El Hussein Restaurant — Restaurant in New Karnak

El Hussein Restaurant - While on tour with Memphis Tours in Luxor, Egypt, our guide Nabil took us to El Hussein Restaurant for lunch. Full transparency - We found out later that the restaurant is on a list of approved places by the tour company. The tour company takes steps to ensure cleanliness, food prep safety, fair pricing, food options, etc. for tourists including surprise visits by Memphis Tours staff members to check the bathrooms, kitchen, etc. That said... Our experience at El Hussein was fantastic. We were brought upstairs and provided a table overlooking the busy street which only added to the positive experience. Our meal began with various Egyptian appetizers including; bread, tahini, an eggplant dip, spiced pickles (think jalapeno flavored pickles), grilled eggplant with garlic, and a cucumber tomato salad. You can eat these as you like, put on your plate or dip a piece of bread into the bowl. We had just finished a tour in 108°F heat, so soup was not on our minds, but they did offer us two kinds of soup. We opted to pass. The large glasses of hibiscus delight went down well as we needed something cool to drink. Our main course - for me, I asked for a combination of chicken and beef, along with rice. They added the French fries (as did several places during our stay in Egypt) I believe it's a thoughtful touch for American tourists to give us a little something of home. (I say this because at a different restaurant, this is what I was told.) While I do appreciate the gesture, I personally would like more of the Egyptian food and culture, but as I say, it's a thoughtful touch. My wife, a vegetarian, had a flavorful veggie stew (not pictured). I should point out that the meat was prepared under Muslim Halal guidelines. So when preparing meat, they ensure the utensils and cooking surfaces are clean and free from contamination. The meat is marinated with herbs, spices, and citrus juices for added flavour, then cooked using methods like grilling, roasting, or stewing. The beans in tomato sauce is meant to be spooned onto the rice as is the "green dip" which was made from local herbs, similar to a sicky spinach dip (which you can also dip your bread). Dessert was a sweet semolina cake, think a sweet cornbread cake dipped in honey. As mentioned above, the busy street was fascinating to view. The local farmers on their donkey drawn carts could be seen stopping at various shops selling their harvest, children playing and working, scooters and motorbikes navigating the busy street between the cars. The wait staff was very cordial and accommodating. This was an excellent break in our day and added to our knowledge of...

I'm giving this place 1 star just because zero stars option is not available. I will try to write objective review of our experience cos the manager was eager and asked us to leave a review. We been brought to that restaurant by our tour guide who was very keen and recomended it after finishing our day tour at Kings valley and West bank. The first very bad impression of the place me and my friends got when we been given the menu which only have 1 page of set menus for 350-500 LE - translated to English, rest of the menu is entirely on arabic language locals speak. So the average tourist is pushed to eat what first page recomends and the choice is not great - sorry I'm not here to eat fries... We have used Google translator image option to see what other pages offer- and voila u can have single starters, soups, mains, sides, deserts - local food we chose from 😂 Me and my friends are all female, and the waiter who was serving us soon started to talk in a very disrespectful manner to one of us - '' One more salad for free because ur very beautiful; I will bring u coffee for free, etc." I scrapped the insolent indivodual from the table 2 times, but that moment he took out his mobile to push it into my friend's face insisting her to add him to her Instagram and Facebook my lid flew - I sent him away and called the manager. The whole point of going to the restaurant is to get served in a nice environment, not to try to hide and block someones sexual drives and desires, I am sorry but what we pay for is service, not gigolo! Nobody gets to that place to answer ur marrige requests 🤦🏽‍♀️🤣 The practice cheating tourist is not nice, get real - we r intelligent people who can find the way to learn arabic numbers or utilise some translator apps to see what menus say 🤷‍♀️ I would recomend to all tourist to stay away from that place in order to avoid getting cheated. I had Lamb liver with rice, my friends had Tagine and Shish, some Salads, humus, but to be honest we are not impressed. I wish we had go to another place, avoiding that arguments and shouting because in the end things excalated, this massive display of disrespect has no place in restaurant we spend our cash. Work harder, and be fair - u wont get rich overnight, and ur staff won't catch the golden han the way they try. All the best with ur...

When seeking reviews, it’s best taken from locals- Having some Egyptian roots I have experienced a very awful experience in this restaurant- surprisingly contrary to many reviews I have read on Google😤! Now I understood that most of the good reviews were from westerners who don’t know much about Arabs or Egyptian cuisine

First Food quality:

I went to this place to experience local cuisine. I ordered kebab, molokheya and rice. The food was basically tasteless. I requested molokheya that was more or less like water, odorless and tasteless. The soup was cold. The food quality is borderline awful at best well below average

Service: One of the most hideous things as a tourist I find, is being presented with a tourist menu (overpriced) compared to local menus- something that many restaurant owners think they trick tourists with . The Arabic menu has no prices! This ruins trust off the bat! I demanded to be presented with proper menu that has prices in Arabic version. Initially they denied that but then they submitted to it to make up for it! I spoke to their “manager” - not sure if he is truly manager (named abo Jana). Advised him against this attitude. He tried nicely to give me lower price but it already made a mark!

Cleanliness The table I was first asked to be seated at smelled awful. I asked the waiter to smell it

I had to move to another place

Atmosphere Bland- nothing special

One of the worst experiences I have ever had throughout my travel history. Overinflated reputation!

Will never be back and highly...