La Brava Sheesha lounge

I’m not an active smoker of many things, but on occasion I’ll take a dabble with good ol’ sheesha. When I think of a sheesha lounge, even if sheesha is the primary reason I’m going, my brain still comes up with uncomfortable images of a hazy, stinky, hard to breathe environment where you have to wash your clothes when you get home and smell the smoke coming out of your hair when you hit shower the next morning (So, Calgary 10 years ago…) Much to my delight, La Brava is nothing like this. I walked into this place expecting bad smokey smells and I couldn’t find them at all. I looked around the room for some sort of industrial air cleaning fan type thing but didn’t really see anything obvious. I’m not sure if an area crowded with sheesha smokers just doesn’t smell, or if they’ve hidden their air purification system nicely within their velvet walls.
It’s a cool place to check out as an alternative to a coffee shop if you’re looking for some one on one alcohol free hang out time. A bowl of shisha is abotu $ 17 a pop but it lasts for a long time. Given the cost to buy drinks at a bar all night, I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised with how much money you didn’t spend by choosing to hang out at La Brava instead. That said, alcohol or not, all the drinks are over $ 4.
The service is really inattentive. I wandered over to the kitchen many times to get someone over. They told me someone would be right over, I said ok, sat down, waited for 15 more minutes and then walked back to the kitchen. You don’t need to much service in a place like this, but that’s how it’s set up. If they had a coffee shop style counter I’d be happy to walk up to it to order a new drink or some extra food etc.

Average shisha bar with spotty service.
La Brava is an alright place to hang out for some shisha and an overpriced drink. You better not be in a hurry though or be willing to speak up to get service. I don’t honestly know why I come back here, I guess because there aren’t a whole lot of places to go in Calgary and it’s pretty close to downtown. I’ve never had the food and probably would never ordinary.
It’s alright if you don’t have anywhere else to go.

If you couldn’t get in to crowded Café Mediterranean, you probably wound up at one of its sister locations; this one is located two buildings down. Similar atmospheres, similar food and drink menus, prices are about the same. Although, for the summer, La Brava offers sheesha (shisha? It’s not an English word, so spelling varies) for $ 9.95, but expect to spend a minimum of around $ 15, since you can’t sit down without ordering a drink (water doesn’t count), and drinks start at $ 4.50.
It’s not bad, even though the waitress struck an attitude when we wanted to sit in one of the corner seats, rather than the crowded middle section she was trying to jam us in to. She dropped it when we told her we were going to be joined by a couple. Service here is slow, despite getting served by 3 different people; don’t expect to get refills (paid or otherwise), and fully expect to ask for your glass of water 2x.
Sheesha flavors vary, I usually opt for the mango or berry flavors, but they were out of pomegranate for the night and the coconut sounded good. I wasn’t disappointed. There’s no alcohol here, but you can get either tea, juice or a virgin cocktail. What I do appreciate about the service is that they don’t rush you out the door, so you can sit and relax with friends and talk in to the wee hours without someone side-​eyeing you for copping your squat and only ordering one drink.
Hey, I would’ve ordered another if I had been asked by the server. :)

Not that great of a place. Nice music. Food is not delicious and way too over priced. Not very satisfied.

Saturday night and celebrating a birthday, I suggested we go for sheesha before hitting up another place for drinks. We initially went over to Café Med (about 2 doors down), but being 10PM on a Saturday it was extremely busy. The wait was long, so we decided to check out Brava right around the corner. Luckily, there were quite a few open tables, so we seated ourselves because we weren’t really acknowledged by anyone when we walked in. We had a server place our hookah on the table but he failed to say hello or make us feel welcome at all. The décor was interesting… tables had plush pillows to rest against, which was nice, and beautiful chandeliers and lighting fixtures. It did seem a bit «busy» though, and confused on it’s identity. There was a TV playing sports (?) but odd music and the ambiance of a restaurant. I also felt their menu was really random.
We ordered a few nonalcoholic drinks as they don’t serve alcohol here, I definitely wished I snuck in a little bottle for myself haha. The drinks were ridiculously expensive, but I suppose that’s where they make their money. We also had white grape sheesha, which was good (but not spectacular) and an order of the spinach and artichoke dip. When they brought out our food, I thought they had given us the wrong thing at first. If you order spinach dip, you expect that to be the focus of the dish. Instead we were given a plate of nacho chips, 6 slices of pita bread, and 3 small sides of salsa, sour cream, and spinach dip? There was literally hardly ANY spinach dip. I was a little bit annoyed, especially after they took a really long time to bring out a coffee we had ordered afterwards. My boyfriend wanted to try the baklava, even though I told him not to, and was really disappointed. I didn’t try it, but everyone said it was frozen in the middle and tasted freezer burnt.
I probably would return here solely for the sheesha, but if I’m looking to have a bite to eat as well, I will wait for a table at Café Med. Their pizza is delicious, and the service there seems to be better than Brava.

Underdog Challenge ²⁵⁄₃₀
Not much love for La Brava and I don’t know why. If you had to rate it amongst the 2 other sheesha joints within the same area, it’s probably a close tie for last place if it wasn’t for another place’s infamously bad service. The crowd can vary, sometimes its Café Med’s rejects trickling in, the post-​bar hoppers looking for a place to sober up, or just the random city wanderer looking for a quiet but occupied space.
La Brava has a Mediterranean menu, so you can enjoy hummus and dips, and have Turkish coffee and Egyptian tea. Their food isn’t terrible but often I’ve skipped it and never found it interesting to rave about, unlike Café Med’s garlic cheese pizza. They have a decent sheesha list but unlike Café Med they don’t have any mixed flavours and just have the basic, i.e. mango, berry, etc.
The music here is also random, sometimes they’ll play some eastern music, sometimes surprise you with jazz, or sometimes blast gangsta rap over your conversations. No complaints, as long as the people who worked here get to have a little freedom and fun themselves.
I hope La Brava stays around for a while and remains slightly unnoticed. Despite its awkward service and décor, there’s an overlooked charm to this place. Maybe it’s just me because the many times I’ve visited here the moment I step in time goes into a coma and leaving seems like the most unnatural thing to do. The first time I discovered this place it was after a night of heavy drinking with co-​workers who wanted to blow their lay-​off cheques as our farewells were procrastinated. We all never got together again after that.
And the last time I was here… well, it was (and probably will be) the most enjoyable night I’ve had in years: D

Good music (sometimes). Weak service. Poor drinks — super overpriced !! Highly lack quality and a good food menu. Just seems like they could have had a lot of potential. You visit for the atmosphere and the sheesha.
The décor is quite tacky — wedding chairs and tile table tops — but meh, at the end of the day I still enjoy this place.
²⁄₃₀

I’ve only been to La Brava once, and it definitely wasn’t for dinner! It was on a busy Friday night and it was thoroughly ok. La Brava is located just down the street from a similar sheesha bar, and perhaps I am showing my bias here. I’ve heard tales that it doubles as an Italian restaurant in the day, but I can’t really speak to that. On the evening in question, the food in question was thoroughly middle eastern and only ok. The sheesha was alright, but I was disappointed in the flavors — I believe one was watermelon and it was just meh.
They’re going for the shiny-​middle-​eastern-​other-​world atmosphere with tapestries and carpets and low lighting, but it didn’t quite mesh with the standard tables and chairs. The lighting was almost too low — it was difficult to see and talk with our group of nine. We had to gesture wildly to get water and any kind of service. Overall, our experience was so-​so.