Lexington Herlad-Leader
Ethiopian cafe scores with salads and 'wats'
- by
Wendy Miller
'' Royal Fasica Christine, an Ethiopian storefront cafe, overlooks knotted traffic and upscale commerce. This stretch of South Ashland Avenue between High Street and Euclid Avenue seems an unlikely location for testing an exotic cuisine on Lexington. But life is full of surprises.
The cafe's homemade interior improvises with the cultural accents. There is a poster of the Abyssinian alphabet, pillows and tables low to the ground, and straw baskets for platters of food. A quote from Nelson Mandela sits on the counter, which in my book always fills the need for ambience. Objectively, however, all these are too close to the cooler's glare to transport you to Addis Ababa ...
The food is billed as "healthy," and it tastes that way: a light hand with the preparation, lots of options on the bottom of the food pyramid, and sparing portions of animal protein in the meat dishes, making dinner for two a potentially expensive proposition.
I've enjoyed all the salads, the fabulous green one made with crisp romaine, chopped onions and intensely red tomatoes ($4.95), the earthier yemiser azifa with lemony lentils, chopped chilies, ginger and garlic ($6.95) and the simple tomato sexed up with jalapenos.
But it's the wats you really want. A wat is a rich stew simmered in a brick-red sauce seasoned with berbere , Ethiopia's essential spice paste. Different chefs use varying proportions of garlic and onions, ginger and pepper, cayenne and coriander, and other treasures from the world's spice box.
Royal Fasica Christine makes three classic stews. There is a very spicy tibs wat ($12.95), whose excellent fiery sauce is marred by tough beef cubes, and a small serving of them at that. On the milder end, try doro wat ($12.95) -- stewed chicken served with a hard boiled egg -- and yessega wat ($11.95), made with beef; to sample both of these, I recommend the combination plate ($15.95 for one person, $26.95 for two). >>more
|
