Magical Little Arabia is hidden behind the Magic Kingdom (aka Disneyland)

A Tour of Little Arabia by Middle Eastern food experts Faye and Yakir Levy.

Who knew that Anaheim, known for Disneyland and the Angels baseball team also sported some of the best Middle Eastern food west of the Mississippi?  A tour of Little Arabia led by dear friends and Middle Eastern food experts, Faye and Yakir Levy  and hosted by Melissa’s Produce proved to be a food lover’s paradise.

When travelling to Anaheim, you need to remember the streets Brookhurst and Katella.  At this intersection, you will find the best stocked grocery store of Middle Eastern ingredients I’ve seen, Fresh Choice Marketplace located at 9922 Katella Ave, Anaheim, CA 92804 in the Little Arabia District. 

The first stop as you enter Fresh Choice is the bread bakery, where you can pick up WARM pita breads just out of the oven. Also check out the Jerusalem bagels and taboun (from the tandoori) and Persian sangak bread.

We tasted the Za’atar flatbread fresh out of the oven at Fresh Choice.  My first bite of the day was beyond heavenly!!

Then check out all the choices for feta cheese and yogurt, fresh grape leaves and vegetables popping out at you, meats without plastic packaging.

On the opposite side of the store, are the sweets…acres of baklava like you’ve never seen before.  In addition, there is a nut bar where you can buy in bulk and find high quality green pistachios used in Middle Eastern sweets.

Forn Al Hara Serves the Best Flatbreads!!

Further north on Brookhurst, you will find affable chef-owner Muhammad Alam serving an enormous variety of Middle Eastern flatbreads and I think we tasted every one of them!  Although we were planning to go across the parking lot to eat lunch at the Olive Tree Restaurant, we couldn’t stop eating these delicious savory treats.

The flatbreads are known as Manaeesh. The most well known is the one with za’atar like the one above we ate at Fresh Choice.  Za’atar is a spice blend with thyme, oregano, sesame seeds and often sumac.  (See how to make za’atar and my crazy good Artichoke, Olive and Potato Salad with Za’atar by clicking here.) My favorite manaeesh was the one in the top left corner, Safiha balbakie – a flatbread with ground beef and pomegranate molasses but they were all incredibly yummy.  We also tasted Lahem bel ajeen (lahmacun in Turkish, pronounced lahmajun), with a light topping of ground beef and tomato. Another favorite was the mozzarella-like Akawi cheese Manaeesh with and without spinach (top right).  The simple Za’atar flatbread topped with a salad of diced tomato, cucumber, fresh mint and sliced black olives (bottom left) was light and fresh tasting.  The spinach fatayer (bottom right) is a triangular pastry that looks like a hamantaschen but is filled with spinach seasoned with sumac.

Chef Alam made a beautiful presentation of the dessert known as Knafeh Nablusi.  This tempting treat has a gooey cheese filling topped with crunchy noodle-like kadaifi dough, syrup and pistachios.

Go visit Chef Muhammad Alam at Forn Al Hara for a quick and delicious meal at 512 S Brookhurst St #5, Anaheim, CA 92804

The Olive Tree Restaurant is Perfect for a Family Meal!

Across the parking lot you will find the Olive Tree restaurant where chef-owners Yusuf Abdo and his son Alan Abdo served us a delicious lunch of classic Middle Eastern dishes.

We’re talking fresh made hummus and eggplant dip, baba ghanoush, stuffed grape leaves and tabbouleh. We were also treated to Koshari, an Egyptian dish starring lentils, pasta and rice with fried onions and a spicy tomato sauce. The Koubeh Lebeniyeh are football-shaped, spicy meat-stuffed bulgur dumplings that are fried, then served in a yogurt sauce.

My absolute favorite dish, which is their most popular, was the braised lamb shanks (ouzi) with a secret 15-spice rice, ground beef, carrots, peas and toasted almonds.  They serve this dish with different grains each day.

Visit the Olive Tree Restaurant at 518 S Brookhurst St #1, Anaheim, CA 92804.  I missed the Ramadan Buffet this year, which ended this week, but it’s legendary feast, which is served every evening of Ramadan at sundown, is on my calendar for next year.

Victory Sweets Serves Fresh-Made Middle Eastern Desserts!

Our last stop on the Little Arabia Tour was at Victory Sweets where we tasted Middle Eastern pastries and learned about them from chef-owner Mohammad Awad.  You feel like a kid in a candy store when you walk in to Victory Sweets with the intoxicating display of baklava and Middle Eastern pastries baked on the premises.

Chef Awad showed us his workshop where he makes fresh filo dough and crafts these beautiful specimens.  He creates strands of kadaif dough that look like a horse’s tail from a fascinating machine that spins the strands in to edible pastry. He fills the kadaif dough with a pistachio mixture and then twists them to form the beautiful treat called Burma.

Burma is a rolled pastry made of the kadaif dough baked with butter and filled with the greenest pistachios that Chef Awad pays handsomely for.

We were gifted an assortment of sweets including the Burma and assorted Baklava that we took home and indulged over the next few days. Karabisch is a cake with pistachio filling, meringue-type frosting and a garnish of chopped pistachios and syrup. Basbousa is a semolina cake lightly moistened with syrup and topped with pistachios.

Visit Victory Sweets at 9057 W Cerritos Ave, Anaheim, CA 92804

I was blown away by the magic of Little Arabia!  It was an unexpected culinary treat in the middle of Anaheim, known for touristic chain restaurants and hotels surrounding “the magic kingdom”.  Thanks to Robert Schueller from Melissa’s Produce who hosted us and Faye and Yakir Levy I have a new destination I will be visiting with regularity. The next time you are heading to Anaheim, I encourage you to veer off the 5 freeway onto Brookhurst for an unexpected treat.  Or plan an afternoon of shopping and exploring the magical Little Arabia District.