CITY LIFE - Las Vegas City Life
African eats - by Al Mancini
Adventurous diners owe it to themselves to try Meskerem Ethiopian Restaurant
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Anyone who has ever attended an event at the Las Vegas Convention Center really doesn't need to be told that the parking situation there sucks. The primary lot on Convention Center Drive isn't nearly sufficient for a major event like the Consumer Electronics Show, which is why I found myself hiking several blocks down that very road recently, having illegally parked my car in a private lot and hoping it wouldn't be towed during the hour or so it would take me to pick up my press credential. During that walk, I saw something that caught my attention: a small sign advertising an Ethiopian restaurant called Meskerem. Having only had Ethiopian food once before (more than a decade ago in New York City, when it was the inspiration for numerous tasteless famine jokes among my friends), I decided to check the place out on my walk back to my car. It proved to be a good call, since Meskerem's wide variety of affordable African dishes made for a much more interesting meal than the overpriced junk food available at the Convention Center.
The hallmark of Ethiopian cooking, however, is injera, a spongy and sour flatbread that serves as much as a utensil as it does a bread. When a meal arrives at your table, all of the courses are laid out on a large piece of injera, with several other pieces accompanying it on the side. Diners then tear off small pieces and use them to pick up the various meats and vegetables with their fingers, allowing them to keep their hands clean while enjoying what would otherwise be an extremely messy meal.
Meskerem is a hidden gem that could easily find a following among adventurous diners outside of the local Ethiopian community..." >>more
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Owner Tesfaye.