Omani Cuisine

Wasabi Sushi (Telephone: 2469 9490) is a Japanese restaurant located in Bareeq Al Shatti mall. It is located in the far right side of the mall right opposite B+F.

Wasabi is a relatively small restaurant with about six or seven dining tables only, yet luckily the place is not exactly crowded as only half the tables were occupied when we came to dine in on a weekend evening. The layout of the place is quite modern and stylish, though a bit dim to some extent. Fun thing about the restaurant is that they have an LCD connected to a camera right on top of the chef showing the preparation process live. Make sure you check it out!

Besides sushi, the menu of Wasabi Sushi has nothing at all other than soup and salad. We ordered the traditional Japanese miso soup (RO 1.900) to which you can optionally add salmon. I had mine with salmon and quite enjoyed it!

The sushi menu of Wasabi Sushi is divided into Hosomaki (rice roll with filling inside and seaweed wrap on the outside), Futomaki (larger rice rolls with additional toppings on the outside) , Nigiri (fish pressed on top of rice pad), Sashimi (raw slices of fish), and Temaki (hand rolled cones of seafood). In my most recent visited we tried a hosomaki Tiger Roll (4.100 – which had tempura prawns, cucumber, avocado, flying fish roe, and Japanese mayonnaise – pictured above), a futomaki Dragon Roll (RO 5.900 – which had tempura prawns, avocado, tuna, salmon, roasted eel, mayonnaise, flying fish roe and teriyaki sauce – pictured below), a futomaki  Namoro-Maki (RO 4.700 – which had prawns, crab, avocado, and fish roe topping), and California Rolls (RO 4.500 – which had prawns, avocado, cucumber, Japanese mayonnaise, and flying fish roe). I liked everything we had, but I thought my favourites were the Namoro Maki and the California Roll.

In total we ordered 3 soups, 4 maki dishes, 1 soft drink and two small bottles of water, our bill came to about RO 30. I thought that the service was quite good and fast enough. My only complaint about the restaurant is that it doesn’t seem to offer much besides sushi. I mean, they don’t have any drinks other than soft drinks, water, and coffee – they don’t offer juices or any speciality drinks. There are also no desserts at all.

I still had a great time at Wasabi, I like their food and will be going again for sure!

Have you been to Wasabi Sushi yet? Do you think that sushi are going to pick up in Oman anytime soon?

B+F Roadside Diner is a burger restaurant in Bareeq Al Shatti mall (Telephone: 2469 8836). It is located on the far right side of the mall if you enter from any of the main entrances. B+F (short for Burger & Fries) is supposedly a branch of another restaurant called Burger Boutique originally from Kuwait.

Unfortunately B+F was crowded as usual when we went to it, so we couldn’t take proper photographs of the seating area. The restaurant is not massive in size and is stuffed with many tables and chairs, it is not uncomfortably crowded, but it is not exactly the place to go to if you want to have a private conversation. B+F has a unique theme of low lighting and modern stylish art. It is almost always crowded in the evening, on weekends it is normal to record your name and wait for up to 45 minutes before you get seated. They will offer to take your mobile phone number so that you can walk around the mall until they call you to come inside. B+F does not take phone reservations anymore.

B+F offers a variety of burgers, salads, grilled meals, and pizza, but the place is ALL about the burgers. We do still take starters when we go there, the starters they offer include nachos, soups, beef skewers, and a variety of tex mex starters. We had this time the Spicy Chicken Quesadilla (pictured above – RO 2.450) which I thought was awesome. It was not really spicy, but still full of flavour, the bread was also nice and tender.

There are loads and loads of burgers at B+F, some classics, some gourmet, some in sandwich form, you name it. Each of these burgers may be served in “Burger Style” which is your regular burger or in “Slider Style” in which you will get two mini burgers served on a long pad. This time we had a Bacon Swiss burger (pictured above – RO 2.850) which had a juicy beaf patty, beaf bacon, swiss cheese, grilled onion, grilled mushrooms, lettuce, pickles, and a special B+F sauce. It came in the perfect size and I really liked it, it was juicy as described and the sauce was nice.

We also ordered a Oz Gourmet burger (pictured above – RO 4.250) which had a grilled beaf patty, topped with cheddar cheese, fried eggs, onion rings, bacon, tomato, pickles, beetroot, lettuce, ketchup and mayo. It was a bit hard to handle as it was big, but it was still quite nice!

For the drinks we had a Banana Berry Smoothie (1.950)  which had fresh banans and mixed berries and a Red Planet (RO 2.250) which had red berry, pomegranate, pineapple, and apple juice. I really liked my Red Planet, I thought it was refreshing and the pomegranate bits were cool!

B+F also offers a number of sidelines such as fries and onion rings and desserts such as cakes and brownies, but we didn’t try any of them during our visit.

The service is B+F is good, the staff are very friendly and talkative, the food took a bit of time to get to us, but we did not mind it.

In total we ordered 1 starter, 2 main courses, and 2 smoothies, our bill came to RO 14.438.

I love B+F, their food is amazing and the atmosphere is nice for people who into that sort of place. If you have not tried yet you are really missing out!

If you are another B+F addict, what is your favorite burger?

Abala is a continental restaurant in Bareeq Al Shatti (Telephone: 2469 5903). It is located right next to the food court inside the mall. I think it opened earlier this year, was closed for a short while very recently, but is now open for business as usual.

Abala is all glitz and glamour. Everything from the tiles on the floor, the chairs and all the way to the cutlery napkins are super stylish. Abala also has some seating outside the restaurant for those who want to enjoy the nice weather of the winter. We went early in the evening while a big match was taking place, so the place was empty.

The menu at Abala is very extensive and serves everything from soups, salads, and nachos, to burgers, risottos, steaks, and pastas.

We were undecided between having Calamari or the Turkey Bacon Wrapped Shrimp (RO 3.5) for the starter, we ended up having the shrimps, which came out as four pieces of shrimp wrapped in a small slice of turkey bacon. It tasted alright, though the *dip* below the shrimp tasted better than the shrimp itself.

For the main course I had a club sandwich (3.5) which came with chips. The chips felt as if it was precooked earlier and then reheated just before it got served to me. It was dry and cold. I didn’t like the sandwich itself either, the toast was very dry, almost burnt, and the filling was a bit too salty for my liking.

My friend had a risotto with chicken and mushrooms (RO 3.5), he asked them to change the mushrooms  with dried tomatoes. He thought that his dish was “acceptable”.

For the drinks we had a Citrus Splash mocktail (RO 1.9) and a She Said Red mocktail (RO 2.1), I had the She Said Red, which had orange juice, strawberry juice, and pomegranate juiced mixed with crushed ice. We really liked both of our drinks and thought that there were the highlights of the visit.

The service at Abala was really good, everyone seemed friendly and our food came really fast. Not sure if it is always like that or just because nobody was dining at the restaurant at the time we went. In total, we ordered 1 starter, 2 main courses, 2 mocktails, our bill came to RO 16.

We did not like the food at Abala, I did not think that the starter was special at all and I really didn’t like my main course. I cannot really recommend this place. Has anybody else been here? What do you guys think?