Ambakas @ Gazi

Friday night out in Gazi.

I intended to try Asty 68, but found it closed due to summer vacation.

Passing in front of Gazohori which is expanding even more (it looks more like an "area" than just a "place"), we arrived at a relatively new Cretan restaurant, Ambakas, which was empty at 8 o'clock in Friday evening. We saw only 3 other patrons during 2 hours we were there.

It is a small restaurant, a half of the tables were on pedestrian walkway and the other half inside. We seated outside. It is one of the back streets of Gazi and I don't think it is particularly attractive. The interior decor looked much better, but good Greeks should eat al fresco.

On seating, they brought us a bottle of mineral water, two small glasses of tsipouro, and this dip & dakakia (small Greek rusks).

And pieces of bread in a bag. These looked like home-made.

The menu is printed on the paper that is used as place mat. There are a wide variety of Cretan appetizers (mezedes). Besides, there are 5 or 6 salads, about 10 Cretan main dishes, and also grill dishes. I don't think there was any fish, but there were many dishes that did not contain any meat. I would say that there is a good range of choice.

We ordered only 3 dishes, but could not clear them all.

First, Cretan salad, which was a variation of Greek salad.

What is Cretan about? It contained mitzithra instead of feta and there were some pieces of small dakos. And small & dry Cretan small olives. Vegetables were crunchy and I liked it, although 6.50 Euro looked a bit expensive.

After a while, we got the appetizers. This is mixed appetizers for 2.

The presentation was really beautiful and the price also really good. I cannot say that I liked all of them, but some of them were quite sympathetic. I liked particular the keftedes made from fava. It cost only 10 Euro and we got stuffed only with these and bread. Very good buy.

But we had already ordered one main dish; "Cretan" pork souvlaki (9 Euro).

I thought that the souvlaki should be a safe choice, but but I was wrong. The pork had unpleasant smell of pork and contained some sinew-ish hard parts. The potatoes were either double-fried or boiled before frying.

After the meal, they offered us two pieces of cakes on house.

These were like ravani, but contained green grapes. Very good.

With a bottle of Alfa beer (3.10 Euro), the total bill is 30.60 Euro. The food did not convinced me totally, but for this price I might come back to try something else.

Ambakas (Άμπακας)
Ikarieon and Orfeos 34
Gkazi, Athens
Tel. 6949 731675


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