Naf Naf Grill — Restaurant in Madison

My now wife and I made the mistake of having Naf Naf cater our wedding. The two employees showed up and seemed fine at first, but seemed to lack any training around fire safety and catering prep. They ignited the “hot pads” (indoor safe liquid fuel to keep pans warm through an event) directly under aluminum trays of food without use of a double boiler. As a result, the tray of pita bread (and the tablecloth underneath) lit completely on fire before the reception. This happened right behind my sister-in-law and her nearly 2-year-old child. Thankfully, the event staff at the venue (not the caterers) acted quickly and put out the fire and ran the still alit pans of food out the doors and into the parking lot. After this, the catering employees announced they were “going home” and left completely. Taking with them the covers for the remaining hot pads, which are the only way to put them out (barring a fire extinguisher). The remaining food (still placed too close and without a double boiler) burnt nearly completely, so that only the top half of the trays were edible. Our event coordinator from the venue called Naf Naf and requested replacement food (and the return of any employees) to remediate the issues. They returned around an hour later (near the end of dinner) with an additional few trays of food, but not enough to replace the burned chicken shawarma and falafel. Once again, they tried to leave without putting out the fires, but our coordinator again intervened and was required to stay there and supervise them while they did their job. After this, I reached out to Naf Naf and laid out this course of events very plainly and simply in an email and requested a refund for the food. My case is that not only was a large amount of food ruined, but the reception area smelled of a fire and that same burnt food which was (at least) unsettling. Most importantly, they started a fire on our rented tablecloths that could have quickly spread to neighboring tables and at the minimum caused a great deal of damage or personal injury. This was prevented by the vigilance of the event staff, and not the Naf Naf employees themselves. Naf Naf responded that they “take this very seriously” and will respond to me “by tomorrow.” That was almost a week ago with no response, even though I’ve followed up with additional emails. I do not recommend using this venue for any catering job. I don’t know if this is a lack of training, but I do see a lack of responsibility and unwillingness to work with grieved parties.

UPDATE

The operating partner of the overarching restaurant group, Mama's Restaurant Group, got back to me. He insinuated that I am lying about their being a fire, and that the service I received went "above and beyond" to deliver a "perfect" catering experience. After, I reached out to every vendor that was around and helped with the fire and catering debacle. This includes the DJ, event coordinator, photographer, and rental company. They have all offered to corroborate my story, but also added a few corrections: The employees on their return did not, in fact, bring additional food. They only brought the additional trays that were supposed to be used to prevent burning, which were not brought the first time (refuting the partner’s claim of a “perfect setup.”) The food that they used to replace all the burning food was part of my original order, which was simply set aside due to a lack of table space. They admitted that they had not been trained in catering, and did not know how to set up the food or what their responsibilities were. It has become very clear to me that this operating partner is exceedingly dishonest and unreasonable. He has now blatantly lied about providing additional food and his employees’ training. I could not recommend Naf...

I like this place a lot, but my wife and I went tonight. It was 7:00 pm on a Saturday. They were out of rice, falafel, chicken, and steak. The lady asked us what we wanted. My wife said, "rice bowl with chicken please." The lady said, "we are out of rice and chicken will be a minute." My wife said "I guess I can have couscous."

She then asked me what I wanted. I rhetorically said, "Well what do you actually have?" She started reading off the menu. I looked over the counter and saw that they had three falafel left, so I ordered a falafel bowl. They added one falafel to my bowl at a time as my bowl went down the prep line until I got to the amount that it's supposed to be at.

Then we finally got our food and sat down. The pitas were cold, and a line about 25+ formed.

Well over half of the tables were dirty. They had the staff. It just seemed like no one was coordinating food prep and breaks for the dinner rush.

This was an absolutely bizarre experience. Like I said, I really like this place, but something went horribly...

Decided to doordash something middle eastern and I will say although the presentation looks delicious. I was kind of taken back by the saltiness of the chicken shawarma and the salted over garlic baba ganoush. I did a "build your own plate" and I opted for 3 dressings. The nafziki (which had a good flavor profile but the consistency was to thin for my liking, I prefer a thicker based nafziki), the tahini which was unpalatable and the garlic sauce which was top notch and did not disappoint considering the unfortunate other sauces. I would say the rice/couscous were on point, along with the veggies. The falafel was perfectly seasoned and perfectly fried with a soft moist inside and nice fried crispness outside! Would I try again? It's a 50/50, maybe. But I wouldn't be opposed to just ordering the falafel with...