Arabesque Restaurant And Lounge

First of all, the food is great. Almost everything we had, including drinks and desserts, was amazing. The reason for my low rate is the service. Food was brought to our table without the cutlery and plates that we had asked a couple of minutes before the food being served. We were really hungry and the food was sitting there getting cold. We asked three times to get some plates and cutlery but no response other than sorry. Finally after 15 minutes, we got three plates for four people, two of them were dirty! It took another ten minutes to get what we had asked. The food was almost cold then. Drinks had been forgotten too and we got them right after finishing our meals. The same went for the desserts. It looked like they had completely been forgotten. I guess the staff started preparing them when I talked to a waiter after 45 minutes waiting for them. In total it took them an hour to serve the desserts. Unfortunately, they didn't have the common courtesy to at least offer a refund for part of our meal or offer free deserts or something. Even when I said I don't want the drinks because it was too late, the waiter kindly said you have already paid for it but if you want I won't bring it to you. All the staff were kind and polite and when we were leaving, they apologized. Also it was explained that the source of all the issues was being understaffed in that night.

Arabesque was a restaurant in at the edge of the Melbourne CBD serving Jordanian/Middle Eastern cuisine. They also served shisha with a variety of amazing fruity/food-themed flavors. We went there for dinner and ordered a number of dishes to share; some chips, dips trio, and vegie trio to start with, kabsa, mansaf, and mashawi for the mains, and ruz ib haleeb and halawet el jibn for desserts. The chips were just like any other thick-cut chips with no middle eastern-type seasoning/sauce. The dips and vegie trios were delicious; the toum, moutabel and hummus dips were so flavorful, and so were the char-grilled zucchini, eggplant and crispy cauliflower in the vegie trio. The Kabsa, which was chicken cooked in spiced rice, had a nice sweet flavour to it thanks to the sultanas, but otherwise the dish tasted monotonously sour. The Mashawi (marked as ‘platter of two’ on the menu, was actually 2 big trays of food enough to feed 10 lol) was rather uninteresting; the two trays consisted of all kinds of grills which were not too different from your average bbq, although the fattoush salad that came with it was nice and refreshing. The Mansaf was my favourite; the slow cooked lamb was so tender and the rice it came with had a nice texture of sliced almonds. Desserts-wise the ruz ib haleeb was a simple pistachio-flavoured rice pudding which was pretty good although after having so much rice as mains the last thing we wanted was more rice. Also pistachio-flavoured was the unique Halawet el jibn, which was rolls filled with cream that somehow had a bit of savoury in it. Another thing we’d noticed was the inconsistent portions; for example, as entrees, the chips was served in small bowl but the dips and vegies were generous in portion. Similarly, the Mansaf was served with tiny bowl of tabouli, whereas the Masawi came with a generous serving of Fattoush. Non-food wise, the dim-lit restaurant gave off a cool, cosy ambiance, and the servers were very friendly although food was not served very promptly. Overall, a pretty average, non-memorable dining experience.

Really friendly staff especially the Kuwaiti waitress. Some of the food is exceptional such as the msakhan and the haneen. But the shawarma was burnt when toasted and the kibba was really small for $14. The designs in the place are phenomenal especially in the bathrooms. Next time I will know which food to order. All the best.

A must-try restaurant to go out of your way! First time trying Jordanian & Middle Eastern cuisine and now I can't get enough of it! My friends and I ordered the Mansaf and Zarb to share. Very keen to try the Knafeh for dessert but they sell out later in the evening. So will come back earlier next time!

Been coming here since 2018. Always fantastic service, great coffee and amazing food. We had a work lunch end of last year for over 50 people, staff were so accommodating and set menu was delicious. Back for dinner tonight with a friend, service and food as always, outstanding. Love the traditional black tea with mint, have never had a meal I have not loved, food is always so fresh.