A Surprisingly Delightful Buffet at Sabra Restaurant

In my previous post, I expressed my immense love for buffets, especially being a great option for an inexpensive and filling meal.  Today, I dined at a lunch buffet at Sabra Restaurant in Newton, MA.  They featured traditional Mediterranean dishes with many vegan options.  At $10, it was a great bargain, as the food contained high quality ingredients and was freshly made.  The server was also very attentive and quick to answer our questions about which dishes were vegan, since there was no signage. 

I decided to start my meal with soup as an appetizer. The vegan option was a lentil soup. 

The soup was delicious and very flavorful. It was so thick and the various beans added an extra chunkiness. This was a comforting soup and tasted wholesome and hearty. It was a great way to start my meal.

I made two rounds through the buffet. The first time, I loaded up on all the various salads and rolled my own falafel wrap. The second time, I focused on filling up my plate with my absolute favorites, thus creating an even more invigorating experience in my mouth. 

Everything on the first plate really complimented one another. The dolmas (stuffed grape leaves) were oily on the outside and stuffed with a mushy rice mixture that spurt out as I bit into it. The tabouli mixture was light and refreshing and was a good contrast to the heavily soaked salads coated in olive oil.  The cous-cous dish was lightly spiced and had a touch of oil and worked really well with the other dishes. The falafels were crispy and deep fried with a soft, chewy center. These are perhaps the best falafels I have ever had. They were perfected by the creamy, decadent hummus, with subtle notes of tahini. 

As I went back for my second plate, I made sure to get the most oily salads and even more of that amazing hummus.  I put some extra tahini sauce on this time and a light coleslaw dish to make the falafel wrap a little more savory. These salads were so satisfying and while they filled me up, I did not feel disgusting afterward.

Overall, I really enjoyed this meal. The food was top-notch and even though it was very healthy, the taste was not compromised. I would love them to add even more vegan options and perhaps be a little more experimental with their dishes, but it's still a great choice for a delicious, filling lunch.