Iraqi restaurant "Ashurbanipal" — Restaurant in Sofia City

This place is contradictory. When you walk to it it doesn’t even look like a restaurant, nothing indicates or signals that it is. It’s in a shady area in Sofia and there are a lot of negative reviews about the hygiene level, the microwaved food and the attitude of the owner. And all of that is true.

However this is the second time in my life that I try such good hummus. And I’ve had my share. We ordered a few meals from the menu and everything was delicious. The only disappointment were the pitas which appear to be pre-ordered and not hand made.

At the same time like I mentioned above there are some cons to the place. When you first enter you will see 5 tables that are somewhat in weird proximity to each other which takes away from one’s dining comfort. The place is a self service but nothing indicates that. When you reach the owner, who keeps appearing and disappearing behind the counter and into the kitchen, he will explain in a rather cold, even rude way to sit wherever. No one gives you the menu you need to realize you are supposed to grab one from around the counter.

Then if you decide to use the restroom you will notice that the light is out. Still there was soap and warm water so that was not a problem for us.

Anyhow we had a great meal experience and even took some hummus to go. What this place gets absolutely right is the flavor. We have dined in numerous restaurants in Sofia, some of which very expensive. And almost all of them miss that. We would continuously get fresh ingredients, arranged well, nice service but all of that means nothing if the meal has no flavor. That is the biggest disappointment with most food places in Sofia. And that’s what Ashur Banipal nails with every meal! Everything tastes amazing and makes you want to come back the day after. Additionally once the owner warms up to you he is actually quite nice and gets happy when he sees that people enjoy his food.

I would definitely go again and recommend this place as the best arabic restaurant in Sofia and one of the best I have visited...

The owner is a charming Assyrian man from Iraq who speaks English very well and the atmosphere is relaxed and non-pretentious which is great.

Alas, the entire restaurant needs a thorough scrubbing especially the restrooms and walls.

I eat a lot of home cooked Levantine and Indian food and I use around 25 Indian herbs and spices regularly in my cooking (some of these spices 99% of Europeans never heard of such as Kaukam, Asafoetida and Ajwain) so I am accustomed to flavourful food.

I understand Bulgarians and European tourists are extremely impressed by Ashurbanipal because they have little to no idea about exotic spices but I found the flavours to be unbalanced.

The dominant flavours are pomegranate molasses and sumac.

The former is added in too large quantities to the point it is impossible to taste the ribs and the latter is added to dishes where it does not belong.

The green salad would be a lot tastier with fresh lemon juice and the tahini on cauliflower lacked garlic and the zest of lemon juice and cumin in the preparation.

The "curry potato" is boiled potatoes smothered with industrial so-called curry powder sauce. It is edible but not tasty (I would not order it again).

Of the seven meat dishes on the menu three are lamb dishes and four are veal dishes.

I personally don't eat veal because they are usually separated from their mothers when they are a few days old and live a sad, lonely and short life before they end up on your plate.

I take the liberty to share a thought with the owner ; Having run a successful and unique business for decades perhaps it is time to return to Iraq and settle in an Assyrian village or town for the remaining 25 to 30 years of your life.

You can contribute to and strengthen the continuity of Assyrians in their native homeland and retire with joy and purpose.

I wish you all the best!

P.S : The homemade baklava is fantastic and is probably the tastiest baklava in Sofia hence the...

Extremely good use of spices and very balanced dishes👌🏾 I'm actually writing this after my second visit and I think for me one of the big standouts is the beef with orange and lemon. The beef is very tender, with just the right amount of chew, while the flavour of the orange comes in as a surprisingly nice and refreshing addition. This honestly might be my new favourite beef dish. Along with the beef we ordered cauliflower with tahini sauce. A lot of time I'm wary of cauliflower dishes, cause in my experience it is very easy to overcook them, but that's not the case here. They are tender but still holding up their shape with no mushy ends in sight. I think along the tahini sauce they also put on some type of garlicky youghurt sauce and that's a very nice combo that somehow still let's through the subtle flavour of the cauliflower itself. The dishes come with free flat bread that you can use to roll all those flavours into one. They told us that if we order a third dish we can also get a free salad, which i had tried last time and it was pretty nice (tomatoes, cucumber and sumak) but summer is at it's end and I'm not much into salads now hahah Last time I also tried their rice with raisins which was okay (just lacked salt ino) but in comparison with other more flavourful dishes not that impressive. The place is a self-service and it's only cash with very reasonable prices. Looks pretty well kept and the staff is nice and fast. It is rather small so if u wanna go there as a bigger group maybe call ahead first? Both times i was there we went somewhat early in the night which i think was a good move cause there would still be tables to...