Mezza Lebanese Restaurant

Admittedly, despite my love of great food, I'm a little lazy when it comes to go have it unless it's in the south end or downtown. This is my sad little reason for having not patronized Mezza yet, despite its numerous accolades and tales of its Lebanese deliciousness. Last week, I finally rectified this shame, when I took a friend out for a birthday dinner.

The restaurant is a good size and is split into two main areas, with a room with a long banquette along one wall, and tables and booths in the other. The decor is warm and inviting with reds and earth tones, and has a modern Middle Eastern feel without having lots of kitschy items like many places in the city.

It's a little past the supper rush and we have the spacious restaurant mostly to ourselves, other than a few other customers. Our prompt and friendly server offers helpful food and wine suggestions; we both settle on their great dinner and a movie menu. It offers either an appetizer and entree or entree and dessert, with a Empire Theatres movie pass, for a very reasonable $29. I am down for anything that is a great deal and allows me to get a free movie as well!

I order the phyllo cheese rolls and beef kabob plate, while my dinner companion gets the hommus and pitas, with the kafta kebobs for her main. After a short wait, our appetizers arrive; the pitas are wonderfully plentiful, which is a nice contrast to many places that skimp on them. The hommus is rich without being too sharp or garlicky, although many of you garlic fiends out there might prefer it that way. The cheese rolls are delicious, with a nice light crunch from the phyllo and the cheese is slightly salty and perfectly creamy without running everywhere. My only complaint is that there were only three; need...moar!!

My kabob plate comes with a skewer of meat, fatouch salad and basmati rice. The beef is moist and nicely seasoned so that the beef is complimented without being overwhelmed by the herbs. The salad is surprisingly fresh tasting considering the time of year and has lots of crunch and a refreshing acidity to it and the rice, well, it's basmati. 'Nuff said. The birthday girl's lamb is even more moist than my beef and a bit more heavily seasoned, and oddly enough we prefer each other's skewers over what we originally ordered. Trading commences.

With great food, wine, service and atmosphere, Mezza is a winner all around and I look forward to going back and going to a movie.

First time at mezza Mediterranean grill for quite some time. I thought it was very delicious. For me. I love this kind of food. Fresh and as healthy as knowing whats put into it when you're able to taste individual ingredients.

My girlfriend and I shared potato wedges, olive spread with pita, falafel, and their cheese wrapped filo plate. All in all. It was quite good along with enough to take home.

The only thing for me was where we say in the booth it didn't feel as though there was enough room... Squished almost, and to me the olive spread was a little overly salty

Would definitely recommend and go back. Be sure to share :)

I love Mezza. Let's get this little factoid out of the way before the gush-fest begins. I have a tendency to end up there later in the evening, a spur of the moment decision to indulge but still stay close to home. It's a great place to go if you feel like trying a bunch of different dishes, and perhaps sharing with friends.

Last time I was in, my partner and I went for gold. We're both veggies, so this spot is perfect for us (but also a great choice for the meat connoisseur). Our lovely server, who always seems to be there when we are, was attentive, professional and sweet. Their wine selection is fantastic, so we started out by ordering a couple glasses of the Ksara Prieure, a Lebanese red wine. We then proceeded to order Fatouch, Hommus, Vegetable Kebbe, Fatayer B'Spanegh, Falafel, and my personal favorite, the Phylo Cheese Rolls. All of the dishes were beautifully presented and made with care. The prices are reasonable, and the atmosphere is quite chic, yet comfortable. If you choose, you can dress up and make a night of it, or else simply relax and pop by in your casual attire. I recommend swinging by their website, which has all of their menus, as well as great mouth watering pictures, sure to excite!

A friend and I checked out Mezza on a whim last Friday night. We were in search of a nice spot to vent over some wine and when we saw the menu, decided to sample a few nibbles.

We shared the hummus, tabboule, grilled halloumi and falafel. All were delicious, but the falafel totally knocked our socks off, yum! The tabboule was also lovely and the serving size massive. I was happy to discover that the leftovers made for a fantastic base for a pizza the next day.

Our server was great. Friendly, knowledgeable and very sweet to present complimentary dessert at the end of the meal, saying that every girl dealing with boy troubles deserves a little baklava. So thoughtful! I'm looking forward to trying their dinner and a movie promo with Oxford Theatre sometime soon.

There are quite a few Middle Eastern restaurants in town, but this one is my favorite. I love the atmosphere, the food and even the music. It's where we often bring out-of-towners for dinner. For special occasions they even have belly dancers!

The service is awesome and the there are so many choices on the menu, it's always a plus to go with a crowd. That way you get to sample everything. Every dish is prettily plated and served with freshest of ingredients. I really enjoy their lunch specials and their Mezza platter with Hommus, Baba Ghanouj, Warek Enab, Kebbe, Phylo Cheese Rolls, Taboulé and Fatouch Salata. That's the perfect nibbling lunch to catch up with friends.

During the week, at dinner, the place is quiet, but on the weekends, it's packed and hopping. Regardless, the service is always the same - attentive, relaxed and never rushed.

Hubby and I really need a place to eat. Even though Quinpool had quite a few vegan-friendly restaurant we needed something closer to Organic Earth Market. We saw Mezza and figured that was a good choice since we knew they had vegan-friendly food after visiting the Scotia Square food court.

The waitress we had was extremely friendly, welcoming and wasn't completely knowledgeable on vegan fare but very accommodating and asked the kitchen no questions asked. Hubby got their falafal which he loves and since I'm not huge for many of those spices I just got their salad and french fries. Seriously it's worth it just for the fries, they make the best ever!

I really enjoyed my salad which consisted of romaine lettuce, radishes, cucumbers, red onion, tomato and a dressing of lemon and olive oil with some spices. It really hit the spot and as mentioned above, I love their fries.

Hubby thinks their falafals are the best he's ever had and even though I'm not big for spices, he made me take a couple bites and I think I actually want to go back and get one for myself. It's the first falafal I can say actually tasted good to me.

The only downside to Mezza is the fact that they, of course, serve meat but not just meat, lamb, lots and lots of lamb. I found myself becoming very sad every time I heard the word in the restaurant. I don't understand how someone can eat a baby...

Overall it was a great dining experience. I give huge props to our sweet waitress and the cozy decor. Even the bathrooms are awesome!

Imagine my pleasant surprise when I discovered this heritage culinary gem a few blocks from my hotel. Being part lebanese and part french Canadian (sharing too much?) with near content cravings for dolma (grape leaves) I decided to give this Mezza shoppe a chance and I'm glad I did.

The lebanese plate was piled high with my choice of shwarma, rice, tabouli, hummus, grape leave and pita bread. Now, it didn't top my momma's recipe (because, well, let's just face it) but it did give it the old college try.

The shwarma was on point, the blend of spices authentic and both the tabouli and hummus were rather good. Price-point was reasonable and the window counter gave the opportunity for some wonderful downtown people watching.

I know this place is closing this weekend, but I might as well review what I had. I realize the service is unlikely to be as good as it was in this restaurants heyday, but it was OK enough.

The good thing is that the food we got was pretty good. We ordered some things to eat in the restaurant and some things to go. We didn't get silverware for either and they missed one of our dishes in the take out order. Was still quite expensive.

The one appetizer I can recommend is the sujuk. The menu says it's spicy but it's not, though it's still delicious.

I think they pretty much just gave up because they are closing soon. Oh well.

Amazing food that is delicious and healthy. The staff are always friendly and prompt with their service - especially Andrea and Lindsay whom are both a delight to be served by.

The atmosphere is great for a nice quiet meal or business meeting over lunch.

Literally the worst I've ever had and I'm Greek. It was dry, they slathered it in disgusting sauce and had a total of 3 leafs of lettuce. I couldn't bring myself to finish it cuz it was like chewing on leather. The best part of my meal was the Minute Made juice. I'd rather set my $8 on fire than have put it towards this garbage.