Mateo H.
Yelp
Updated hours for Ramadan Kareem (2025)
Ramadan - New Hours:
- Thursday-Tuesday 4PM-9PM, Wednesday- CLOSE
- We failed to check hours for Ramadan. Also, the hours on Yelp and Google are not updated for the long holiday.
We waited 20 minutes outside since we were excited to try Somalian food for the first time!
Food:
- Food alone gave this place
- They serve East African, Somalian food known for their goat platters and samosas.
Sports plate $43: A huge portion and Serves 2-3 people. We got Goat and Chicken with Chapati (flatbread), Basmati Rice, mixed stir fried. It was an amazing combination of spices that created a diverse array of aromatics and flavors into the food. Coupled with the Basbaas green hot sauce and Bizbaz white sauce made it a more complex experience. My bf even said he was crying it was so good lol I would definitely come back just for that.
- Mandazi $2: Deep fried, sweet, sesame bread. Was a nice additional speciality bread to mix sweet and savory flavors with the Sports plate.
- Sambusas (Samosas) $3 each: Deep fried, crispy Ramadan snack filled with ground beef, green onion, wrapped in spring roll type wrap. It was good but was my least favorite but you can tell it was made with fresh ingredients and made at that moment.
FREE TEA. It is self serve in the restaurant. It is a sweet black tea spiced with cardamom, great quality even after cooling it off with water.
Water is not free. Bottled water $2 each BUT the waiter was so nice he did not charge for the water.
Location:
- Located in VTA Ohlone-Chynoweth light rail station in a strip mall.
- Easier access would be the Free VTA Parking lot off of Chynoweth Ave. side.
- You can cross over from Santa Teresa Blvd. side as well.
Service:
- Nice and Helpful service from waiter. We asks for recommendations and he recommended the goat sports plate
- Food came in 28 min
- We walked up to the counter to order quicker. We were given an order number.
- Free seating when we were there.
Ambiance:
- Casual, cozy
- Not busy upon opening with 3 customers total was there
- Comfortable colorful chairs, marble floors
- Opened double doors and turned on ceiling fans for cooling
- Nice decor, Somalian artifacts on the walls
- Restrooms: Very clean, single person restrooms. No code necessary for both restrooms. There is a code key on Women's door but it's not active. Double locks on women side. There is a kettle in the women's restroom I'm not sure it's use.