Baba Supermarket — Attraction in Malden

This is a nice, small middle eastern grocery store. There are two aisles of dry/packaged/canned goods shelves, a few refrigerator cases, a small produce section, a deli, and a meat counter. Right now is during the pandemic, and the cashier wasn't wearing a mask -- but he was otherwise pretty friendly and helpful. The only people in there were me, the cashier, the butcher/deli worker, and one other customer. The store had everything I was looking for, and seemed mostly clean and organized. My only issue was that almost nothing had prices on it -- which in and of itself wouldn't be a problem except that when I went to check out, the cashier said "so how much are we going to charge you today?" and just came up with a number out of his head (didn't add anything up on a register or calculator). The exactly $17 even that he quoted felt reasonable to me given what I was purchasing, but I don't 'believe for a second that was the true total given that the one thing I bought that did have a tag on it was labeled $1.99 (not an even number). Still, I would definitely...

I stopped into Baba while exploring downtown Malden. They're all the way down at the end of Pleasant St, so it could be easy to miss them. I was just popping in to check it out, but the owner was so friendly and proud of his prepared food that I decided to get lunch there. While I was deciding what to order, the owner offered me a free sample of their home made falafel. It was the tenderest, most flavorful falafel that I've ever had.

I ended up ordering braised lamb shanks and okra (a traditional Middle Eastern dish), that came in a perfectly-seasoned tomato sauce, with salad, over rice pilaf. It was huge, and delicious. They also have shwarma, and other hot dishes that change daily. I am going to become a...

New to the area and was pleased to find a place that sold Arabic food/groceries. Very nice people. Nothing had prices though which was quite inconvenient. We bought 3 items (Labne, bread, olives) for a total of $9. Having just moved from Dearborn MI, this was very pricey (would have been $4 there), but I'm learning everything is more expensive in MA! It would be very helpful if things had prices on it though and I'd probably buy more if I knew how much I was going to pay before...