Saba Foods Middle Eastern Yemeni Restaurant

I grew up in the Middle East eating such delicacies which is why when I heard that there’s a restaurant that caters to middle eastern cuisine, I was excited to try it.

I ordered in due to my hectic work schedule and to my disappointment, the taste wasn’t nearly as good as I remember it. I got the roast chicken leg Mandi for two and a Kunafa. Now, don’t get me wrong, the chicken was tender and fell right off the bone. However, neither the chicken or the rice was flavourful.

Before ordering, I called the restaurant to double check if we get all the sides in the picture that was advertised on uber eats and the lady who attended to my call confirmed that the order will be true to the picture. She said that I don’t need to add on to my order. However, you can see in the image attached that I just got a small portion of tomato based spicy sauce to go with a lot of rice and chicken - I could barely even finish my meal as it was drying and not flavourful. I did not appreciate the misinformation.

Final thoughts: The Kunafa was nice and the only saving grace for me. If you’re someone that grew up in the Middle East like me and have certain expectations, it won’t be on par with it. But sure, it is worth a try for someone that is exploring a new cuisine altogether. Will I order from here again? Maybe not.

Atmosphere: 4

Food: 2

Service: 3

Bad food, the rice was lumpy and stale, as was the meat and the kunafa. The worst experience ever. The kunafa had a sour taste because it was old, and the rice was also tasteless. You can’t call it mandi or kunafa. Sorry for this bad rating, but I am really upset after my experience, and I had to throw away the food in the end and lose it.

Food: 1

Service: 1

Disappointed with Service and Timing

I visited Saba yesterday at 7:30 PM with my friends. The restaurant was extremely busy, which I understand, but the service was very disappointing. We ordered the Platter for 3 Combo and a Falafel Platter. However, the food arrived in such a staggered manner that we couldn’t enjoy our meal properly.

First, we received the salad (which was supposed to come with the platter) after a long wait. Then, after some more time, we got the red sauce. By the time the actual platter arrived—at least 20 minutes later—we had already finished the salad and sauce. The gaps between each item were so long that we couldn’t eat everything together as intended and had to take most of it home.

This was my second visit, but unfortunately, it was quite disappointing. I had to call the server multiple times just to get our food and the sweet dish. Overall, I left feeling frustrated rather than satisfied. I hope they improve their service and timing in the future.

Atmosphere: 2

Food: 2

Recommended dishes: Chicken Haneeth, Lamb Chops, Cheese Kunafa Nabilseeh

Ordered via Ubereats, and got an impression of cheap fastfood, instead of fancy Vancouver restaurant. From the whole $150 order, only lamb chops were decent quality and taste, the rest is absolute disappointment- dull unfresh cut cucumbers and tomatos instead of salad, dry lamb haneeth, instead of promised tender juicy one, and kunafa- just the flat rubbery soggy pancake ( I have another vision of true kunafa, sorry).

Food: 2

I was never so disappointed with the quality of meal delivered. The side salad was prepared from spoiled vegetables which even looked terrible. The lamb was super dry, and not even possible to swallow without water. The rice was absolutely tastless. But mostly I was surprised with kunafa. We have ordered it as a desert, but it was absolutely disgusting. Probably the cook who prepared it had no idea about what kunafa is actually is. The kunafa I saw looked like a pancake and on the taste had absolutely nothing in common compared to traditional kunafa. The food is highly overpriced, for this amount I would have a much better food quality (and also quantity!) in other restaurant. And somebody calls this Saba a fancy restaurant?! Really?! I have never experienced such a frustration!

Food: 1

This place is godly awful and almost had me throwing up. We ordered from this place on uber eats, and it ended up costing us 150 for 3 people. The #2 best rated dish in their menu is a bowl full of rice with a small peice of meat which was dry. The vegetables that they claimed to be a salad were spoiled and clearly not fresh like they looked on the picture. And finally, the kunafa, that i expected to have the thin hair texture that kunafa is known for, ended up being a soggy pancake with salty cheese underneath. Overall my experience ordering this place was awful and this almost had me throwing up, and everyone in my family who ate this had a stomach ache after. 150$ for this is the worst deal imaginable and there is hundreds of places better than this for a fraction of the price. This place is awful and I will never recommend this to anyone. For a “fancy” restaurant, this is the worst experience I have ever had, and I could name over 20 fast food places that are way better than this. 150 is absolutely outrages because me and my family always get away for under 80 dollars worth of food which is way better than this. DO NOT ORDER FROM HERE, by far the worst experience i’ve ever had.

Atmosphere: 1

Food: 1

Service: 1

Kunafa without syrup what a joke

Food: 2

Service: 1

Food was good, meat was incredibly tender and melted off the bone. Platter for 2.

I’m 99.99% sure that the “Yemeni Hot Sauce” is just the pico de gallo from Costco. If it’s not it tastes EXACTLY the same. It’s good stuff though.

Atmosphere: 4

Food: 4

Service: 4

The service was not up to expectation. The service at the old location was excellent, while here no experience at all.

Atmosphere: 1

Food: 1

Service: 1

I used to love this place at the old location, used to be a very traditional Yemeni restaurant. While the new place is extremely nicer, and the rebranding is very nice and the ambience is classy and upscale, the servers are inexperienced in the food served, and the restaurant went from being a traditional Yemeni restaurant with lots of soul I felt like the place lost their soul a bit to satisfy the general public. The food is still 100/100 tho and is amazing. I just felt like I was sitting at a cactus club

Atmosphere: 3

Food: 5

Service: 3

Very fancy and spacious restaurant that has a good number of vegetarian and vegan options (totally 3 out of the 8 main courses). The falafel platter has a generous portion size and is very filling for a reasonable price. Taste-wise it's decent but their homemade cheesy kunafa was easily the show stopper! Great vibe, recommended for group outings.

Atmosphere: 5

Food: 4

Service: 4

Recommended dishes: Falafel Platter

Slow/non-existent service from start to finish. We waited for a while until someone came to greet us.
Wobbly chair when I sat down so I had to asked for another chair.
Almost impossible to get service, no one gave us water or take our order after we've sat down for 15 minutes, we had to wave down someone to take our order.
Finally, the appetizers came but funny thing was we didn't even have our serving plates so we had to ask for some.
They didn't take away the dirty dishes (our appetizers) when they put down the main course platter, so our table was just cluttered with plates and dishes.
The dessert came but we needed to wave them again for the 3rd time because I ordered a hot milk tea that was supposed to come with the dessert...and yet I only got my milk tea after we already finished half of the dessert.
Even getting the bill was a difficult, yup we had to wave them again to give us the bill.
Went to the washroom before I left the restaurant but there's no toilet paper inside the stall...so I couldn't go.
Should hire an extra server (especially for weekends), or provide better training to the staffs so they can be more efficient (clear responsibilities and dedicated positions), or come up with a better process in order to reduce the wait time for the customers.

Atmosphere: 2

Food: 3

Service: 1

Food is delicious and serving sizes are adequate. Limelight stolen by the lamb choices they offer. The beef stir fry could be tweaked with some seasoning and then maybe I would give them a five star.

Atmosphere: 5

Food: 4

Service: 5

Recommended dishes: Lamb Mandi, Grilled Chicken

I ordered on Uber eats, and added a note to make sure that the chicken is well cooked. But the chicken had raw smell and the quantity of rice was so less. There was no salad while the description says salad included and the tomato sauce was so little. I had to bake the chicken a little more but still smelled raw. Overall, the taste was below average. I cook mandi 100 times better than this. Just because I was sick and wanted to eat something good, so had to order food online. I thought lets try out a new place.
But I regret!

Food: 1

Service: 1

We had a reservation and entered at 6pm, but waited for another 15min to be seated.
The appetizer chicken wings we ordered didn't come even until we finished all the other foods so we had to cancel it.
A waitress gave us a stew that we didn't order first, then took it away without saying anything.

Food and decorations are good.

Atmosphere: 5

Food: 4

Service: 2