Travel: Hundred dollar night in Doha, Qatar

The other day, we decided to have some Turkish food in the vicinity of Doha. In the midst of the city, we found this restaurant called Turkey Central Restaurant. Sounds authentic to me.

 

So we walked in and first thing that you will see is the shawarma meat being shaved off the grill. We're off to a good start. Walked in and went upstairs to dine in.

A glossy paper menu is given with half written in English and the other half in Arabic. There was a lot of food to choose from. From hummus to shawarma to BB-Q'd meat. We chose to share appetizer so we ordered the Maza appetizer which consists of Tsiziki sauce, hummus, olives, and a lot more. It is then served with hot, freshly baked pita bread.

Excuse me while I wipe my mouth, still salivating while I picture the things that they had to offer.

 

 

The service was not the greatest, mostly because of the language barrier, but they are attentive.

Here is the picture of the bread with the Maza getting scooped down. It is delicious.

Here is the meat plate. It's an orgy of the mouth.

Shawarma Plate. Fries and meat hiding under the seasoned bread.

 

I wish I can tell you guys about what the food consists of and all that jazz about it, but I am really no expert when it comes to this. From what I can tell, it's one of the best Turkish food I have ever had. Even one of the guys that was with us, confirmed that everything that they offer in this restaurant tastes the same as the ones offered in the streets of Turkey but in a lot cleaner environment.

 

To top it all off, we paid QR (Qatari Riyals) 167.00 for the whole table. That's $47.00 to feed five big full grown man. Trust me, we had a lot of left overs. Well worth it.

We then walked down the street to purchase some baklava from Pattiserie Sweets. I bought half a ki of pistachio baklava for QR 35. Close to $10. It was, again, delicious.

To end our night, we decided to go down the souqs to hang out, enjoy a cup of coffee and smoke some hookah. We sat there for about 2 hours, I had a cappuccino and ordered strawberry mint shisha to smoke. For the 5 of us, it costs around the same amount of money we spent to eat. It was QR 160 for coffee and shisha.

One hundred dollars to feed five person and enjoy the scenery of downtown Doha was a budget compared to other city America has to offer. When you get the chance to visit this country, hopefully around the winter/spring timeframe due to lower temperature and comfortable weather to cruise around town, try these places and explore others. Thanks Doha!

The view where we were sitting at while smoking shisha.