Canary Chicken House

They have ok persian food. Stays open late into the night. I got sick after eating chicken there once. I have not been back since. I think this place shut down anyway.

I had the koobideh and their yogurt drink. The koobideh was ok. I’ve definitely had better elsewhere in LA. The yogurt drink tasted terrible and looked like semen. NOT WHY I ORDERED IT.
If you park in the back make sure to tell the owner, they’ll tow cars if they think you’re not a customer.

Came here this past Saturday and had an order of koobideh kabob. Maybe it was a sign when I walked in to this place and that it’s no longer booming… no longer warm, no longer filled with fumes of delicious fragrant. The saffron rice in my order is no longer fragrant. The koobideh was very dry, as if it’s been cooked a long time ago. The broiled tomato tasted old. It was a true disappointment comparing to what I have had in the past.

Very pleased the quality of the food.
We ordered the catering deal for 10 people. We were very happy with the quality of the food, the quantity, and the variety. The best compliment I can give is that my mom liked it !
We’ll definitely be back.

I love how this place stays open very late (like they’re on Persian time), & the décor is funky and fun! Love the fresh juices & the food is, overall, pretty good. Although not my favorite Persian restaurant on the Westside, it is #1 for late night dinners, the delicious fresh juices & the unique & cozy style of the restaurant.

Was just scouting out different restaurants on Westwood Boulevard when we saw the sign for the $ 7.99 All You Can Eat Buffet. Sounds good to me! So we went in got a nice little table by the window, and was handed a plate for the buffet.
There is a separate room just for the buffet with exotic rices, spicy beef & chicken kabob, stewed tomatoes and a variety of cooked vegetables, and a whole table for melon & desserts. Had two plates when I usually only have one.
Was a nice way to spend a holiday day off with an exotic & yummy Persian feast!

Tasty koobideh! It was moist, cooked perfectly, and full of good spices. I couldn’t pinpoint why, but the salad dressing tasted odd to me. I liked the torshi veggies and the toasted sangak bread… mmm…

While not my favorite Persian restaurant on Westwood Blvd, their food is still very good. It’s well-​priced and very delicious.
My favorite part about this restaurant is the decoration. In the back, there is more traditional Persian décor… though some of their décor is still pretty random (like the giant turtle in the little fountain in the middle of the back of the restaurant).
I’d recommend trying one of their chicken wraps. They’re pretty filling and tasty.
The service isn’t always the best (last time we went, they weren’t very nice about splitting the check two ways, as most restaurants are), but overall I don’t have too many complaints.

the food was nothing impressive. the ground beef had a weird taste. Kale pache was wayy too expensive.

Canary is a cozy, friendly Persian restaurant with a nice menu for lunch or dinner. It’s also a LOT more vegetarian-​friendly than many traditional Persian places, whose menus tend to be meat-​focused. I can’t comment on the meat dishes personally, but everyone I’ve been there with has left happy with the various meat-​and-​rice options.
Myself, I’d recommend the gormeh sabzi, which can be ordered with or without meat: Canary prepares the best version of this deep, dark vegetable-​and-​bean stew that I’ve ever had, complete with a whole dried Persian lime immersed in the almost black, indescribably rich broth. The ash-​e-​reshteh lentils are also delicious. Every table gets a bunch of fresh bread.
The ambience can be a bit lacking here — it’s perhaps a bit dumpy for a first date, and there can be strange music and/​or religious broadcasts on the TV in the back of the house. But it’s a great friendly, casual spot for lunch with a group of friends, and the food is plentiful, cheap, well-​made, and delicious. If you care about tablecloths and place settings, go someplace like Javan instead; otherwise Canary will serve you far better food and charge you half as much.

All i can say is GORMEH SABZI PLEASE, and CHELOKABOB SOLTANY.
Its greatly priced good Persian food.
They have lamb testicles on the menu guys!!! Dear god i will leave the testicles in the bedroom and off my dinner plate.

Bf and I were out running errands and low blood sugar hit him like a bad attitude around 9ish, so I suggested that we try this Lebanese place on Westwood Blvd. But on the way there, we passed Canary Chicken House and I remembered having some really good Persian food there years ago, so we grabbed a meter just down the block and ran in to get him the hell some food!
In the past several years, I had forgotten that this little unassuming-​looking gem is open til VERY late (awesome for night owls like me/​us) and has great food! How could I forget? I dunno, but I won’t forget again after our dinner tonight!
The waiter was so friendly, this happy-​faced guy made us feel so welcome, that it made me want to hug him right off. Less than 5 minutes after we sat down and ordered drinks, he brought them to us with a plate of fresh and warm Persian flat bread and pats of butter. The bread was a mix of chewy and crispy, with some sesame seeds in areas, and took the edge off bf’s hunger immediately (thank you Canary!).
We decided to order the Soltani Kabob plate a (one skewer of Barg — tenderloin — and one skewer of Kobideh — ground beef) and the ground beef kabob sammich on Persian bread.
The food got to us SO fast, that I AGAIN wanted to hug our warm waiter!
Bf’s Kabob plate came with a huge pile of fluffy white rice (we didn’t upgrade to the cherry rice this time, but I’ve had it before and it’s AWESOME) with saffron rice on top, a salad with cucumbers and tomatoes, a half a charred tomato (mmmmmm…) and two big kabobs. The Barg — tenderloin — was seasoned so perfectly, and cooked medium rare just like we ordered. It was tender and not overly salted like some restaurants tend to do. The Kobideh was seasoned perfectly also, and tender as well.
The salad had its own dressing, a lemony, herby, fresh-​tasting little side of flavor that we put on my sammich, bf’s rice and salad, and even the bread. It was YUM-​O!
My sammich was like a kabob wrap, with salad and pickles and a little mayo, and tomatoes, and cucumbers. It was SUPER yummy with the lemony dressing…
WARNING: I likes me a messy, drippy sammich — even in public :). And hell yes, I’m proud of it!
After we ate, we ordered tea, which was a very fragrant Earl Grey-​like bergamot-​infused goodness, and… to our pleasant surprise, a little dish of Bamieh, the round deep-​fried dough cookies that are crispy on the outside and juicy on the inside from bathing in rosewater syrup since birth.
We purposely did not order any of the amazing looking desserts there because we are both watching our girly figures :) but we were foiled by the waiter’s generosity. (again, deserving of hugs)
So what’s the verdict? Bf needs to have a snacky before we go on long errand runs. Yes bf I see you reading this, next time have a snack!!!
Ok, the real verdict — the tenderloin kabob was THE BEST, most tender and perfectly seasoned thing on our plates. The ground beef kabob was excellent too, but the tenderness of the tenderloin pieces was SO memorable.
The prices here are excellent, it was $ 40 for the entrée, the sammich, a Perrier and 2 teas — and I have a half a sammich for tomorrow. Oh, and when I told the waiter how much we LOVED the dressing, he packed up a side of it for us to take home.
See why I wanted to hug this man so many times? He’s like the Persian uncle I never had!
The only thing that took away from a 5-​star review, which I hate to say… is the ambiance. They could use a little feng-​shui-​ing honestly. The last time I was here many years ago, the food was comparably great, but they had these raised platforms with Persian rugs on them where you’d sit cross-​legged and they’d serve you food on the same level you were sitting. It felt like you were sitting on the floor, but the waiter was never looking down at you. It was odd, but I LIKED IT!
They have since re-​done their seating situation, but they could use a little more help — like a bachelor pad that needs a woman’s touch.
But this is not at all a reason why you should avoid it by any means — go for the food and you’ll love it!
Hugs to you, Uncle waiter guy!

I had Canary’s food for the first time on a friday night two weeks ago. It was late, we were hungry, and we were far from home. Luckily this place was still open.
The food here was amazing and the service was even better. Despite the fact that we crawled in just before closing time (about 3 am), the staff was happy to whip us up something and get us on our way.
We had kabobs, halem, kookoo sabzee, masto khiar… everything was delicious. In fact, it was so good, we went back the very next night (ok maybe the staff wasn’t too happy about us coming in at 3 again, but they were still happy to serve us). After experiencing it the first night, I broke my record driving from the valley to Westwood just to make it in time.
If you’re out late, if you’re hungry, swing by and check out the menu. And if you’re there late enough, maybe we’ll be dining together!
I

One animal’s reproductive organ, is another animal’s dinner.
Don’t ask me why, but I decided to check this place out and try their Donbalan (lightly breaded lamb testicles). For some reason it was really hard to find dinner partners for this night, but I found a few brave souls so I didn’t have to do this alone.
We ordered other things as well, not just balls:
Masto Khiar ($ 4.25) — Yogurt with herbs & cucumber
Shirazi Salad ($ 5) — Chopped tomato, onion, cucumber, olive oil, & parsley
Traditional Dizi ($ 13) — Lamb Shoulder
Gormehsabzi Stew w/​rice ($ 10.95) — Stew with beef, beans, & onions
Heart ($ 7) — Lamb heart
Donbalan ($ 8) — Breaded lamb testicles
All the dishes came with crispy (fried) pita bread which I wasn’t a big fan of. I like my bread warm and fresh, not hard and stale like it’s a week old.
The Masto Khiar was delicious. It even made that weird pita bread taste decent. The Shirazi Salad was surprisingly tasty and went well with all the other dishes.
The lamb shoulder I just didn’t understand. They got, arguably, the best tasting meat on any animal (the shoulder) and made into a paste. Why??? It was like eating apple sauce …
The Stew was outstanding. The beef in it was moist and perfectly prepared. It was a blast of flavor from all the seasonings. Went great with the rice.
The heart was, without a doubt, the star of our meal. Was extremely tender and everyone kept fighting over it. The testicles weren’t as appetizing as I imagined them to be. (Yes, I actually thought they would be tasty. Don’t judge me!!!) It was like eating a sponge with a really gross aftertaste.
The service was great and everyone was nice. The interior was very artsy. Lots of drawings on the walls and they even had a fountain inside the restaurant. All in all a decent place, just a bit on the pricey side.
(Check out the pictures)

3.5 stars. Craving for Persian food, we considered some of our choices nearby. Shamshiri is our usual hangout, but am I one of the few who reminisce about Shamshiri before it moved north of Santa Monica Bl and remodeled into something else? Then, I remembered seeing some ads on our local cable TV, so decided to give it a try. Coincidentally, Canary isn’t far from where Shamshiri used to be.
The establishment doesn’t look like much from the outside. In fact, my first glance from driving-​by told me «sandwich shop/​liquor store»? However, once you get a closer look, you see it’s not just a hallway and that they’ve made use of inside rooms. The tables are not too big, but do the job. The décor is… uh, unique. Murals of Persian-​esque images, there was even a fountain in one of the dining rooms (the water dripped via a rope). There are some high-​hanging LCD screens playing what Persian music videos/​concert footage that don’t match the music from the speakers (ranging from what sounded like traditional Persian music to an interpretation of The Beatles on acoustic guitar.)
The food was well-​prepared and satisfied my craving for the moment. They advertise as «homemade». The beef tenderloin and ground beef kabobs (soltani kabob) was tasty, served along grilled tomato and a wedge of raw onion, plus rice. The fesenjoon (stewed beef in a walnut sauce) was rather sweet compared to other fesenjoons we’ve had in other places, but enjoyable. The house doogh was refreshing as well. Prices are reasonable, but still you are looking at north of $ 10 for the majority of dinner items. Lunch specials (which I have not tried) are advertised at $ 7.95 (don’t know what they include as far as salads, drinks, etc., but seems a bit pricey for lunch «special».)
The service was warm and courteous. We asked for a cup of hot water but our waiter brought out two cups of cold water… maybe language barriers, but otherwise we were well attended, greeted, etc. The level of attention and friendliness makes a difference (and an impression!)
There is something about a «Plus 20% service charge» on the menu, following a whole bunch of Persian text (that I cannot read), but we didn’t notice any charges on our check other than the food and beverages what we consumed.
Verdict: a good option among others in the area, especially if you no longer care for the «upscale wanna-​be» look and feel of other Persian restaurants in the area.

Uh. no. Wouldn’t bother with this place again. There are so many other Persian places in Westwood why oh why would you eat here.
Granted I only had the ash, but it was gross. Trust me when I say, I know my ash. My relatives were also not pleased with the food. The service was horrendous and we. were… the… only… people… there. I am not kidding.
I’ve decided the only reason people like food here is because it is open until 3:50 am (it’s even on the menu) aka it’s a spot to hit up when you’re drunk and looking to binge.
Seriously though, what is the deal with 3:50 am? Why not make it 3:30 or 4? What would happen if you showed up at 3:45 am? or better yet, 3:49 am? These are truly the mysteries of the world.

On the cheap side and often overlooked for more posh eateries in the neighborhood, this Persian classic delivers consistently great food at even better prices. The soups are outstandingly spiced but not spicy. It is a mystery how the chicken kebabs are always so tender. For desert try some rose flavored ice cream.

This is a classic Persian place.
Their lunch special is great value. $ 6.95 and you get free bread, salad and an entry with rice. I got chicken kabob and it was juicy. The salad was fresh with a nice dressing, not too sour. The bread was warm — a big plus. They give you chilis instead of just butter and onion for some heat. She also gave us a plate of eggplant. I found out later it was a special treat.
The waitress was friendly too. We each put in $ 10.
5 for value
5 for service
4 for food

Bland and overpriced. The décor was amusing though.
I got the lamb stew, called «dizi.» The menu did not mention that the lamb, garbanzo beans, tomatoes, and everything else would be beaten together into a bland paste. Whither the flavor? This stew seemingly had not been seasoned at all.
My gf got the beef stew with red beans and herbs. This was okay — at least it had not been frapped — but again, lacking in any particular flavor. There was nothing in the flavor palette to identify this food as any particular cuisine; could have been beef n’ bean stew from anywhere.
Some of the menu items had descriptions, while others did not; this would have been fine except that the waiter had no idea what any of the mystery items were. I think waiters should generally be able to at least define, if not describe in detail, basic menu items.

Dear Mr. Canary Owner Sir,
Thank you for the delicious meal to top off a wonderful night with my love. I just wanted to let you know this is The FIRST place I have dined that between 2 am and 4 am there’s a minumum order per person AND a 20% service charge AND you were willing to argue your point.
Sure, all night long its cover charge plus 2 drink minimum.
Sure, make me purchase at least $ 10 — if I paid with my Debit or ATM card. Understandable.
But seriously, does your rent increase between the hours of 2 and 4?
MAYBE YOU SHOULD CHARGE FOR PARKING CAUSE I HAD TO WALK TO YOUR FREAKING PLACE FROM A BLOCK AWAY!!!
Of course, I didn’t learn of this «minimum per person + plus service charge» until AFTER eating, with my leftovers in tote (cause you do have huge servings — though we split lentil soup and I had half a sandwich taking the other HUGE half home) and going up to pay. (It sure ain’t posted on the front door — if it is — it’s hidden — and I am sure as pond scum that is not listed on the MENU nor thier website
— as of 6÷12÷07)
Mr. Owner Sir, you — swore up and down that there is something posted someplace in your restuarant that says there’s a minimum $ 10 to eat in your joint. Fine — so we pay the $ 20 — although the bill was less than $ 14. No prob.
Let me just say this though its NOT about the money — Im sure this restaurant does just fine ALL DAY long — the food is decent — but THERE WAS ONLY 22 PEOPLE IN THE WHOLE FREAKING PLACE!!! INCLUDING US!!!
Again, let me repeat, it’s so not about the money — you weren’t busy, the food was great, but come on! Its the principal — when does a restaurant owner feel that he needs to make a minimum order per person? Did I suck too much oxygen? We paid cash!!! Why don’t you just hike the prices up or something? Change the menus out to «LATE NIGHT MENU».
Take the $ 6 sandwiches off your MENU!!! I seriously felt jaded when I walked out. I expected nothing for free — by all means NO!
You didn’t have to argue the point — I think you completely missed the point all together. Lunch Menu, Dinner Menu, Late Night Menu. Or, how about close, if in fact your rent DOES increase during 2 am to 4 am and you feel the urge that 22 patrons will not justify your late Friday/​early Saturday work hours.
Ice my cake in any language Mr. Canary Restaurant Owner Man and I will Unilocal so EVERYONE can hear!!!
Little Loud Me. :)
Bitter is not thou lentil stew
Thou shall not bitter, too!