One of the greatest things about living in a cosmopolitan city in America is the access to almost every kind of ethnic cuisine. From Spanish tapas to Ethiopian cuisine, it seems that San Diego has it all.
Like most, I thought I would be in food heaven living in Italy for a year. Eating my plates of garlicky seafood pasta with rich Etna wines I was, but there were days when I longed for the warm taste of coriander or the cool green wasabi that sends jets of fire through your sinuses. Don’t get me wrong, like most, great Italian food (specifically Sicilian) tops my list, but the classic flavors of basil, thyme, and oregano can seem slightly lackluster at times.
My longing for something non-Italian was rewarded one day with my discovery of a small dingy shop named Istanbul Kebab on a tiny medieval Street in Siena, Italy. All I can say is I was not disappointed. Messy, juicy, and meaty, with every bite I became convinced that I had discovered the new it-food, something better than the California burrito from Rigoberto’s.
Sicily knows Kebab as the best drunk-food ever. Fast Food Indiano, your one-stop shop for kebab is the center of Catania’s kebab craze. Open six days a week until six in the morning, it also sells cheap beer to the large student population that inhabits Piazza Teatro Massimo every night of the week.
San Diego, with all its international cuisine, seems to have missed out on the kebab craze. Fiji it seems has not. That is how I found my self this Saturday eating kebab from Kebab King at the Morris Headstrom mall in Suva. Although Kebab King did not quite meet my high Sicilian expectations, it was unmistakably a kebab. It’s only too bad that my diet didn’t allow me to eat the pita wrap.
Buon appetito from Suva!
TYPE 1 TRAVELER 