Peace ‘n’ Spice — Restaurant in Padua

It’s interesting that this place has so many good reviews because the food was terrible. We ordered shaktura, hummus, and naan to start with. Shaktura was delicious but you could see the pastry wasn’t fresh. It was left over either from the morning or the evening before. It’s a Middle Eastern restaurant but I ate the worst hummus of my life. They watered the hummus, so you could taste the water and a little bit of chickpeas, which makes me also suspect that they use canned chickpeas instead of cooking their own. It was funny that they brought us stale bread while we ordered “naan”. They could have told us if they didn’t have naan. We wouldn’t have minded the other type of bread, but there was no need to lie to us as if we didn’t know what naan was.

Then we got the Turkish plate with three meal options. It’s supposed to include beef skewers, rice with saffron, borek (Turkish pastry with minced meat), spinach, and cacik (Turkish yogurt and cucumber sauce). I was disappointed and mad because as a Turkish person, I know how these should have tasted like. The meat tasted bad, and it had an excessive amount of mint. You can look up how to make shish kebab. I couldn’t even finish it. Instead of making rice with saffron, they put plain rice and a teaspoon of saffron rice, which was hilarious. The borek’s mixture tasted bad, and the pastry was obviously leftover. Overall, the only edible thing was yogurt sauce, so congratulations on mixing cucumbers and yogurt well.

I wouldn’t have this meal even if it was free, so it’s sad that it was also overpriced. There are many good restaurants in Padova, please try these instead of having a bad experience here. I think they’re trying to give you random food by convincing you that it’s from Middle Eastern...

This place is totally a tourist trap.

First of all, there are only two options on the menu to choose: 3 dishes for 12€ or 5 dishes for 15€. We were in 5 people and would like to have some appetizers as snacks around 16h, that's why we asked 2 kits of 5 dishes each.

Once the food arrived, we discovered that when the person choose 5 instead of 3 dishes, the portion of each dish is smaller. This was not previously mentioned. Not even on the menu neither by the waitress.

Moreover, the menu was stating "falafel - 4 pieces" and we choose it as one of the dishes. When the food came, it was only 2 falafels. This was not mentioned previously as well.

Finally, below the only 2 options of the menu it was stated "service fee: 1.50€". Nothing else, but the owner assumes that his menu is very very clear and we should assume that is was a service fee per person and not per plate, even if we asked only 2 plates.

At the end, he tried to charge us 5 times the service fee to not even provide plates for each person or ice cubes for our water. The cherry cake was the guy saying that we were wrong and we don't understand the menu because we don't english so well. He might doesn't know that we are all master students and that menu was nothing clear.

All these factors supports what we say: it is a tourist trap. When you order the food you think one thing, but when the food and the bill come you realize that you...

Tried it just as they opened. Outstanding staff and amazing food. Beautifully decorated place. We didn't have a reservation cause we just tried on a whim. They still seated us. I suggest ro make a reservation because this place is popular. I can see why. Very popular with the Italians. You can see Italians are more comfortable with this food than Chinese dishes.

I can't get over the amazing service. And the food is 95% authentic. I've been to most of the countries that are featured on the menue. My baby sitter of 5 years was from Afghanistan. So familiar with that food. My husband has been around the middle east and Africa for work. I've lived in parts of Africa too. Mainly Johannesburg and cape Town. My husband has seen more. Usually we go to bologna or Milan for other cultures food. So glad Padua has such variety.

I'm use to having a different culture food everyday because of my life style. So I'm glad Padua has restaurants like this. I can't eat pasta everyday. Sorry. I need more variry. Will definitely be...