7944 Mason Montgomery Road, Mason
Phoenician Taverna serves up superb, authentic Lebanese food in a Mason strip mall. Owned by Wassim Matar, the restaurant has established a glittering reputation in its half-dozen years of operation, recently turning up on local top 10 lists with downtown and Over-the-Rhine establishments helmed by famed chefs with names like Salazar, Falk and de Cavel. The menu lists less than a dozen main dishes, everything from fatteh bel a traditional yogurt dish with chicken, lamb or eggplant served in layers with chickpeas, warm yogurt garlic sauce and sautéed pine nuts to a simple kebab of meat chunks and vegetables over rice.
Appetizers, or mezza on the menu, are listed in three sections: cold mezza vegetarian, hot mezza vegetarian and not vegetarian.The hot mezza vegetarian list offers mouth-watering items such as a cheese pie and a spinach pie (fatayer bsbanigh in Lebanese), described as homemade dough filled with spinach, pine nuts and sumac onions in lemon and extra virgin olive oil. Mr. Matar, would you consider opening a second location in the city?
Photo: Hailey Bollinger