Food Review : Comptoir Libanais at Cheshire Oaks *

If you are feeling adventurous and are in the mood to try some Lebanese food, why not head to Comptoir Libanais‘s newest restaurant located in the shopping area of Cheshire Oaks.  The restaurant at Cheshire Oaks opens an hour before the shops open and closes an hour after the shops close.  So if you have planned a long day of shopping (discovering the 145 stores located in Cheshire Oaks), why not stop off at Comptoir for either breakfast, lunch or tea first and treat yourself to a Lebanese style hot cooked meal before your day starts. We had the chance to recently visit their restaurant and here’s our review of the place.

No matter which Comptoir Libanais you visit, the decorations do not disappoint. At the moment they have over 20 restaurants all over the UK offering clients a wide range of Lebanese food from breakfast to supper.  We have previously visited one other store of theirs which is based in The Spinning Fields, Manchester to sample their Christmas menu and we loved it.  We noticed similar bold and bright colour scheme in the Cheshire Oaks branch with lots of middle eastern patterns and pictures on the walls.  It feels as though you have stepped into Lebanon for a full experience of great ambiance, great food and excellent service.  In Cheshire Oaks, there is an upstairs section to their restaurant and you can choose to sit on the top if you wanted to (which we did).

Lots of drinks are available from teas, to cocktails, mocktails and wines, we started off with our the Fresh Rose Mint Tea which was served in a silver teapot.  It is a refreshing drink with lots of green tea, mint, rose water flavours coming through, and you can have it hot or iced as well.

For starters, we first ordered the Lamb Kibbeh which was minced lamb (locally sourced) which is cracked wheat parcels filled with lamb, pine nuts and onion served with a mint yoghurt sauce and sprinkled with pomegranates. The lamb kibbeh was tender and very moreish, the yoghurt sauce complimented the meat. This starter cost £6.95 but we would totally recommend this dish.

We next ordered the sharing Mezze Platter which cost £9.95, which is also a perfect vegetarian dish. This is perfect sharing platter for two (if you are having mains after) or great for one if you are not having any mains.  Our platter consisted of hommos, baba ghanuj, tabbouleh, falafel, natural labné, cheese samboussek (which was a pastry filled with cheese), flatbread and some pickled vegetables.  Like most people we had our favourites which was the dips…to our surprise, the baba ghanuj came tops!!  Made with aubergines (you wouldn’t have guessed it) there was a lovely creaminess to it and you could get the smokiness of the aubergine coming through. The hommos was delish as always. The labne is actually a form of cream cheese made from fresh yoghurt which tasted yoghurty. The tabbouleh tasted fresh of course and the hot spicy chillies gave the dish the heat it needed. We were not too keen on the cheese samboussek and the bread was not as soft as we would have preferred it to be.

We can’t recommend Comptoir’s homemade lemonade enough! There did have 4 different versions on their list but we tried 3, which was the Leymona Lemon & Lime (lovely sour flavour to it), the Roomana Pomegranate & Orange Blossom (refreshing with the orange blossom flavour coming through nicely) and finally the Roza Lemon & Lime with rose syrup (which was my favourite). The regular sized drink costs £2.95 while the large sized drink costs £3.75 (these were the regular sized ones).

For mains, we first ordered the Lamb & Prune Tagine (costing £13.45).  The pieces of lamb was cooked to perfection with prunes, butternut squash, roasted almonds and sesame seeds. The store manager, Stu (who looked after us) asked us if we wanted quinoa or rice, and even suggested rice but we opted to try both. After trying the dish, we totally had to agree with him that the rice tasted better with the dish as the quinoa turned a little soggy. The lamb was tender and the sauce was so flavoursome, the prunes gave the dish a bit of sweetness which had a lot of spice but not enough heat!

This is a gluten free dish and salmon is basically one of my favourite fish so I was looking forward to trying this out. The Spiced Salmon Shakshuka which costs £13.45 was served in an earthen dish. The salmon was roasted and you could get the smoky taste soon as you bite into the fish and this was slow-cooked in an olive, tomato, peppers, onion and chilli shakshuka sauce and topped with sliced fried crispy onions. Not our favourite dish as we felt the salmon had a strong taste to it but the sauce was the star of the dish and was totally delish!!  We just kept mopping the sauce with our flatbread. We were told that this was one of their spiciest dish in the restaurant, but personally, I would have liked it to be a little spicier.

As we finished our mains, we could not stop to admire the walls and designs of the stunning restaurant. Tony Kitous’s flair for bold colours and designs can be clearly seen in each of his restaurants. With three cookbooks under his name, he is doing everything he can to get Middle Eastern cuisine mainly Lebanese flavours be more recognised and celebrated. Again being in the restaurant and seeing families of all shapes and sized coming in to order a mezze platter only reinstates what Comptoir Libanais is about..the sharing of – Family, Food and Love.

For desserts, we were served a selection of 6 pieces of baklawas, these can also purchase as presents for family and friends as they come in a beautiful gift box. We also tried the Mango & Vanilla Cheesecake (which is hands down my favourite dessert here (besides the rice pudding which I had with their Christmas menu). The cheesecake had a delicious topping of sweet mango puree, pomegranate seeds & pistachios. The biscuit base was not as crispy as we would have liked but still, this was cleaned off pretty fast. Next, we tried the Orange Blossom Mouhalabia, similar to a pannacotta, this is a more traditional version of it with Lebanese flavour. The milk pudding was topped with date, fig, apricot, prune & sultana compote and I could get some strong spice smell coming through. Worth trying is you wanted something more traditional.

Things to note:

• Comptoir Libanais does serve a delicious Lebanese style hot cooked breakfast if you are at the restaurant early (they also serve pastries and croissants too)
• They do take-aways, so feel free to give them a call and have dinner ready if you don’t have time to cook dinner as you have been busy shopping all all
• They also cater for private parties/office gathering/family functions, do speak to the staff/manager for details.
• Sign up to their newsletter on their website for free baklawas
• If you loved their food and want to recreate it at home then why not Tony Kitous’s cookbooks?  He has three published books at the moment all available on Comptoir Libanais’s website.

About Comptoir Libanais

Tony Kitous is the man credited with putting the glamour into Middle East cuisine and providing the people of the Western World the opportunity to experience real, wholesome and healthy Lebanese food in a souk-like setting.  Comptoir Libanais means ‘Lebanese counter’ and that’s exactly what it is: somewhere you can eat casually, with no fuss.  The first Comptoir opened its doors in 2008 and has been steadily growing since 2015 and has seen them open their doors to their first Comptoir outside of Greater London which is Manchester.

Where is Comptoir Libanais?
Unit 171
Cheshire Oaks Designer Outlet 
Kinsey Rd
CH65 9JJ
Tel: 07826 869409

What are their opening hours?

Monday – Saturday 9am until 9pm
Sunday 11am until 5pm

How to get to Cheshire Oaks

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*We were invited to review the food at Comptoir Libanais, all opinions are our own.