Al Arbab — Restaurant in London

It's quite unfortunate that I have to write this review. We absolutely loved the food here; there's no doubt it is delicious and perfect for a family meal. However, during Ramadan, we booked the entire upstairs section for an iftar party for around 30 people. While everyone enjoyed the food, they all ended up with extremely upset stomachs and food poisoning. This was surprising since we had eaten at Al Arbab many times without issue.

Following the incident, our guests left negative reviews on the restaurant's page. Al Arbab reached out to us, asking us to get our guests to delete the reviews in return for compensation (a free meal). We accepted the free meal and did our best to deter our friends from making rash decisions. One guest, a lawyer, considered legal action, but we convinced them otherwise. While we couldn’t take our guests phone and delete the reviews ourselves, we did stop them from doing anything more, like taking legal action. We also left positive reviews from several accounts to balance things out and apologised to the restaurant tons of times.

Yesterday, after the long Muharram fast, we decided to visit Al Arbab again. Upon entering, a worker approached us, asking, “Are you those people who had a party, left bad reviews, and then had a free meal but didn’t delete those reviews? We decided we will not serve you again.” We didn’t retaliate and left quietly. As we exited, the man said, “I am a Muslim fasting man,” to which we replied, “We were also fasting all day,” and left.

From the replies the company has left to the negative reviews, it seems this man frequently brings up being Muslim as a defense. If he truly wants to use his religion, he should use it to show kindness and bring barakah to his business. He claims losing customers doesn’t affect him, yet he repeatedly asked us to have reviews removed and refused to serve us over lost customers. Through this incident, he has now lost 50+ customers, as we were planning another birthday party in September. But it’s fine since he doesn’t care.

It's sad to write a review like this about a once family-favorite restaurant. He showed no respect by refusing to serve us in front of children. Thankfully, Green Street has plenty of other restaurants, and we were able to open our fast (although an hour late) somewhere else. Despite the horrible treatment, I must admit the food was good, it's just a shame the poor customer service...

The instagram posts looked really good and we wanted to try the mandi for so long. We ordered mixed grill platter (2-3 persons) and lamb mandi (2 person serving) as there were 2 adults and 3 kids.

The positives first The prawns were really good in the mixed grill. The chicken tikka was also very good. Lamb in the mandi was soft and there was no smells. We are very particular about smell so it was a big plus. I liked their arabian champagne serving style. It was nice (although they could have choosen a better name for a halal restaurant) We were served by Mehreen and she was polite and considerate

Now the Negatives The seating is pretty awful. The place is cramped. The seats are very low and the tables are very high. I am 6 feet tall and by the time we finished, I had aches in muscles I dis not existed. The table was too small for their lamb mandi dish. The mixed grill was served on such a big tray that it was just too cramped. There was fish in the mixed grill which just did not need to be there, not with the head and tail attached. Put my son off big time. Unless you are from south of india, I don’t think anyone would touch it. Lamb in the mandi needed more salt. But more importantly the mandi was quite under whelming. It should be served with more sauces. A small tub with tomato sauce does not do justice. When we requested more, two tiny plastic tubs were provided. I would really suggest the owners to rethink their serving strategy. They could have just put the mixed grill on mandi and it would have looked much better. Add mint sauce and increase amount of tomato sauce. We went for iftaar and ordered before hand. The food was cold which I understand that iftar time it is very busy but the rice could have been microwaved. Overall I did not feel that I got value for my money. We went to a different place for desserts.

I would suggest

Please remove a few tables so that there is more space Lower tables so it is comfortable to eat Smaller dishes for mandi and with better presentation. Mandi tastes better with more sauces. Make it juicy with sauces served with it Remove the fish from mixed grill.

I would rate the over experience between 3-4 stars but they have the potential for 4...

A Yemeni themed restaurant infused with South Asian spices.

Ordered a Mixed grilled platter for £39.99 which serves 3-4 people (apparently).

Lamb Shank ⭐️⭐️ Didn’t taste or feel fresh Slight firm bite Seasoning was non existent (not even salt and pepper) Had a cat food smell emanating from it.

Grilled chicken ⭐️⭐️ Wasn’t marinated or juicy had to dip in sauce for moisture but texture was ok Tandoori chicken rather than Yemeni grilled chicken

Fish ⭐️⭐️ It was basically a piece of FRIED masala fish. If I ordered masala fish then I would’ve given it 4 stars but I wanted Yemeni GRILLED fish.

King prawns ⭐️⭐️ Overcooked as you can see and tasted like it was FRIED.

Beef Stew ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ It was ok but would have preferred meat pieces

Rice ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Tasted pretty decent for what it’s worth but there was too much and not enough meat. I liked the addition of peanuts and raisins.

Condiments ⭐️⭐️⭐️ Garlic, yoghurt and chilli sauce were not bad

Portion ⭐️⭐️ Definitely doesn’t serve 3-4 people unless you’re serving supermodels or people who like to eat a lot a rice by itself. Small lamb shank

Price ⭐️⭐️ Definitely not worth £39.99. Price has increased by £4.99 but NOT WORTH IT. I could’ve bought a bigger platter from elsewhere for less.

Customer service ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ The guy at the counter was welcoming and helpful. Really friendly but would have preferred if he smiled.

Atmosphere ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Upstairs dining was adequate and they are renovating the ground floor for seating

Overall I was very DISAPPOINTED with the QUALITY OF FOOD AND PORTION SIZE. Did fill me up but mainly due to the overwhelming amount of rice. DIDN’T enjoy the food and NOT a fine dining experience.

Unfortunately, I WOULDN’T...