly sweet.
But anything you eat here is merely a prelude to the kebabs--giant, beautifully marinated skewers of roast meat that come to the table covered in canopies of lavash.
Lamb lovers order shishlik (“shishlique”), a skewer of tender lamb chunks still on the bone; this version is just about perfect. I happen to like the mahi kebab, a long boned whitefish filet that contrives to be entirely black on the surface but wonderfully moist inside.
Chicken kebab comes in big chunks (barg) or ground up (kubideh). There’s also a “chicken” kebab (which tastes like Cornish hen to me) on the bone; all three are juicy and tender.
Oddly, the kebabs I like least are the beef shish kebab and kubideh (ground filet mignon). Both have a faint liverlike flavor that doesn’t appeal to me.
You could end a meal with good baklava, the honey-drenched fritter zulbia and vials of penetrating Persian tea.
BE THERE
Raffi’s Place, 211 E. Broadway, Glendale. Open 11 a.m.-10 p.m. Tuesday-Saturday, 11 a.m.-9 p.m. Sunday. Beer and wine only. Validated parking in structure. MasterCard and Visa accepted. Dinner for two, $21-$35. Suggested dishes: chicken salad, $3.50; shishlik, $9.50; mahi kebab, $9.50; chicken kebab with bones, $8.50. Call (818) 240-7411.