Food Trip: Aden Restaurant. My Favorite Yemeni Restaurant.

Don't get me wrong my friend. I still love to eat Pinoy foods but somehow my taste buds learned to adjust to different flavors while living in Dubai for many years. I am easy to please when it comes to food and would eat anything served on the table with gusto even when I am full. Be it Indian dish, arabic or any middle eastern cuisine.

But there is always one dish that I loved to eat more than anything else. Not only me but my family have learned to eat as well.

That is Mandi.

Mandi is a traditional dish from Yemen. Mandi is made of basmati rice, lamb or chicken and spices. There is a lot of restaurant serving Mandi dish in Dubai but there is one restaurant that I always go to everytime I wanted to eat Mandi. I go to my favorite Yemini restaurant - Aden Restaurant.

Aden restaurant is located in Dubai-Sharjah road in Al Tawoon area opposite Al Mukhtar bakery. There is enough parking in front of the restaurant but sometimes parking is difficult during lunch and dinner time. The restaurant has 2 floors. The ground floor serves as a reception counter and dining area which are divided into arabic sitting and table sitting. The second floor has the toilet and have cubicles reserves for families.

  

Being a frequent customer, the waiters already knew what we wanted to order:

 - Medium grilled fish - not spicy (you have the option to make it little spicy or spicy). You can order small or large fish.The name of the fish is Thanoor. Unfortunately I don't know the name in English.

medium grilled Thanoor fish

 - kuboos or big flat bread

kuboos or big flat bread

 - chicken mandi

chicken mandi

and one big bottle of water, I always order a can of Coke for my "burping effect" after the meal :)

While waiting for the orders we were served with a soup, their own version of salad with lemon and a bowl of spicy blended tomatoes as a sauce.

soup

salad

spicy blended tomatoes sauce

The way they grilled the fish is that they the split the Thanoor fish in half and put spicies depending on preference and baked in the oven. The chicken mandi always come with a generous portion of rice. You have to try eat the kuboos bread while it is warm because as it get cold the bread will be tough to eat. 

can you strip the fish to the bones like this? ......    :)

The restaurant always serve fresh fish. And it is all worth it for the bill of 60 aed I paid for 4 people. You can also asked for a mint tea to be served at the end of the meal. 

----------

How to get there:

If you are coming from Dubai:
- make a U turn at al Khan Bridge going back to Dubai.

If you are coming from Sharjah:
- after al Khan bridge before Mona Lisa clothing shop

Nearby Attractions:
Al Qasba

DIY: Half-day trip to Jebel Jais, RAK

One of the things I love about UAE is that there lots of outdoor places I can visit during the cooler months. Of course there are familiar destinations that are always on my list but there are new and exciting places that I can keep my weekend exciting if schedule permits.

I will be posting a series of  blogs about where I have been and the outdoor destinations I visited. For this post I will share about my trip to Jebel Jais.

One of the new and upcoming tourist outdoor destinations is located in Ras Al Khaimah. North of UAE, Ras Al Khaimah or RAK, is one of the seven emirates of UAE. It is about 130 km from Dubai or less than 1.5 hours to drive, depending how fast you can go in the highway. (120 km/hr is the maximum speed in most of the highway in UAE) In RAK, there is a new mountain destination called Jebel Jais (Jebel = Mountain) is starting to draw tourists from different emirates because of its cooler weather. Jebel Jais is considered to be the highest mountain in UAE. I have read in social media that during winter months there are instances that the summit of Jebel Jais is covered with snow. 

It is fairly easy to navigate to Jebel Jais from Dubai. 

Brown signages in UAE leads to historical sites and tourist destinations

If you are coming from Dubai or Sharjah using Mohammed bin Zayed road make a free at the round about that connects to Sheikh Muhammed Bin salem road. I reset my car odometer here to zero. After passing two flyovers I reached the clock roundabout. I made another free right on Khazam road. Take another free right from the next roudabout. The road will slowly bend to your left and you will find a golf course on your left. Keep driving until you reach the Lamp roundabout. Go straight. 

To your right there is an Emarat petrol pump. This is the last petrol station you will find going to Jebel Jais. You may fill your gas tank or take a quick toilet stop. From this point there are road signs pointing direction to Jebel Jais. Don't forget also that you need to pass the military camp on your left side and a oil depot to your right. When we went to Jebel Jais one week end we followed a group of tourist cars heading to that direction so it was fairly easy for us.

No. That is not Jebel Jais yet

The road is relatively flat and in good condition. As the city is slowly fading into the background the scene is replaced by huge boulders of rocks and barren mountains with roads cutting through the mountains and valleys. 

I am actually driving through a dry wadi (wadi is a river bed). The surrounding area have signs of erosions with huge water barriers in some areas. I can see a very deep basin hollowed from the ground. I imagine that it serves as a catch basin for the water coming down from the mountains during the rainy season so that it will minimize the flood water going to the residential areas. Despite of these harsh conditions there are still local people living in the area because I can see few villas and herds of goats roaming freely in the area.

I reached another roundabout with a sign going to the left is Jebel Jais and to the right is Wadi Bah. We turned left and noticed a group of cars that we followed before that the stop in the first rest area. From here the road will start to incline.

Driving in Jebel Jais is similar to driving in Jebel Hafeet, another mountain destination in Al Ain. The road is divided into three. Two lanes going up and single lane going down and is lined by concrete barriers. I thought I would need a 4x4 car to drive to Jebel Jais but my 1.8 saloon car hardly made a sweat negotiating the sharp curved and steep climbs going uphill.

And watch out for the weekend cyclists too. It has become their destination as well.  

That is Jebel Jais summit at the photo. Look! 

I took us one hour and thirty minutes from the starting point (Km 0 remember :) ? ) to reach the last viewing area with few stops along the way for photo ops. That was quick! My car Odometer reads 63 Km. Knowing that it was our first time to reach Jebel Jais.

The last rest area is not actually the summit. The summit is still a few minutes away but we did not attempt to go there because it was still under construction and they put barriers on the road.

There are lot of campers in the area with tents and people setting up barbecues. I counted seven rest stops with toilet facilities along the road. A small cafeteria can be found selling hot tea or coffee and snacks. There is someone cleaning the toilet and maintains the cleanliness of the area. 

I don't know if they allow overnight camping. But if they do, try to be extra careful especially if you have kids with you. If you plan to do camping try to reach early before sundown because there is no street lamp yet at the moment.

solar powered toilet facilities with running water

The trip to Jebel Jais will take only half day if you leave early and don't plan to camp overnight. For us, being rewarded with this awesome view of the valleys below from Jebel Jais is enough for now. I am sure we will come back again.

We end our weekend get-away driving back to Sharjah to eat lunch at Aden Restaurant.

the view from the last camping area. See those ZIGZAG road leading to the top. 

----------

How to get there:

There are inter emirates public buses travelling to RAK. But for this trip it is better to take your car or you may rent a car.