Anais Restaurant - Taste of Persia & Shisha — Restaurant in Sydney

Anais Restaurant - Taste of Persia, Baulkam Hills & Norwest

Anais is in Norwest, Bella Vista, but since it's on the other side of the road, it also comes up as Baulkam Hills.

The decors are relaxed and pretty. It's got open air covered seating as well as indoors.

We ordered the Taste of Persia, which had one skewer of Chicken Joojeh, lamb koobideh, and lamb barg. Served with basmati rice, we ordered for it to be topped with zereshk or barberries.

The chicken joojeh was chicken breast with saffron and spices. It was very mild, delicious, and perfectly cooked. I was amazed at how soft and juicy the chicken was. The lamb koobideh was minced lamb skewers. Again, it was delicious.

The lamb barg, which was a skewer of butterflies lamb backstrap, was not to my liking. Less salt, a bit tough.

We had the perfect order for two, but there comes a time when you think you need to order more, even though you don't have to. So we ended up ordering a Shirin Polo with meatballs. Essentially, it was a similar basmati rice, white and orange coloured with orange peels, almonds, carrots, saffron served with lamb meatballs. The garnishing with pistachios was missing. The rice was mildly sweet, and the lamb meatball was delicious as well. However, we probably weren't wowed with this dish, and we got this packed. Perhaps we were full, and the rice was very similar to what we had in the dish before.

Overall, we loved the place, decor, and the food and would love to be back. Entertainment book gave us a 25% discount. All in all, a...

Food presentation was fabulous, but unfortunately that's where the positives end. Food was extremely bland (no flavour), chicken kebab undercooked (red bits with blood in the center), backstrap lamb kebab over cooked and chewy. The minced lamb kebab also lacked flavour. Did complain and present the undercooked chicken to the helpful waitress, who kindly appologised.

The rice pudding dessert looked nice, bit was dreadful due to excessive sugar. In fact, 1 hour later, I still taste the sugar at the back of my throat.

Service was great; the waitress talkative and sympathetic to my complaint, who herself has mentioned to management on many occasions many of the shortcomings, but alas to deaf ears.

Plenty of potential to pack in customers with something special including the unique location, but unfortunately falls way short. The taste could easily be improved by using charcoal or food fire, instead of the ubiquitous gas burner and indulging in some of the traditional Persian spices. There are many fine Persian restaurants around Sydney, but unfortunately this is not one of them. I dined at this restaurant 3 years ago and thought it was pretty good back then, especially the interactive belly dancer. No such entertainment tonight. How can standards drop so quickly????

Highlights: The wonderful waitress, location and food presentation.

It's Saturday night, and the restaurant was ~20% full. This must obviously say something about current...

Great value for money and very enjoyable food was spoilt for the terrible service. The wait staff were dressed casually and unprofessional which equaled their service - casual and unprofessional. Asked twice for our order to be taken - I don’t go to a restaurant to be ignored! We were not allowed to finish our tapas starter as the staff were determined to clear the table to serve our banquet - they did not even ask - HOW RUDE - I chose not to make a scene but this is unacceptable! We paid for our meal yet the wait staff were trying to push us out the door. The bottle of wine that we ordered was plonked down in the middle of the table like a bottle of table water! The young staff were clueless on how to serve wine, they did not ask if the bottle of wine is the one selected or even open it let alone pour it - it was delivered like a bottle of table water! The poor service definitely took the shine off the experience- 1 star for the food and 1 star for the value for money but you lose 3 stars from the pathetic service - I suggest the owner either get rid of every wait staff person as they were all terrible or re-train everyone to a higher standard or just hire better trained, more mature staff who have self respect to dress appropriately for a dinner service restaurant and can pronounce the items...