Eat Like an Egyptian

Mazag Café

by David Snyder

When the Wednesday special landed at the table next to me, the customer — already a regular — could not contain himself."Ah, voila!" he crowed dramatically. An elongated "bravo!" came next as he admired his plate. And after his first bite? An effervescent "merci beaucoup."

Food often moves people to exclamation, sometimes even in another language. But you don't expect to hear such stuff in a 16-seat coffee shop. Then again, Mazag Café, at 10th and Carpenter, is not your ordinary café.

Tired of the corporate world, Dahlia Osman, a 10-year Philly resident who hails from Egypt, decided to open Mazag ("good mood" in Arabic). In addition to Miscela d'Oro coffee, homemade pastries and warm service, Osman and her mother, Nemi Assaad, also dish up Mediterranean salads and small plates.

Wednesdays, though, are special. On this day — and only this day — Mazag serves koshary, an Egyptian dish that Osman makes by molding medium-grain rice, lentils and pasta on a festive plate and topping it all with a light tomato sauce. It sounds too plain to warrant exultation, but the harmonious blend of flavors that had my neighbor cooing come from house-infused garlic vinegar (drizzled on tableside), bitter fried onions and a deliciously nuanced homemade hot pepper sauce. After a few bites, I found myself wishing I knew how to say "delicious" in Arabic so I could pay the dish the compliment it deserves.

Other eats are also praiseworthy. It takes a gentle hand to integrate delicate currents of lemon, garlic and onion into baba ghanoush's smoky mashed eggplant. I used my finger to clean out the cup of yogurt cucumber sauce that accompanied tightly wrapped grape leaves. Mazag uses tender, crunchy rolls from Artisan Boulanger Patissier to make generous panini. The rice- and tuna-based Egyptian salad was also generous, though it needed more acidity.

The intriguing nutty vanilla flavor in the dessert-like sahlab, a warm, creamy Egyptian drink made with orchid powder, made me want seconds. The allure of Mazag's bold, cardamom-laced Turkish coffee, though, was even harder to resist.

"Delicious" in Arabic, Dahlia later told me in an interview, is "laziz." "Taamo shahi" ("great-tasting") can also be used. But if you're not comfortable showing love in a foreign tongue, no worries: Mazag satisfies in any language.

(david.snyder@citypaper.net)

Mazag Café | 1001 S. 10th St.215-925-1842

Hours: Mon.-Fri., 7 a.m.-7 p.m.; Sat.-Sun., 8 a.m.-6 p.m.

Breakfast, $1.50-$8.50; Panini, $5.50-$7; Salads and small plates, $3.50-$10