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| - We visited Le Petit Alep last night for the first time. We had checked it out the day before and noticed there were lots of people waiting at 8pm, so we thought we'd beat the crowds and get there by 6:15. Luckily we did, as we noticed people were already starting to wait for tables at the bar by 6:45.
We were seated right away and brought menus and a bottle of cold water. After about 5 minutes or so, a waitress came by to ask if we'd like drinks. We mentioned we would like a bottle of wine, so she said she'd have the sommelier come over. That seemed a little strange to us for such a casual restaurant. The sommelier arrived about 5 minutes later and suggested a few wines to us. We ordered and he brought our wine within a few minutes. He poured it for us and returned to top up our glasses a couple of times during our meal.
We waited for about 10 more minutes before our waitress reappeared to take our orders. We ordered the Aleppo cheese plate to start and 3 main dishes. We noticed that all tables were given a small basket with a bag or two of mini pitas. It seemed strange that the pitas were served in plastic bags, but I guess that's so that they won't dry out.
Our cheese plate arrived garnished with some fresh arugula. There were 8 slices of Aleppo cheese, drizzle with a little olive oil and what looked and tasted like a sprinkling of za'atar. It was quite tasty, but I felt it could have used a little something else (maybe olives?).
Our main dishes arrived a few minutes after we finished the cheese plate. We had one Chiche Kebab plate which had filet mignon with onions, topped with grilled pieces of pita bread, green salad and a rice/vermicelli combo. It was very tasty and the steak pieces were rare as requested.
We also ordered the Baked Lamb plate which had baked lamb in a sauce with pine nuts, rice and green salad. The lamb was quite tasty and moist.
The final dish was Poutine D'Alep. This tasted exactly the same as the baked lamb dish, but it was served atop french fries which had the same sauce as the baked lamb and was also topped with aleppo cheese. It tasted just as good as the other lamb dish, but it really could have used a fresh element such as a salad as it was very heavy.
The waitress came by a few times during our meal and was very friendly, as were the other wait staff we encountered.
The prices were fairly good. Our bill was around $85 before tax and tip.
All in all it was quite a nice meal. If we were in the area for more than a week, we may return to try other dishes.
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