Monday, February 9, 2009

Finally Falafel in PQ: Urfa Tomato Kabob

Yay! There is falafel in Penn Quarter. Urfa Tomato Kabob opened a week ago and is serving up Turkish food. It replaces one of my all time favorite PQ lunch spots, Café Deli, at 740 6th St NW. Last summer I wrote about the falafel at the D&C Cart over at 8th and H Streets, but those carts disappeared along with the fall weather. Urfa looks to be permanent if they can keep up the business. Not sure what happened to Café Deli.

Visited Urfa last week and I'm most excited about the falafel. The sandwich was huge and just dressed in tahini with tomatoes and lettuce. They call it the Cairo Falafel. The Cairo plus a drink plus fries cost $7.99 after tax. Lunch under $10 = I will be going there often. And they don't skimp on the falafel, there were like six falafel balls in the ginormous pita pocket. That's about it for the vegetarian food though. The other popular items on the menu are doner (like a gyro) and meat kabobs.

The "Tomato" part of the restaurant's name comes from the homemade tomato sauce they use on the kabobs. "Urfa" is short for Şanlıurfa, a city of over a million people in Turkey. Urfa gets an A for effort, and an A for serving good falafel.

It's three blocks from the nearest 42 bus stop, at 740 6th Street NW. And yes, SB I will be there for lunch today, so consider that advanced notice of me being in your hood. ;)