Khan's BBQ

February 28, 2019

Khan’s BBQ

I’d been looking forward to going to Khans ever since Maso invited us. On Thursday, we piled into his car and ventured out into the night. OK, it was about 7:00 pm.  “What is Khan’s BBQ?” you ask? Weeellll, in about 1983, a car repair shop opened up. It was owned and operated by five sons of an Indian family. The mama of the family made great BBQ so in order to bring in a bit of money on the side, she barbecued up a batch of meat every day and sent the boys out to sell it on the street outside the shop. It became very popular and people lined up.  They set out a table in front of the place BUT it became even more  popular. People bought their meal and laid it out on the bonnet of the cars on the street to eat it. (Bonnet = Hood). Maybe they ran out of car bonnets or maybe it was getting a bit out of control… but the next step was to open up the car shop as a restaurant, which they did in 1989. Then it was official.

 Now, every evening, 7 days a week, they move their barrel BBQs out to the street and cook away. During the day, it’s still a car repair shop.

They added a table of salads. The next generation of the family waits table, gets drinks, keeps things stocked. The youngest member looked to be about 3 years old.  He was “assisting” with the meat cooking.

In order to accommodate the busloads of foodies, they rent porch space from their neighbors. The streets are congested from 5 to 11 every night. You can see some of the people across the street behind us.

And it’s oh, so good. Absolutely the best chicken e-v-e-r. Mama Khan really has her secret recipe down pat. In addition to the chicken, we had what looked like tubes of shaved mutton, kabob of beef, Zanzibar pizza (nestled next to the chipsies)….

“Zanzibar pizza” makers pan-fry their crispy, stuffed snacks with pride. More like a mash-up of a crepe and savory pancake, these tasty fried pockets of dough house a dizzying array of fillings…” (https://www.atlasobscura.com/foods/zanzibar-pizza)

The naan was extremely good, too. The final sweet treat is called Jalebi, which is a spiral of sugar and citrus… hard to describe. You can see it on the right in this picture. Sooooo yummy.

People had pretty much cleared out by the time we left.  I took one longing look back, wishing that I had two stomachs to give to food…..