El Jannah Chicken Bayswater North — Restaurant in Melbourne

I have been coming here for some time now and have noticed a couple of issues with the service when the place is busy, thankfully the food is good.

Feedback for the owner primarily, last Saturday (25/5) I attended the restaurant about 6.20pm. There was a queue at the register for orders and no staff there. The take away/pick up section was busy with people waiting for their orders and uber eats. The staff were clearly struggling with the amount of orders, and whilst this is fine, what wasn't okay is they left a queue of us waiting to order unacknowledged. After 5-10mins one gentleman chased down a staff and asked what was going on and would they take his order. The young staff member said that they were very busy and trying to clear old orders before taking any new ones.

I watched as that man and another infront of me walk out and leave. It was another 10mins before a staff came to take our orders. You lost at least 6 customers who walked out on account of this....

When someone came to take our orders there was no acknowledgement or apology for the delay/wait.

Once I made my order I had to wait another 30mins for it. This is unusual as normally its rarely more than 10m. Now at this point it wasn't as busy either as you'd lost customers and cleared the backlog.

When I enquired on my delay time staff informed me that's run out of salads and had to make more.

When I finally got my order I checked to see it was all there and there was no bread, when I enquired about that I was told they'd run out of bread too but gave me an extra chips. I didn't need an extra chips, but I thank you for at least trying to make good on that, would have been better had they at least told me the situation when I collected the order (or earlier while waiting and offered me some alternatives).

I will come back because for the most part we enjoy the food and this was a particularly unusual occurrence. If it were to happen again though I think I would not return.

Clearly some training is required of the staff on how to handle busy periods and also better stock management, running out can't be helped sometimes, but you'd expect that not to happen before peak...

I was intrigued when an El Jannah restaurant opened up near me, as I had never heard of it before. I went there to discover it’s a charcoal chicken of Lebanese style which is chicken typically marinated in a blend of spices, including garlic, lemon, and various herbs, cooked over char grill giving it a smoky aromatic taste.

I wanted to try it how it comes el naturale… which is with a side of garlic sauce aka toum. In my initial experience, I found this garlic sauce overwhelming and rich and not complimentary. Whilst the chicken is unique and tasty, due to the cooking method it doesn’t have the moistness and juiciness to hold up with the richness and intensity of the garlic sauce which made it challenging to finish the meal as it becomes monotonous and overwhelming.

On my return I experimented with a variety of sauces, BBQ, gravy, and sweet/spicy and I must say any one of the sauces combined with the standard meal elevates it to the next level. The addition of different sauces balanced out the intensity of the garlic sauce. The gravy I find quite uniquely flavoured and adds a savoury richness. While you do need to pay extra for sauce, you can add the BBQ sauce for just $1 extra but in my opinion, it needs this.

I find the portion sizes quite good and there is no issue to request the breast piece if ordering a quarter chicken. I did sample a piece of fried chicken and it was very overly breaded and not that enjoyable so ill stick with the specialty which is the charcoal chicken. Something also needs to be said also for cleanliness as I have never found the tables to be cleared or wiped of crumbs and grease.

Update Aug 2024 Over time as I have become accustomed to the flavour of El Janna charcoal chicken I must say I have become somewhat addicted to it. I’m often craving the unique taste and it has become my regular. Also over time I think quality has improved, it is often much more moist than previously mentioned and can hold its own. It’s pretty much the only ‘takeaway’ that I eat now, I’m very happy to have El Jannah close by and I have upgraded my...

Sadly here goes the review I hate doing much prefer 5 star reviews. We decided to make Saturday dinner at the new Bayswater El Jannah eat in. We arrived at 7.15 on Saturday night and was surprised to first see it was next to kfc and hardly any people inside. It was an extremely cold night and sadly when entering the restaurant it was not well heated, but still it was pleasant decor but sadly lots of plastic plants not real ones. Front of house service was ok, sadly the guy probably needed a better understanding of the sauces and contents.The menu seemed to be a cross between nandos and kfc.We sat down and received our food in ten minutes which is acceptable but surprised with only 6 customers in shop.Sadly this is where things went pair shaped, on arrival I noticed probably 30-40 flat precooked charcoal chickens sitting in like a flame grill area , which I believe was poor food management as they were reheated with high heat making chicken to hot on outside cooler inside and sadly very dry white meat, the overall flavours were good but just no love added when reheated .i also had the grilled chicken burger and my partner had the fried burger, what a total disaster it was pretty well in uneatable the fillet was about 8mm thick and dried out to a peace of shoe leather,far to much sauce obviously again no love in the final delivery,the fried ones fillet was better but no real flavour. Considering $1.5-1.8 million goes into buying these franchises the new owners of this shop will go broke as in my world if the food is not cooked with love it’s not going to deliver a great result and allow for a strong successful business, in my world it’s no bodies fault except head Honshu a great team needs a...