  parched in the sahara so, mona and i tried to go to urlLink cora's exactly at 12 noon yesterday and the line-up was long! i wanted mona to try the place and we never figured out how long we would have had to wait - we just left.
it's nice to see that people of halifax have discovered cora's and chose it as their brunch destination on saturdays but i can roughly surmise the speed and quality of service (plus the amount of racket! ) when they are especially bustling. i wasn't opposed to trying sahara restaurant , an arabic restaurant that was new this summer located in the old san remo's spot on spring garden road. it has made its presence apparent but piping really loud arabic music to the street all all times it is open - it reminds me of wandering past a hip-hop clothes store on a side street in vancouver and the hip-hop music they blared to desperately attract customers.
the first level of the restaurant (which is above street level) located in a house is the "fast-food" level with a cafeteria-style layout. the second level of the restaurant is the more formal area with more decor: like pillow slips pinned to the wall, little stools around a round copper/bronze tray that they would use to sit down and drink tea, and there is even a room of sofas draped in colourful embroidered fabric and i wonder what occurs (certainly not eating meals) in there.
a quick glance at the menu (and seeing a dinner as it passed by on a tray) revealed that at least the restaurant wasn't ripping off patrons with authentic ethnic cuisine as none of the plates on the menu (it did not say it was only a lunch menu) was greater than $11.99. mona ordered the sampler plate that i considered: it came with a lamb kofta, chicken shish kebab, and another lamb-thing (can't remember the name given to it! ) that was a like a sausage (1 piece) (11.99). i recently came upon a recommendation to myself (from the food and hospitality magazine) to try the shawerma at urlLink mediterraneo as they prepare it for 36 hours (or some ridiculously long time) before it is served to you - i may yet try it there since i now know how to eat one! yes, so i ordered the shawerma chicken (9.99). for the dinner plates, they all sounded nearly the same to me " meat with authentic arabic spices" was a very common description. they also served fatayer (which i should have tried, now that i've looked it up and know it is like spinakopita/samosa, etc. ), falafel, mezza (dip? ), etc. hurray for mona - she knew exactly how to eat her dinner. three skewers of meat across basmati rice pilaf and a side of salad that was coriander-heavy (neither of us enjoy that despicable spice!). she said the chicken shish kebab was tasty. a piece of pita bread was served across the dinner with a side of tahini . boy, has it been a while since i've had that and i polished that off with nice reminiscing of how paul always had a stock of it and we'd add molasses to the tahini to make it a sweet-tasting tip.
shawerma chicken (pieces of chicken that are shaved off as the chicken is turning on a vertical spit) was served on "arabic bread. " there was a side of white sauce (not donair sauce), and the server presented us (me) with a bottle of Tabasco sauce. apparently (from this urlLink site ), i was supposed to form a pita roll with the chicken, tahini, salad (where was my salad? ), and hot sauce. but to me, tahini was not for putting over meat... so i went the way-canadian route and used the knife and fork to eat chicken and rice since the white sauce's use has still not yet been accounted for by the above-mentioned website.
i liked the rice - nice fragrant basmati rice (thanks to a plentiful amount of oil) - which differs so much from our stick-all-together gobs of long-grain white rice. the chicken was another story since i've never been a fan of barbecued chicken and it tasted very nearly just like that. (i don't like barbecue sauce so if you do....) it was all-in-all alright. sahara restaurant address: 5688 spring garden rd. urlLink read more.... 
