Best Pick: Harambe

Harambe @ 2149 Commercial Drive

I discovered Ethiopian cuisine many years ago when I lived in Houston. It was a brief encounter but left a tantalizing memory. As a child, I was a fastidious and prim and loathed getting his hands dirty playing, and I must say that hasn't changed much over the years. It went against something deep inside me to eat using my hands as utensils, but it was a pleasantly dislocating experience. More importantly, the food was fantastic - like no other type of food I've tasted, but highly refined and exploding with new flavors. You had a large variety of small servings of different dishes that you pick and choose from with each bite. The bread itself was delicious and strange and wonderful. Everything was new and mystifying and exotic.

I was happy upon moving to Vancouver to discover the town is blessed with quite a few Ethiopian restaurants. After trying out most of them, I've come to the conclusion that I like Harambe the best. Nyala on Main street is not authentic. The one time I ate at Axum on Hastings I got sick. Addis Cafe is decent but not quite as good as Harambe. Fassil on Broadway I've never tried because every time I drive by there they're closed.

I've been to Harambe innumerable times over the years, and every single time I get the same thing: The Chef's Choice Platter. I never tire of it. If you're going to try Ethiopian cuisine for the first time, my recommendation is to go to Harambe and try the Chef's Choice Platter. I feel it does a great job of conveying what is so amazing and unique about Ethiopian cooking.

The interior of Harambe is quite pleasant, too. The walls are festooned with a smattering Ethiopian cultural artifacts of different kinds as well as ethnically tinged art in different styles by different Ethiopian artists. Really very classy as well as being warm and inviting and relaxing.

This mural painted on the bar is also really cool:

At Harambe you have the option of sitting at a western-style table or sitting at a table with traditional Ethiopian seats, which are kind of like stools, and a small table closer to the ground. I always sit at the western-style tables, but it would be fun for a group looking to experience the whole Authentic Ethiopian Cuisine Package to sit at the traditional table.

They even have special Ethiopian chai tea at Harambe, which I get every time, as it goes very well with the food.

But perhaps the coolest thing about Harambe is that they make their own honey wine or mead, called "Tej". I always get a glass of this stuff when I go there. It's absolutely marvelous. Very sweet and mellow and easy to drink, I suspect it not to have a particularly high alcohol content. The fermented flavor is somewhat reminiscent of the Kombucha Wonder Drink. Rather than tasting strongly alcoholic like wine, it's more like the taste of juice that's gone a little off.

You have the choice of ordering any number of dishes that come as stand-alones, but I never do this because I would feel it wasn't worth the money. The dishes are somewhat expensive. Even the Chef's Choice Platter is fairly expensive at $12.99 for one and $24.99 for two. But at least when I order the Chef's Choice Platter I always feel like I got my money's worth due to the big variety of items. It makes for a very satisfying meal, whereas eating a big serving of the same dish would get boring.

This is what the chef's platter looks like:

(click for larger view)

It looks small, but I can assure you this is a big serving. The above is a serving for two people. Kweepo and I were just barely able to polish it all off. When you order the Chef's Choice Platter you also get a few extra rolls of injera on the side. They're very generous with the injera. I've never run out. I always have some injera left over afterwards.

Ethiopian cooking is vaguely reminiscent of Indian food in the sense that you have a variety of sauce-based dishes - i.e. meat or lentis or beans in some kind of curry sauce - that you can eat in combination with a naan and rice. In Ethiopian cuisine, they use a special type of bread called "injera", which serves as the base accompaniment as well as the utensil. The injera is like a big, thick pancake. You rip off a piece with your hand and use it scoop up a bit of one of the dishes by pinching into the mound of your target dish using the piece of injera.

Though I've never gotten used to the whole eating with your hands thing, I find it to be quite fun to eat the Chef's Choice Platter, especially as a communal activity. I know the idea of eating with your hands would put a lot of people off, but it's a real shame because the food is so good. I have this idea that if Harambe opened up a downtown location where they could make some concessions in terms of the authenticity of the experience by offering forks and knives by default and perhaps altering the presentation of dishes slightly accordingly, without altering any of the recipes, this type of cooking could become a smash hit with the lunch crowd. It's hearty, tasty, healthy and different, without being too weird or exotic. I feel bad whenever I go to Harambe for lunch and it's empty. Although the last time we went it was thankfully pretty busy.

The Chef's Choice Platter comes with a whole bunch of different items:

3 MEAT ITEMS:

- Yebeg wot (lamb)

- Doro wot (chicken thigh)

- Alitcha wot (beef)

5 VEGGIE ITEMS:

- Shero wot (ground chickpeas)

- Misir wat (red split lentils)

- Tekil gomen (steamed cabbage)

- Gomen (boiled spinach)

- Yatekilt alitcha (sauteed carrot, string beans, potato and onions)

There's also some salad in the middle, though it seems kind of out of place. It seems to be the only non-authentic element here. But I have to admit that I do appreciate having some roughage present to cleanse the palate, and at least it's good quality salad and not lettuce or something. And it does go pretty well with the rest of the dish, surprisingly.

Here's a close-up of some of the items.

I don't even know where to begin describing the taste. All I know is that every one of these is good. The chicken is my favorite, with the red lentils a close second. The injera itself is wonderful - fluffy and tender and obviously freshly made.

They also have some other items on the menu that aren't included here, notably some fish dishes, which I may have to try the next time I go.