El Jannah

Call it aioli, toum or skordalia, the popularity of garlic sauce extends to multiple countries and cuisines. Perhaps more than the chicken, the garlic sauce at El Jannah is the stuff that will keep you coming back for more.

But for now, let's start with the chicken. The eat-in charcoal chicken meal is of Lebanese bread, pickles and garlic sauce along with a quarter ($6.90), half ($10.50) or whole ($19.90) chicken. Middle Eastern hospitality means it's a meal and a half. It might be a by-product of an extremely large charcoal barbecue, but occasionally the chicken can be a little dry. One dunk into the garlic sauce (made to a family recipe) however, and all is forgiven.

The ‘chicken sandwich' (please don't call it a kebab) is the better bet. It's a feat of engineering to fit the amount of freshly pulled chicken, pickles and tomato they do on a round of Lebanese bread. It ain't food for the shy, that's for sure. The smoky chicken is complemented by pickles in alarming colours (bright green and neon pink), combined with a good whack of garlic sauce.

Often at a charcoal chicken joint, vegetarians are left running a distant second. Not so at El Jannah, with freshly fried felafels in the offing – crunchy orbs of chickpea goodness. Ask nicely and they will fry the felafel to order for a ‘felafel sandwich' that will leave even hardcore meat eaters satisfied. The chips are write-home good too, sprinkled with a healthy dose of chicken salt.

A few years back El Jannah bought the premise next door, levelled it and expanded the restaurant to cater for the increasing eat-in crowds. The regular queues out the door of the large but nondescript space lay testament to the popularity of this charcoal chicken restaurant. Is El Jannah a life-changing diner? Probably not; but for a hella-good chicken and garlic sauce, it's well worth it. Wilson Chung