Fanous Lebanese Restaurant — Restaurant in Nicosia

Excellent location down town, easy to find and few steps away from the main Ledras street, located on a quiet street with historical charm. There are tables inside and outside; I like more to sit outside, even during winter months. Speaking about the food - I love Arabic food. Some Palestinian dish with aborigine sounds good, but when ordered brought with dry rice as if it was prepared few hours ago. However, grilled meat always works out well, especially mixed grilled meat, there is another super Middle East dish – mansaf, if with the lamb meat and yoghurt (traditional with hot dip), then it’s supper delicious and size almost for two people as I never ate a full portion of that dish. Homemade mint lemonade is very cooling. I’d like especially to highlight shisha (nargile), to my mind is one the best in Cyprus (tried many places throughout the Cyprus, inc fashionable place – worst ever), traditional is the best to try, the price is very reasonable, around 10 EUR. Sometimes during the football games, the restaurant could be overcrowded even during the day on weekends. Tried to sit on Friday’s or Saturday’s evening and it was fully booked, so the reservation is strongly preferable, although it is possible to find a table for 1-3 persons with no reservations, but it could be inside (loosing charm of the down...

My father and I really enjoyed our lunch of (medium-size) fatoush, chicken livers in garlic sauce, cheese rolls (I think it’s rakakat but called cheese pies on the menu), spicy sausages, and rice with aubergine, chicken, and nuts (it’s mostly rice). We’ve been eating Middle Eastern food regularly for the last 3 months and decided to try dishes we hadn’t had before. Lots of nice pita, a dish of strained yogurt, and at the end you get a complimentary mahalabia (milk pudding) topped with pistachios with rose syrup on the side. We packed up leftovers and asked for an order of ful medames to take away, which came with a box of make-yourself salad items and plenty of pita. A spoonful of ful before I put it in the fridge confirmed that it will be delicious with the leftovers tomorrow. There is plenty of seating inside, not just couches, which isn’t clear from any of the photos on Google. It was a cold day, and we needed inside seating. It’s not fine dining, the waiters are OK but not particularly attentive, but I’d definitely...

So I just turned up at this restaurant (8pm on Friday evening) and spoke to the 2 young male waiters outside, asking for a table for 1. There was at least 3 free tables inside that I could see behind them and 2 free outside as well.

Their reply, as polite as it was, left me quite surprised - "Sorry, but we are fully booked" and so I mentioned the free tables inside and they said they do not serve food inside, which I have never heard of before.

I do not understand what the reason was that they decided to turn me away. Both the waiters looked very relaxed, were chatting by the door and the restau was definitely not heaving by any means. I also genuinely do not believe they were "fully booked" as there were free tables both inside and out.

Unfortunately since I was turned away I did not taste and therefore cannot rate the food/atmosphere...