Shawarma Mediterranean Grill — Restaurant in Centennial

We were in the mood to try a new Middle East restaurant, which is probably not the best idea when you’re really in the mood for authentic Mediterranean food. After finding one that we haven’t visited yet, we traveled at least 30 minutes to get to it! Google maps took us directly there in a busy plaza. We were so hungry and though surprised it was a fast food eatery, we were eager to devour. We both ordered shawarma sandwiches and we asked for it to be made like they’d make it in Palestine or Lebanon etc. You can choose items to add to your sandwich, like tahini, pickles, fries, lettuce, etc. We also ordered baklawa and chocolate mousse. But we weren’t sure so we asked for one of the servers to add what he thinks goes in. He was nice enough to oblige; though, not sure if that was a good idea since perhaps that accounts for the unauthentic taste. No matter, it looked delicious so we sat at the first booth so we can start munching! The bread is the best part of the sandwich, we thought. It wasn’t to our liking! Not sure if it was the combination of what the line cook stuck in our sandwiches or the missing humus, or the meat just tasted like fajita meat, which we both don’t like much. Our meat was beef/lamb, but had that fajita flavor. From the many patrons who visited when we were there, perhaps the restaurant caters to western flavors. That’s not for us! There are plenty of Middle Eastern restaurants who serve authentic food, so we will keep patronizing those. We will definitely keep an eye out for new Middle East restaurants to try as well! But wait, what about the baklava and mouse? They were delicious! They give you a good-sized portion of that sweet triangle of goodness with the best tasting scoop of ice cream! The moose was not too sweet, but still tasty. The atmosphere? It is clean and the staff smile when you talk to them. I don’t remember any Arabic music blasting, which is always a disappointment for us. Arabic music just gives a restaurant that ability to transport patrons to the places where the food originated! Maybe that could make up for the missing flavors! You never know! Should you try it? Of course, it might appeal to your taste buds! Would we try it again? Well, perhaps if there weren’t any others and we wanted to travel that far...

Today is Tuesday. On Tuesday where I work lunch is catered for all employees, it really is a brilliant perk and much appreciated.

Every morning on Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday you get an email with a menu to a randomly chosen restaurant. On this Tuesday the menu was for Shawarma. Normally there is a low probability I would seek out Shawarma on my own, its not really my go to cuisine.

So from this Tuesday’s menu I picked out a lamb Shawarma dish. The gist of it is tenderly braised lamb over rice, hummus, mixed greens, and spiced potatoes.

First of all, the lamb was fantastic, 8/10. I’m not sure what sauce they used to hold the lamb and the rice together, but it tasted slightly of butter and some other spices I wouldn’t be able to name. The rice was cooked well, and despite it being all put on a to-go platter it was nicely separated.

Portion size was appropriate for a growing lad like myself, although I did only eat half of the baked pita bread wrapped in tin foil that came with it.

One thing that did bother me though was that I paid extra to get falafel on the side. I remember growing up and going to siedos and when you got falafel it came with a basket of falafel. However here it came with 1 (one!) falafel that was the size of a regular meatball at best! Can’t complain too much though because I dug the taste. Texture was a little soft but I would attribute that to sitting in the container on the drive over. Made and eaten fresh helps anything taste better, no doubt about that.

Overall I was happy with my experience at Shawarma, and will definitely be ordering off the menu again when it comes through...

Ate here on 1/27/24. Unfortunately this is the worst Mediterranean place I have ever been to. I am genuinely baffled as to how this place has more than four and a half stars.

My partner and I are both vegan and we wanted to order the falafel wrap, which the website says is vegan... However one of the workers (rudely) told us the pita contains dairy when I double checking that it was vegan friendly. Then, strangely one of the workers whispered in their ear, "there is no dairy on the pita." We overheard this comment, which I don't think was intended. That being said, neither of them took ownership to provide us with the correct information. Anywho, we opt to not get the pitas (who has ever heard of a pita in their life that contains dairy?? Not me!)

Anywho, we get our food a moment later and every single thing is salted 5-10 times more than it should have been. I am seriously not exaggerating. I almost always finish my food everywhere but I couldn't even muster up the strength to do that here. Saltiness aside, the base flavor of everything we ate was just sub par at best. The "spiced potatoes" were soggy with no flavor, unless salt is a flavor then sure.

Wish I could at least say that the staff was friendly, but that wasn't the case.

The best part of our meal was the water we had...