Almaza

This review is mainly for the extremely poor customer service. The waitress and waiter were extremely inattentive and rude. The hookah was also terrible because it was too smokey. Food was mediocre. We will NOT be returning!

Amazing! I love the Lamb Shank. So delicious, so tender it falls off the bone. My son loves everything Beef and Hummus. It always taste great! Weather you eat at the restaurant or order to go. The staff is so friendly. Thank you Almaza!

As a Middle Eastern, this is the best restaurant in LA area I have tried. I usually don’t post reviews for restaurants, but this place deserves it.

My husband and I had the hummus with beef shawarma, lamb shank, chicken shawarma, and Turkish coffee for lunch the other day. The lamb was falling off the bone. Yum! All the food was delicious and authentic. Large portions as well. My husband is Israeli and very hard to please when it comes to mediterranean food. With all the food being exceptional, this will be our new go-​to for hummus and shawarma. We were very happy.

You must try the seafood combination plate. This shit is to die for!!! I ordered off of Eat 24 and they did forget my hummus. However, when I called them and let them know, they were extremely polite and apologetic & offered to bring it to me or add it to a future order. Of course I had to have it right away because that hummus in a pita bread with that seafood and rice is too damn good.
YES I will be ordering from them again.
Btw: this is my 2^nd time ordering from them.

Food is great, hookahs are spot on as well. Lots of seating in and outdoors. Really enjoy this spot. The service is scarce or very slow maybe due to the extra attention typical wait staff have to give to the hookahs. Can’t go wrong with the chicken Schwarma, fish kabob, hummus, Greek salad etc etc. I’ll go everytime because I’m not in a rush. If you’re in a rush here to grab a meal this may not be the spot for you.

The food here is great. The chicken kabob was the most tender and flavorful chicken I have had since Zuni café.
The service was a little lacking. Our waitress clearly was not interested in serving our table, but she was able to put on a game face serve our party of two.
I would definitely go back.

This is place is amazing the food is incrdi and the service is great. Definitely recommended it.

Food was amazing and service was even better. I called in just before the kitchen closed and they still managed to squeeze my order in! Top notch service in my eyes. I ordered the Chicken kofta kabob combo with fries and hummus. The hummus was home made and delicious! Pita was great, and plenty of it. The chicken kofta were really well seasoned and had amazing flavor! Even the fries were on point with a little seasoning on them and extra crunchy. Definitely will be back here again and again!

We came here at night. Their cocktails weren’t so great. The food was over the top. We ordered the chicken shawerma and beef kofta. My personal favourite was the lamb chops and humus. Service was a little slow, the hookah seating outside was pretty crowded, maybe that’s why. Among the desserts, my favourite was the Baklaveh (rice pudding) followed by the Knafeh (a little on the sweeter side). Overall it’s a great place to have Mediterranean food late in the night (they close secret midnight).

I thought I have tried some good Mediterranean food but after I ate here the foods is awesome I think anything you try will be good We sampled a little bit of everything and no disappointment.

This is just a review of the food, not the hookah. I was craving some Mediterranean food, and Almaza came up on my Unilocal search.
The food looked pretty good, so my friends and I decided to try it out. When we arrived, the outside hookah patio was packed, so I assume Almaza has really good hookah.
We ordered the chicken shawarma and beef kabob. Your order comes with a choice of two sides. The options are a side salad, rice, hummus, or French fries. We ordered some rice, 2 orders of hummus, and French fries. It also came with an order of pita and garlic spread, which I thought was a nice touch.
Overall, the food was okay. The beef kabob was chewy and the chicken shawarma could have used more seasoning, although it was moist. The garlic spread was okay. It didn’t really have that strong garlic flavor I like. I think Zankou Chicken has a better garlic spread.
Also, the service was horrible. It took at least 30 minutes for them to give us our food, and they never checked with us to see if our food was okay, or even to refill our waters. In addition, when we asked for our check, it took them 15 minutes for them to give it to us. I know they were busy with their hookah customers, but they need to pay attention to their food customers too, especially when their Mediterranean food is sort of expensive (15 – 17 $) despite being average.

Great atmosphere, great deserts and especially great hookah. Can’t go wrong. Didn’t get food but the customer service was very good in comparison to most hookah places.

This is a review of the food only, since I had it delivered. Everything I had was straight up delicious. The chicken shawarma, the vegetarian platter (especially the dolmas), and the desserts were all incredible. If you like food that’s fresh, tart, and garlicky, this place is for you! I’m not 100% sure which dessert I had — I ordered two, and they were out of one but didn’t specify which, and many of the ingredients are similar. (They substituted baklava for the other one. Not a huge baklava fan, but this one was pretty tasty.) I’m pretty sure it was the knafeh, but whatever it was, it was mind-​blowing. This was my first time eating Almaza’s food, but I’ll definitely be ordering from them again!
Side note: My only complaint is the $ 3 delivery fee PLUS a $ 30 minimum order. That’s not really feasible for someone who lives alone and isn’t rich. So I won’t be ordering from them as often as I might otherwise…

Lovely place right by a busy street. You can sit outside in the patio area, watch all of the heavy traffic that you aren’t in while you enjoy perhaps a hookah or some of their amazing food!
Every time I come here I always get the chicken kofta kabob. It’s my favorite, seasoned perfectly and juicy. You get an option of two sides, I believe they are hummus, salad, and fries. I usually go with the salad and hummus but the fries are great too.
One thing tho, if you order something and made a mistake, for instance kabob instead of kofta kabob, they will not exchange it. If you say «this is not what I ordered,» they will say «yes this is what you ordered,» and they will not exchange it. Just make sure you are certain you order what you said. They aren’t flexible with taking orders back, or at least one server wasn’t. However, because the food is so good here, I will continue to come back.
The garlic aeoli that comes with the meal is my favorite. I’m not certain what’s the exact name of it, but I will stick with garlic aeoli for now.

I love this place so much! We had them delivered through grub hub. We had the kebbeh balls and the lamb kabob plate (we had the same thing). We chose rice and hummus as the entrees you get two sides. They fill the plate with rice and put the meat on top so it’s a large portion and the meat is so juicy and flavorful. The hummus (I love their hummus) was on the side and it was a good portion size as well. This was the first time we have had the kebbeh balls and I would highly recommend them! They’re so good. I love how many options there are in the appetizer section!
The food was scheduled to arrive in a little over an hour and it showed up in about 40 – 45 min and everything was still hot and fresh!
I would highly recommend this place.

I was looking for a good, fresh spot to satiate my Mediterranean food craving.
Upon a simple Unilocal search in the Culver City/​Westside area, I stumbled upon Almaza.
I can’t comment on the restaurant itself or ambiance as I ended up ordering delivery.
However, the food– especially for delivery– was delicious.
I got the chicken kabob with rice and fries and a side salad– the chicken was cooked and seasoned perfectly, and the rest of the sides (especially their fluffy rice!) was delicious.
Definitely check this spot out.

Soooo. Here it goes. I really thought this place was decent. Wasn’t the best Mediterranean but it was good enough and they deliver. I used to order the chicken shawarma, falafel, mahi mahi, and sometimes the dolma (grape leaves). (No I wasn’t just ordering for me). I would always ask for the pita to be cut in halves and not quarters. Almaza was doing just fine.
On our last order, the food took awhile, pita came in quarters (not the end of the world, I know), the mahi tasted funny, and there was a hair in our food. Enough said, moving on. Sorry Almaza.
Tried them one more time… forgot the hummus side and then insisted they provided it when asked. Nah, I’m cool off them. They are consistently inconsistent. You’re a 2, Almaza in every sense of the rating.

Pretty let down by the delivery. Quality simply wasn’t there — the chicken shawarma was little dark abstract pieces of flavorless chicken and the 3 item kabab sampler wasn’t much better. The beef was super chewy, chicken kabab was ‘fine’ and the beef Kafka wasn’t very flavorful. Fries were super soggy, but that does happen with delivery. Wasn’t cheap, at 13 – 17 for the entrees plus tax and tip etc.
Won’t be ordering again, maybe dine-​in is better and I’ll update a review.

Only ate the baklava and tried the shisha. Will have to come back for food. but nice atmosphere, can have some wine, unusual for shisha places. Baklava was very good, almost too good to be true for the place.
Shisha was just OK. finishes soon and we asked for al fakher but they gave us some other kind of tobacco — didn’t tell us until we tasted it and still charged us for it. Not cool, but easily taken off the bill.