Saturday, September 15, 2007

Restaurant review - Addis Cafe

This will probably be my last blog post of the weekend as I have a gazillion things to do (unless I get bored with work in which case I might blog again). But I can't leave this one out of print (or online publication) because I had been wanting to go for Ethiopian food at Addis Cafe on Commercial Drive for a long while.

My good friend NW and I hadn't seen each other in a few years (unbelievable considering that we live in the same city and very close neighbourhoods -- but bear in mind I had been away from Vancouver for a couple of years too). N and I share very similar views, and in some ways, there's a lot of work that we do that is similar.

Anyhow, we agreed to meet here for lunch. Ethiopian food is very social and I've become sort of the "guy to ask about where to eat Ethiopian in Vancouver" with my friends and colleagues, so I am pretty confident that I know almost every place that serves this type of food.

The staff were super sweet (I am not sure if they're the owners, but definitely had the feeling that they were). The great advantage: they take credit cards, debit or cash. N was kind enough to treat me to lunch which I really appreciated, but more than that, it was the opportunity to catch up that made the occasion special.

We ordered a vegetarian combo with chicken (5 veggie items and the chicken in the middle). I absolutely loved it. I found the veggie portions a little smaller than I have tried at, for example, Red Sea Cafe and Fassil on Broadway and Fraser but the flavour was great. I couldn't finish eating simply because I was so full.

The great thing about NW and I is that we're able to synthesize what has happened in our lives in a few minutes. We both have MBA training and thus know the value of transmitting our ideas across within a very short time frame. It pretty much took an hour and a half to catch up on the last few years and we both promised we'd get together much more often now.

I also should credit NW with a few lessons (I am not sure she knows I learned all this from here but here they are...
  • How to itemize my work into discrete units (she's great at it).
  • The value of good writing (she's an excellent writer).
  • The value of good people skills (she's fantastic to network with!)
It was a great experience, so the good food was just a nice added touch. "Icing on the cake" as they would say.

Addis Cafe in Vancouver

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