Eat here

 A long long time ago...two years ago almost to the day, I did a favor for Tanta Marcia. Her dining room chairs needed to be recovered and the wood needed a bit of TLC.

Marcia and I shopped together at www.fabricguru.com. I admit that I was bossy about which fabrics Marcia should choose.

There were a whole lot of different elements in the room that needed to get pulled together visually with the fabric choice. I selected a few that I thought w.ould work and Marcia chose this one. 

I am not usually quite so bossy but I knew that I was right. After the fabric arrived I got to work recovering all of the chairs and waxing all of the wood.

Tanta Marcia and her husband Fred were grateful. We decided that taking us out to dinner would be my payment. Life and then the pandemic got in the way.

Tuesday was the big night. We arrived at Marcia and Fred's building and were taken with them on the Access-a-Ride van as their guests. 

This is the website of the restaurant Cheburechnaya. The friendly, welcoming tone of the page captures exactly what the place is like. I know that I often recommend restaurants with terrible decor and excellent food. Cheburenanya has excellent food, mediocre decor and excellent service.

What did we eat you ask? We all had soup. I am cutting and pasting from their menu. All spelling errors and weird syntax is theirs.

• Shurpa (assorted vegetables boiled with lamb ribs and beef meat in a clear broth) $6.00
• Borsht (beef boiled with beets, potatos and cabbage) $6.00
• Lagman (tomato based soup with assorted vegetables and beef meat served with thick homemade noodles) $6.00
• Chicken pelmeni (chicken dumplings served with a clear meat broth and chickpeas) $6.00

We all loved our soups. Next time I may try the borsht that Fred chose there was a huge piece of beef in his bowl.

I ordered

1. Cheburek with meat (ground mix of lamb and beef) $2.00
2. The suffix burek is related to boureka. So this was a saucer-sized round of thin dough filled with chopped meat and onions crimped around the edges and deep-fried. It was delicious but a little greasy for my taste.

The table shared an order of manty.

• Manty (steamed dumplings filled with chopped lamb and onions) (4pc. per order) $8.00
• 
  

The manty looks like the dumplings one gets in a Chinese restaurant. The flavor is exactly on the cusp of Middle Eastern and Chinese. It is served with a slightly spicy vinegary sauce. Totally worth getting.

• Lulya Kebab (ground mix of lamb and beef meat) $3.00
• Chicken Lulya (ground chicken kebab) $4.00
• Fat Free Lamb Ribs (four pieces of pure defatted lamb ribs) $6.00
• Lamb Heart $4.00
• Lamb Kebab (pieces of marinated lamb meat with a cube of fat in the middle)

I think this was the rest of our order. because of Covid, we didn't share. I had one chicken lulya that was just insanely good. I think everyone else each got two kebabs.

We also got one order of really excellent bread which is a cross between pita and a really good baguette.

 You can peruse and drool over the rest of their menu here

We were all jammed by the end of the meal. I was too full to eat breakfast the next day. This place is so worth a trip to Rego Park if you love kosher meat. The next time we go we may actually choose vegetable matter as well. The meat though ---so good.

All during the meal and on our way home we kept thinking about which of our friends and loved ones we should take here. Our kids NEED to eat here as does my sister and my meat-loving nephew and Allan and Jo and Sue. Our list of who we need to take here keeps growing.It is even close to the subway.