Finally an Arab Restaurant in Orland Park Americans will love

One of the best Arab American restaurants in the Southwest suburbs and in Orland Park, the heart of the Arab community, is Zwar at 9328 W. 159th Street. Zwar offers the best tasting Middle Eastern food items that you can order.

By Ray Hanania

Americans (non-Arab) ask me all the time, what’s the best Middle East restaurant where hey can go to get the best tasting Arabian food.

There have been a couple that I like like Fattoush, at 107th and Harlem Avenue, and the Nile restaurant at the southwest corner strip mall at 87th Street and Harlem Avenue. In the Bridgeview area, they have the best tasting Arabian food.

But finally, in Orland Park, which is the heart of the Arab American community, a new restaurant opened under new management called Zwar that offers the absolute best tasting shish kabob dish of any restaurant in the Chicagoland area. It is the absolute best.

Zwar, located on the east side in the Jewel-Osco shopping mall at 9328 W. 159th Street, offers a beautiful and clean dining room and a large menu that offers almost every Arabian dish you might want.

Classic and great tasting Shish Kabob plate with skewers of beef, lamb, and kuftah on a bed of yellow and red rice at Zwar in Orland Park. Photo courtesy of Ray Hanania

Run by a Jordanian woman, Saedah Alhmound, the menu is fresh, carefully made and served with the customer in mind. It’s perfect for American families that have come to love Middle Eastern foods. You have to give it a try.

Zwar offers a full menu of Arabian foods. My favorite is the shish kabob plates that offer skewers of chicken, beef, lamb and “kuftah” which is spiced ground beef made with a slightly spicy edge served on a bed of yellow and red rice and sliced onions and tomatoes on the side. You can purchase dinner plates of each meat kabob or a combination platter.

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Click here to view
Steve Dolinsky “The Food Guy”
report on Zwar Restaurant

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Sides include hummus that is phenomenal with the freshly made bread, and a small dish of tabouli (diced salad with burghal).

Other food selections include baba ghanoush (eggplant dip), falafel and also stuffed falafel. You can order the hummus with ground beef splashed in the center with almond slivers and chick peas and olive oil, and hummus with shawarma, or as Americans commonly call it, Gyros. Greek and Arab foods are very similar, but they are not as spicy as are Spanish or Indian food servings.

traditional plate of hummus with chick peas and olive oil at Zwar restaurant in Orland park. Photo courtesy of Ray Hanania

You can see the full range of Zwar’s menu at:

https://togo.dylish.com/restaurant/zwar-restaurant/home

Like most modern restaurants, mainstream or ethnic alike, Zwar offers a menu scanned with your cell phone using a QR Code.

Another favorite of mine is Kibbeh (or Kubbah) which is a football shaped outer crust of deep fried cracked wheat stuffed with ground beef, onions and pine nuts.

Tabouli salad at Zwar restaurant in Orland Park. Photo courtesy of Ray Hanania

They offer a breakfast menu of egg-based meals including omelettes and kalayeh, a Middle Eastern style of stir fried tomatoes and onions with or without ground beef.

In addition to a wide range of meat dishes, Zwar also offers seafood options, too. And they cater to vegetarians, too, offering vegetarian stuffed grape leaves, vegetarian shish kabob, and th eVegetarian Plate.

They also offer sandwiches (pita bread and wraps) and shawarma or gyros-type sandwiches and plates.

Remember, this is a brand new owner, and no one cooks better than Arab women. She has the best chef working for her, a cook who has worked at the best restaurants in the Chicagoland area.

Anis cooks filled with dates at Zwar Restaurant in Orland Park. Photo courtesy of Ray Hanania — Anis cookies filled with dates at Zwar Restaurant in Orland Park. Photo courtesy of Ray Hanania

Syrian or Pita bread. Photo courtesy of Ray Hanania — Syrian, or Pita bread. Photo courtesy of Ray Hanania

Arabian coffee at Zwar restaurant in Orland Park. Photo courtesy of Ray Hanania

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Ray Hanania

Ray Hanania is an award-winning opinion columnist, author & former Chicago City Hall reporter (1977-1992). A veteran who served during the Vietnam War and the recipient of four SPJ Peter Lisagor Awards for column writing, Hanania writes weekly opinion columns on mainstream American & Chicagoland topics for the Southwest News-Herald, Des Plaines Valley News, the Regional News, The Reporter Newspapers, and Suburban Chicagoland.

His award winning columns can be found at www.HANANIA.COM Subscribe FREE today

Hanania also writes about Middle East issues for the Arab News, and The Arab Daily News criticizing government policies in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Hanania was named "Best Ethnic American Columnist" by the New America Media in November 2007, and is the 2009 recipient of the SPJ National Sigma Delta Chi Award for column writing.

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