Abou El Sid Restaurant — Restaurant in Geziret al Zamalik, Jazirat al Zamalik

Disappointing Experience at Abou El Sid Restaurant

As a Canadian with Egyptian roots, I had been longing for authentic Egyptian cuisine and was eager to visit Abou El Sid Restaurant during my short trip to Egypt. I had heard good things about it and was hopeful it would provide a memorable experience. Unfortunately, it fell far short of expectations.

We visited on December 30th and were greeted by a bustling restaurant filled with patrons, which initially raised my hopes. However, we were informed of a minimum charge of £850 per person and placed on a waiting list for an hour. While this was surprising, I accepted it given the lack of other options during my brief visit. Once seated, we were placed in a nice location, but the heavy indoor smoking and poor ventilation made the experience uncomfortable. As someone allergic to smoke, I struggled until a window was opened behind me, providing some much-needed fresh air.

The food, sadly, was the biggest disappointment.

Pigeon: This dish was served cold, with an unpleasant smell and taste, nothing like the pigeons I remember from my mother's cooking or other renowned spots in Cairo like Farahat. The price for a single pigeon was shockingly high, adding to the dissatisfaction. Rice with Meat: While the rice itself was good, the meat that accompanied it—despite our request to serve it separately for vegetarian members of our party—was cold and unappetizing. This dish was barely touched. Om Ali: As a dessert, this dish lacked the flavor and quality expected from a restaurant of this reputation. Out of everything we ordered, the rice was the only dish we truly enjoyed.

Adding to the frustration, when we received the bill, we noticed two dishes had been added that were never served. While the extra amount was relatively small (around 200 Egyptian pounds), it was an unnecessary and unwelcome surprise.

Overall, the experience was underwhelming. The food quality was poor, the atmosphere uncomfortable due to smoking, and the service left much to be desired. I shared my thoughts with nearby diners, and on a scale of 1 to 10, I rated the experience no more than a 6 for the quality of food.

In summary, Abou El Sid Restaurant is overrated, with overpriced and disappointing dishes that fail to capture the rich flavors of Egyptian cuisine. I wouldn’t recommend it to anyone seeking authentic and high-quality Egyptian food—there are certainly better...

This trip to Cairo was 90% foodie trip. There were so maaaany things I wanted to try in the 2 days here and I've tried quite a few.

This restaurant reminded me of a nawabi style in an older building that's been redone many decades ago. So the restaurant is old in an even older building so it has an amazing charm to it. The door to it feels so royal.

The service was a bit slow. I mainly wanted to try 2 things here (but they ended up bringing a third thing I didn't order so when you place the order, just reconfirm your order)

Stuffed Pigeon Mulukhia Some chicken dish (this is what I did not order)

The Mulukhia was the star of the meal. I had seen it online and while it has a slimy texture, it tasted SOOOOO GOOOOOOOD. You can dip pita bread in it or have it on the rice (which I took from the chicken) or have it as is. I wish I can find this dish at home.

The stuffed pigeon was very underwhelming. I had it stuffed with frik which I liked. It seemed there was not much meat after stuffing it. Not sure if this is how it is served everywhere or it was just this place. The meat that was there though was AWESOME. I wanted more and more of it.

The chicken was very underwhelming. It was kind of like a tandoor chicken but blander and drier.

The decor in the restaurant takes you back in time. I came shortly after they opened in the afternoon at 1 pm and there was only one family of 3. Shortly after I came though, there were at least a doze and a half people that came in so it is a go to place.

I will visit it again to try out some of their other stuff my next...

This is the worst experience I have had in Egypt. This restaurant is terrible and has terrible service. To start off, it says the food is egyptian. However the food did not turn out to be egyptian. The fattah had yogurt inside which is not egyptian. How does this make sense when it says this is an authentic egyptian restaurant. On top of this the food was cold and the rise wasn’t fully cooked for some of the other items me and family ordered.

We had to wait 30 minutes to even get served JUST water. All the employees in the restaurant were serving only the “rich” looking people or only people who were visibly not from Egypt while leaving the others behind. This is extremely disrespectful and terrible customer service. How could someone treat the people of the country worse than the people that just look better? We were dressed well and we came to a vacation in Egypt because we don’t live in Egypt and this is the first restaurant we try here on this vacation and AS SOON AS WE SPOKE egyptian... we got treated this TERRIBLE service. The waiters were also really rude and didn’t care about us at all. We asked for JUST ice and they took about 15 minutes or even more to get it, we even had to ask another man because that one forgot and then the other just because that MAN also forgot and it was very bad.

Please don’t visit this store, you WILL waste your money on food that is not worth it and for extremely unbearable customer service and not even authentic Egyptian food. If i could give this 0 stars I would. The restaurant should have...