Kouzina

LOCATION: 1649 Beacon Street Waban, MA 02468
TYPE OF FOOD: Mediterranean
REVIEW: Words like, "Mediterranean", "Asian", "European", and "American" are extremely vague terms, especially when it comes to food. For instance, Mongolia is as much as China is in Asia (nothing is better than listening to a little morin khuur on a Friday night). What's especially even more vague is when you look at the menu and wonder what country in the region does a certain dish come from (how does a restaurant expect to me to know where qovurma comes from?). That was the case when I stepped into Kouzina, looked at the menu, and wondered, just wondered.

What in the world is a "bronzini"? Apparently it's a fish, but to me, it sounds like some Arabian piece of furniture. Why is "pita" spelled "pitta"? It honestly doesn't make sense to me whatsoever: do we spell cake "cakke"? Despite these confusing things, I was able to decide my meal choice within the space of a few minutes: the lamb "pitta" sandwich. It took a few minutes to cook my meal, but thanks to the magic of the Internet, you only have to read one sentence in order to understand that fact. Or maybe two. Or maybe three. Or maybe four. But wait- five! But wait- oh, whatever.

The sandwich was strangely wrapped in tin foil, and was cut in half so you would get two sandwiches. It came with French fries with Feta cheese mixed in, but as I don't eat French fries, I ate the Feta cheese. It was very good, and high quality. The sandwich itself had a liberal dose of tzaziki sauce, which in this case was a good thing and it kept the sandwich wet and with a nice yogurt flavor. The lamb in the sandwich was cooked well, and was nice and chewy, as well as flavorful. The pita itself was perfectly grilled, and all in all, the sandwich was very delicious. The only problem I could see was that the meat was dripping juices, and as a result it got all over my pants and caused them to get wet. Oh well, it's a side effect of a tasty meal.

SERVICE: The service was fine, but not overly exceptional. They did their job (any guesses would be greatly appreciated) and they did it well. Apparently that job extended outside of serving food (oh, that's their job! I thought they were carrying the nuclear football-my bad!). From what I could see, they were also doing garnish and helping make the food. This is unusual (I decide what's usual and unusual! Got a problem with that?), but Gordon Ramsay doesn't know, so it don't matter. Gosh, all that Hell's Kitchen is is him having a temper tantrum. I mean, the show is good at times, but come- oh. I review food. Not shows. Sorry.

ATMOSPHERE: This is where the major problems came. The atmosphere was a real letdown. The owners hung up several mirrors and paintings as the only decoration covering about fifteen percent of the right wall, but the paintings and mirrors looked old, as if they had been up for years (the bottom of them looked orangey, rust anyone?). The floors didn't look too appealing either, though they were clean. The bathrooms though are a mess. The faucet was really working, and it overall looked like it hadn't been cleaned in a few days. I was only in there for at most two minutes, but maybe that might have been a good thing. Maybe, just maybe. Just maybe. Just maybe. What does that mean, anyway?

PRICE: Thanks to a certain recent tropical storm I'm doing this review in a bookstore, next to a Starbucks, on my laptop. And thanks to my laptop's strange inability to open PDF files, I am unable to, for certain, give the price. I do believe it was in the neighborhood of nine dollars, but I could be wrong. The price could be twenty dollars, but that doesn't matter. For any price, the food was excellent, and I would pay one hundred dollars to eat the sandwich. Taking out, of course. On my couch. Watching football. And hoping to avoid a Coors Light commercial. Oh yeah. Living the dream.

RATING: Kouzina is a place which serves excellent food with good service at a reasonable price. The major downside which prevents a perfect score is the lousy (yeah, I gots me a vocabulary!) atmosphere which really forces you to takeout, if you have that option. But I don't know that for sure. Why? Well, I'm in a bookstore. Sitting on a highchair. Typing this review. My left arm's falling asleep, and I'm hoping, really hoping, that this gets through Blogger. How's your day been? Kouzina gets a three out of five.