FOOD: Nyala (Little Ethiopia, Los Angeles)

It had been aquite a few years since I had visited the Little Ethiopia section of Los Angeles or even tasted Ethiopian food, so when Mad Professah's San Diego correspondent said hewas driving up last weekend and wanted to eat some good ethnic food that he couldn't easily find in that less cosmopolitan city, I suggested Ethiopian, asked around and was told that Nyala (1076 South Fairfax Avenue, Los Angeles, CA 90019; 323-936-5918) was the place to check out.

The picture above doesn't provide a sense of scale, the white platter was probably about 18" in diameter. The three of us ordered the vegetarian combo, the meat combo and a shrimp dish (#6, #14 and #16, respectively on the menu).

The vegetarian combination consisted of samples from Yemiser Wot (red lentil stew simmered in seasoned red pepper sauce, fresh garlic and ginger), Kik Alecha (mild yellow split peas cooked with onion, fresh garlic and ginger), Defen Yemiser Wot (bean stew cooked in fresh garlic and ginger), Yatakilt Wot (mixed vegetables: fresh carrots, potatoes, and cabbage cooked with garlic and ginger) and Yabesha Gommen (collard greens seasoned with fresh garlic and ginger). In the picture, the vegetarian dishes basically appear in an outer ring starting with the light yellow Kik Alecha in the lower left, up to the white cabbage and veggies in the upper right.

The meat combination consisted of Doro Wot (chicken marinated in lemon juice, then sautéed in seasoned butter, fresh garlic, onion, ginger and seasoned red pepper sauce), Yebere Wot (beef marinated in red wine and sautéed in seasoned butter, fresh onion, garlic and ginger) and Yebere Alecha (Tender pieces of lamb sautéed in seasoned butter, fresh onion, garlic and ginger). We also wanted a seafood dish, so we picked Shrimp Tibs (shrimp sautéed with onion, tomato, garlic, seasoned red pepper sauce and olive oil).

The feature of Ethiopian cooking that everyone remarks upon is the lack of utensils and the family-style sharing of entrées. One uses the spongy, crepe-like material called injera as an implement to pick up pieces of any of the stews or sauces.

Surprisingly (since I'm not vegetarian) I found the Kik Alecha and the Yemiser Wot to be the tastiest dishes, along with the Shrimp Tibs. This is mostly because there simply was not enough meat in any of the chicken, beef or lamb dishes which made up the meat combination to satisfy three adult males. In fact, all the "meat stews" were decidedly niggardly (look it up!) in the amount of meat they contained. Also, somehow the texture of the lentils and split peas combined well with the malleable injera to produce a pleasant sensation in the mouth.

I must say I was somewhat disappointed with how small the portions were at Nyala. In some sense, that is a good review, because it means that I wanted more of what they were offering.
However, to me, this seems to be a fundamental miscalculation in the dining experience. One doesn't leave Nyala hungry (the injera is quite yummy and seems to expans in one's stomach like most starches), but one doesn't leave Nyala satisfed, either.

For dessert we ordered baklava, which was pretty mediocre by Los Angeles standards. There is excellent baklava to be found in almost any hole-in-the-wall shop in nearby Glendale, so it is puzzling Nyala would serve such an indifferent confection and call it dessert.

GRADE: B-.