Robin Garr's LOUISVILLE Restaurant Reviews

85	Abyssinia 3220 Frankfort Ave. (502) 897-1706

Remember when you were small, how much fun it was to eat with your fingers, and how irritating it was when your mother would scold you for doing it?

Well, head for Abyssinia, my friends, and indulge yourselves! At Louisville's first authentic Ethiopian restaurant, dishes are served the traditional way, with soft, tangy injera flatbread offered as both starch and utensil, and nary a fork or spoon in sight (unless you ask).

Ethiopian fare isn't entirely unknown in the city. Some of these dishes were on the bill of fare at the original Utopia restaurant (which Abyssinia succeeds in the same quarters); and downtown's Cafe Kiliminjaro includes a tasty Ethopian dish or two among its international mix of tropical cuisines.

But Abyssinia is Louisville's first and only full Ethiopian restaurant, staffed by friendly Ethiopian servers and chefs and serving up what appears to be a reasonably authentic version of this spicy East African cuisine. It has been a long time coming - original plans were to open this restaurant last March - but an early visit suggests that it was worth the wait.

The setting is frankly a bit spartan, a small, older building on the outer reaches of Frankfort Avenue, a bit east of the busy "Restaurant Row" strip. It's a long and narrow "shotgun" layout, with a dark, simple but cozy bar and a few high tables and stools in a front room that's enhanced with a few attractive Ethiopian murals. A smallish dining room at the back has been brightened with bold colors, bright yellow over green, with a corner storage room painted burnt orange under a thatched roof. Mirrors, tiny white lights (maybe just for the season), and small photos on the walls complete the decor.

A half-dozen tables sport heavy cotton tablecloths (under protective glass) with attractive brown-and-gold abstract designs embroidered on white. Another two or three "tables" are furnished with unusual Ethopian serving furniture, a knee-high round wicker affair that looks a bit like a mushroom or maybe a sombrero. Drop in a serving dish, and two diners can turn to, with folding wooden trays on the side for their drinks.

Ethiopian music plays in the background, audibly but not over-loud; it's an intriguing blend of sounds, with a hint of Africa, a touch of Arabia, and a beat that's reminiscent of reggae music, pointing up the Rastafarian connection that blends threads of Ethiopian culture into Jamaica.

In honor of this happy cultural mix, we summoned a couple of Jamaican Red Stripe beers from the bar while we examined the menu, a document that may require some study, as many of the names of dishes will be unfamiliar to those who haven't encountered Ethiopian fare. Some of the names of dishes seem tough for English-speaking tongues to handle, but the management provides a short glossary ("doro" is chicken, "wot" is stew, "sega" is beef and "fit-fit" is a condiment made of injera mixed with stew), and each dish is clearly described in plain English.

Five appetizers are offered, from $3 (for sinigkaria, stuffed jalapeño peppers with seasoned tomatoes, onions and herbs) to $5 (for timatim-fit, injera mixed iwth tomatoes, pepper, onion, lemon juice and vegetable oil, or our choice, sambusa, a beef-and-pastry turnover).

Main dishes include 10 entrees made with poultry or beef, all $8 to $10; seven vegetarian dishes start at $6. If you would like to sample, combo dinner featuring small portions of different dishes are available, with three vegetable dishes at $9 for one, $17 for two, or three meat dishes at $12 for one and $23 for two. All entrees are served with two vegetable side items and injera, the traditional Ethiopian flatbread made with teff, an indigenous cereal grain. Rice is available as an optional alternative, but I recommend the injera, which is integral to the Ethiopian dining experience.

Ditto for the "traditional" serving style: If you're put off by the idea of eating with your fingers from the same plate as your friends, you may order your meal in individual bowls and plates (and request a knife and fork). But doing it the Ethiopian way is part of the fun.

The menu adds a star beside some entrees to denote hot and spicy, but only one or two are so marked. Our dishes weren't bland by any stretch, but compared to Ethiopian places I've enjoyed in New York, Washington, San Francisco and Chicago, Abyssinia's fare is a bit on the mild side, perhaps toned down until they get Louisville accustomed to Ethiopian tastes. If you want it hot, however, add $1 to entrees for a side order of fit-fit, a fiery condiment made from injera and hot peppers.

There's a full bar, but no exotic Ethiopian brews, not even tej, the traditional honey wine. But the aforementioned Red Stripes made a fine match with this spicy fare.

We started with a shared order of sambusa ($5). Thin flour pastry, similar to won ton wrappers, was folded into good-size triangles around generous portions of flavorful ground beef with fine-chopped onions and green peppers, seasoned with elusive spices and a good waft of peppery heat, then deep-fried golden brown, sizzling hot and crisp. They were so good that we could have probably eaten a half-dozen each and skipped dinner. But more good things awaited, so we moved on to Ethiopian dinner for two.

Dinners served for sharing in the traditional fashion come on shallow, attractive earthenware bowls a good 18 inches across, carpeted with a pizza-size round of thin, soft and rather spongy injera. The injera was topped with two mounds of each entree plus separate rations of red and yellow mashed-lentil side dishes, a order of Abyssinia salad (a tasty but not particularly exotic salad of romaine, tomatoes and thin-sliced onions in a simple vinaigrette), and three more portions of injera rolled into egg-roll-size portions. Tear off a piece and use it to pick up and eat bites of food with your fingers. If you're good, you won't even need a napkin. I'm not that good.

Doro wot (chicken stew, $9) was very much like a spicy chicken barbecue, with long-cooked shredded chicken in a thick, pleasantly spicy brown sauce, along with a whole drumstick and a whole hard-boiled egg with an odd but not unappetizing dark color and chewy texture that suggested it had been simmered in the stew for a long time.

Tikil gomen (a vegetable main dish, $8), was outstanding. Earthy and delicious collard greens were long-cooked with chunks of onion, carrot and potato, elevated with a blend of savory but not overly hot spices that turned these simple ingredients multi-dimensional. This is typical of Ethiopian fare: Interesting, aromatic and exotic flavors, it might remind a casual observer of Indian dishes, with its meats and vegetables long-cooked until they share their spirit with their thick, spicy and exotic, aromatic sauces.

If you have the time, finishing the meal with a leisurely pot of Ethiopian coffee ($2.50) is highly recommended. Remember that Ethiopia is the original home of coffee, which is said to take its name from the town of Kaffa where it was first cultivated. (One attractive Ethiopian legend has it that humans first discovered coffee's energizing properties after watching goats dance excitedly after eating ripe coffee "cherries" in the wild.)

In Abyssinia's version of the Ethiopian coffee ceremony, ground coffee is steeped in water in a heavy, black ceramic pitcher that sits directly on the fire (this takes a while, so be patient) which is served on an insulated pad in a wicker basket. The coffee was smooth and mellow with almost a chocolate taste; sugar and cream are offered, but the coffee was so clean and delicious that we enjoyed it black, pouring small portions into tiny cups.

A tasty and filling dinner for two, including the beers, came to an affordable $30.92, and friendly and attentive but not obtrusive service earned a $6.08 tip. $$

(December 2002)