Balkan Restaurant

The Balkan Restaurant

Style: Balkan (duh)

Website: Balkan Restaurant Website

My Rating: 3.5/5

Likes: Really tasty breads; cool desserts; neat map painting on the wall with a fat Italy; friendly service

Dislikes: Cutting thick meat with a butter knife... here in 'Merica, we use knives with these things called serrated edges; It could also be a little tricky to find

The Fleenor-Thomas Ethnic Food Club strikes again when we went to a Balkan Restaurant called.... wait for it... Balkan Restaurant. We received the idea from a LivingSocial deal and decided to try something completely new. 

Finding the location was interesting. My husband and I were lucky because our friends arrived there first and told us to look across from the CVS. It is tucked within a strip mall on busy Patterson Ave. However, once we parked in front of the Papa Johns next door (shh... don't tell my mother we parked there because she thinks people will hit our car) we were greeted by friendly faces and ethnic people actually eating there. That is always an excellent sign.

They had a painting on the wall of the Balkan area, including Italy and Greece. The menu had an interesting representation of ethnic foods. Many meals were loaded with Kalamata Olives which I associate with Mediterranean. However, we also ordered things like cabbage rolls and schnitzel, which I don't associate with Greece or Italy. 

We first ordered an appetizer to start with. We had a burek, filled with cheese. The burek was a puff pastry, similar to a popover. It was just a touch greasy to make it taste decadent, without being overkill. 

Brent ordered the stuffed cabbage rolls called Swarma. He said that they were good. I am taking his word for it. Somehow, the love of cabbage skipped in my Irish genes. I suppose that the Italian took over.

Both Brad and Whitney ordered the Hungarian Goulash. It was beef served with mashed potatoes. I personally thing it would have been better if you could more easily mix the two. I would like to eat a bite of meat with the potatoes saturated with the paprika gravy.  

I ordered the Balkan Gourmet Schnitzel. This was my favorite of all of the dishes ordered. Others at the table agreed with me. The meat was a ground beef and lamb mixture and placed on top grilled lepinja bread (the slightly greased puff pastry from the grill). On top of it was some gouda cheese and smoked meat. The juices from the meat ran into the bread which made it extremely tasty. The only thing that I do wish, was that they gave me a sharper knife to cut it with. The bottom of the grilled bread was very hard to cut with a blunt butter knife. I spent more time sawing than eating. The meal was also served with some salty shoestring potato fries and a lettuce side salad. I did not care so much for the dressing on the salad. It tasted like a mixture of mayonnaise and Italian dressing. 

We also had dessert, which did not last long enough for me to take pictures of. The first was a rolled baklava that was cut into pieces. The second was a square of baked apples in filo dough. This was a treat, because it tasted like baklava with apples and honey. 

Overall, it was a very tasty meal shared with excellent company. The service was nice and the food was affordable. Although it was a fun and satisfying experience, I am not sure that I would drive the hour it took to get there again in the near future.