Messob Ethiopian Restaurant — Restaurant in Los Angeles

Are you kidding me?

25 minute wait after we arrive in the dimly lit banquet hall. Ok, I can deal with that, just seat us in the hall! What does 1000 sq ft of empty space spell? Dumb management. We get moved into the other room. Ok, another wait til we order. Time check? Probably 7:30. Coffee for four and a variety of veggie dishes. My friends are vegan, I can deal, just give me coffee. Oh, the coffee is in a clay perculator, it will take extra time. Sure, my own kettle takes about 10 minutes to boil but I figure it tastes better than the 208 F degree water I have ready at all times in the kitchen. The minutes tick by. My friends and I discuss all sorts of things, other wonderful Ethiopian meals we have had among them. Boy, can't wait for that coffee! I am no stranger to Ethiopian food and have tasted it on both coasts. Great cuisine. This night however, I am very hungry. I passed through a whirlwind of emotional states before the food arrived. I witnessed other tables, some receiving food, some not. Were they here before us, or not? If we had ordered all our stuff on one plate, would it have arrived sooner or not? Where on earth is the coffee? It is now past 8 pm. I think we received napkins and water at some point. There seem to be four members of the waitstaff. We have heard the kitchen is small....

8:22 rolls around. I think of myself as a patient person but if I'm going out to eat and paying over $15 for a meal I expect a certain level of service, breadsticks if nothing else (njera as the case may be!) At this point I have had it. I announce to my friends, "If the food is not here in the next 3 minutes I am leaving." I know what state I'm in and god help he or she who wishes to cross me. I stare at my watch for the next 180 seconds. Somehow, someway I can tell the waitress bringing a platter over at 8:25 precisely has our food. I feel a sense of grim satisfaction that they haven't forced me into the street, but my anger does not abate. The food arrives and I pounce like a vulture. Half of my dish is gone before a waitress returns; we inquire about the coffee. It is "not possible to make the coffee." We ordered it over an hour ago! Couldn't you have told us it was not possible then?! The rest of the meal went by in a hangry haze. My friends later told me they had never seen me like that before. They are lucky not to have seen me like that before. I never want to be like that again. Please, if you are going to the trouble to have a restaurant, give guests their food in a timely manner. This restaurant in particular has a vast banquet hall area which is generally unused. *&$%ing convert it to a kitchen! That is all. If you are still reading, and you would like to have your food within the hour of ordering, please go somewhere else. This place is clearly popular enough that they do not need your business, and would be better served by being more honest about the fact that they are booked solid on a Saturday night. Look elsewhere in your Jonathan Gold book for Ethiopian options, spend the extra couple bucks for Genet down the block, whatever. I just don't want anyone else to have to go through the anguish I experienced. I gave two stars instead of one star because the shiro...

First off I just want to admit that I am NOT a fan of Ethiopian food and I probably will never be. I only came here because some of my bf's relatives are Ethiopian, so we ventured out to try Messob.

If you like Ethiopian food, than this place is probably the most traditional and authentic Ethiopian restaurant you can find in the heart of LA. It's nestled in Little Ethiopia amongst other Ethiopian restaurants, but this place seems to always be packed compared to their other restaurants across the street.

We came for dinner with a party of 8 people and the only seating for such a big group was in the front of the restaurant. The space was so limited that we couldn't even squeeze into a circle around the tiny communal table, so 2 of us were separated into another adjacent table. Also, I'm not sure what is up with the lighting at the restaurant but the area we were seated in was so dark we couldn't even see what we were eating. We attempted to turn up the dim lighting, but the server came by twice scolding us and telling us that we couldn't mess with the switch because the lighting for the rest of the restaurant became super bright. So we ate in the dark until the manager came by and told us we could turn up the lighting a little. My other complaint is with the seating. I understand that the tables and chairs are suppose to be traditional Ethiopian style seats but they were severely uncomfortable. The seating was so uncomfortable that I felt like I was squirming in my seat the whole time throughout dinner. There were two guys in our party that were over 6 ft tall and they had a even harder time adjusting to the seats without cramping up their legs. I hope they can invest in some more comfortable seating especially for larger parties in the future.

After ordering our food, it felt like an eternity for our food to arrive. The service was really painstakingly slow. We ordered two Super messob combos for the 8 of us which came with an assortment of meats and veggies. They also serve complimentary Injera bread which you use to wrap the meat and veggie to eat. There's no utensils involved so you are eating with your hands the whole time. There was nothing spectacular amongst the dishes that stood out to me. I can only compare most of the food to baby food. Think mashed up lentils and chick peas, and...

I want to start this of by saying if this is going to be your first experience with Ethiopian food do NOT try Messob. While visiting L.A., my family and I thought we should have a little taste of home and Messob was our first stop, that was our first mistake. We ordered 1 special kitfo, one normal kitfo, and the vegetarian platter. The butter they used for the kitfo was absolutely horrible and tasted like bone marrow, which is a sign that they’re not using authentic Ethiopian butter. Each bite of the kitfo was like chewing through a raw UNFLAVORED stick of butter, it was too heavy and thick. And the cooked kitfo that we ordered was too tough because they probably left it on the fire too long. As bad as the kitfo was the vegetarian platter was surprisingly worse. Each meal was dunked in unnecessary amounts of oil. The only flavor in the Misir and Gomen specifically was of grease and left a rancid film over my mouth even though I only took one bite. I can’t remember the last time I had numerous meals in front of me and NOT ONE of them had an ounce of good flavor. I’ve lived in Ethiopia almost all my life and I promise you the only authentic thing about this restaurant is how long they make you wait for below average, cold, and mediocre food. I could have overlooked the horrible taste of their food if it hadn’t given me food poisoning. I’ve been bed ridden for two days throwing up my guts and so has the rest of my family. For anyone who wants to try Ethiopian food, please try somewhere else or make it at home. Even a child who has never walked into a kitchen can make better food than whatever it was that they served us. This is a very disappointing and inaccurate representation of our beautiful Ethiopian cuisine!!

P.S. Anyone who left a positive review is either a friend of the restaurant owner or has no concept of what Ethiopian food...