A very pleasant dining experience for both families and friends, small groups or large, Lumee, a Mediterranean-Middle Eastern restaurant in Alkhobar’s Corniche district, packs all the traditional flavors you want in a lively, welcoming atmosphere.
Walking in during Ramadan, you are greeted with the warm, familiar scent of Saudi coffee continuously passed around tables by staff.
The restaurant itself is quite large and busy, yet it sits at just the right sweet spot between homey and exciting. Its wooden structures, trinkets, and decor reflect a cultural theme that is felt in the menu as well.
Let’s start with the appetizers: My favorite was definitely the hummus with beef. The hummus was perfectly creamy and garlic-forward and the beef charred with flavor. I kept dipping my bread back in for this one.
Their Arabic bread was a highlight of the meal as well, thin with the right amount of crisp and softness.
The chicken musakhan fingers were deliciously crispy on the outside with great flavors on the inside (albeit a little more filling would have been ideal). They were paired with a well-balanced yogurt sauce that wasn’t too garlicy.
The majdool salad, a citrusy green salad with chopped dates, offered a refreshing start, but I did wish for more dates to balance out the acidity.
I would definitely recommend the mini za’atar and cheese samboosa — hot, perfectly crispy little bites with a cheese that is delicious and creamy. You’ll wish you just had one or two more at the time.
The Sheikh Al-Bathenjan, a char-grilled aubergine with muhammara, tahina, walnut, and pomegranate, was a great starter as well. While the aubergine itself and the muhamarra could have packed a bit more flavor, they were cooked very well with a good balance of ingredients.
Now for their mains: As always, we start with the best and, for me, that was the chelo kabab: tender, flavorful meat and not too heavy. I had been craving Persian food for a while, and this definitely helped satiate that.
The Ghoozi lamb shank with daqoos did disappoint me a bit. The rice was very good, their daqoos delicious (speaking as daqoos’ biggest fan), and the meat almost fall-off-the-bone tender — yet it really lacked flavor.
Lumee’s take on chicken shawarma — round with flat bread — is not a bad option. Though it did not blow me away, it was a welcome change from the rice dishes.
The chicken kabab, however, I would skip. Though it was cooked well, I thought the combination of spices did not work well together.
I would no doubt recommend Lumee. Take a few friends or family along and fill up your table with all kinds of dishes that give you a little taste of what home looks like across the region in a comfortable, busy atmosphere resembling gatherings at your grandma’s house.
