Tarboosh

After watching a basketball game and leaving a bar, I still was hungry. There were few places that were still open that looked good. This place caught my eye. I love Mediterranean food in general and have at at several places. Tarboosh is one of the top places for me. I ordered the chicken shawarma wrap and it was made right in front of my eyes. The set up is similar to Subway, where the staff member asks you what you want in your wrap. Food was fresh, fast, tasty, had good value, and the wrap was quite large. I highly recommend this place for a late night meal.

Love that Calgary has a place open so late with decent food. We typically come in from the NW just got some decent late night food.

I love the chicken shawarmas from here! they are wonderful! The staff is great too!
I could definitely eat here everyday!

on a spit at least not just coming from a steamer like cedars deli on edmonton tr. Beef was kind of stringy and fatty and not too good. Needs to be cooked waaaay longer or they need to use a higher quality of meet especially for the prices they charge and location they are at. Mango drink had a solid layer on the bottom like its been sitting forever.

I LOVE TARBOOSH! For my friends and I it has evolved from a post bar staple to a regular occurrence at least once a week. The chicken shawarma is no joke! Did I mention that they are open 7 DAYS A WEEK UNTIL 4 AM?! Perfect for your Sunday Funday, Messy Monday, Twisted Tuesday… See what I’m getting at? — Gigs

We found ourselves at Tarboosh after having to leave Tubby Dog disappointed and just needed to eat something at that point. Although I do have a go-​to falafel place, this one is pretty darn good. Fresh and tasty without being too greasy. Quick and polite service. I’m not sure I’d come here out of the way, but I would return if I was around and in that mood.

I skipped dinner because I had a shoot that ended late. Around 11:45pm I needed some food and I was happy to see this place was still open. Great hours of operation with 1am weekday closing and 3am Saturday closings!
The lady that helped me was friendly and made me a great donair. The meat was as good as I’ve had and the wrap was large enough so it didn’t fall apart on me.
I will be back again!

Sometimes the pretty lady you see at night ain’t as pretty during the day.
And this is how I’ll begin my review of Tarboosh. I’ve walked in here several times at night in post-​bar state looking for their most greasiest wrap and my requests have been adequately met. Serve me your finest gold brick of salt, fat, sugar, and carbs and save me from an upchuck session, then we have ourselves a good night.
Again, I repeat, the pretty lady you see at night ain’t as pretty in the day.
I’m not sure if it was the owner or the manager, but he got mad at me when I showed up with an entertainment coupon. Dude, I’m just trying to squeeze out another free falafel, that’s what it says on the coupon and if I was born with the tattoo «cheapskate» on my head then so be it. Our conversation:
«Oh, the entertainment people, they printed that wrong! they… you call them!!»
«Don’t worry about it. It’s Sunday and I don’t want to go through all that trouble, in fact I don’t have to at any day of the week. Can I just order some food?»
«OK!»
Maybe I’ve gotten snarky but still, coupon debates are the bane of society, they really are. They bring the worst out of everyone and TARBOOSH, you should have just let it fly. Just sayin.
But most this review mostly covered the meal experience I had. Maybe I didn’t have that 6^th shot of tequila my new best friend bought me but my sober palate didn’t enjoy the same falafel and fries I’ve been getting. For the price the wraps were small and the fixings were limited. The salt garnished with fries was a bit much for me so I asked them to bathe it in hot sauce for me.
So much sodium, my liver’s PTSD is acting up.
Unilocal’s 30 Day Challenge 12 — ¹⁄₃₀

I watched Party Girl over and over again as an impressionable youth until I learned every word to the movie. Ever since, I was inspired to order «a falafel with hot sauce, a side order of Baba Ghanoush and a seltzer» every time I walked pass a Mediterranean restaurant. I have walked passed Tarboosh a multitude of times and decided today to stop in and ask for my regular although it was my first time here.
I was not disappointed. Firstly, I think it’s incredibly awesome that I watched him form my chick pea patties before deep frying them. It was the equivalent of watching the chef make home cut fries. And then I loaded it up (except for onions — seriously, like men, if a vegetable makes me cry, it has no place in my life) with hummus, lettuce, tomato, pickles and pickled turnips (yum!).
Although the restaurant was nicely decorated with a plush couch in one corner to lounge on, I opted to eat outside in the sunshine and was thankful for tables right outside the door.
Next time you are walking by, stop in and enjoy!

Tarboosh! Where have you been all my life, cuppycakes? Your place is so clean and organized, the staff is so friendly and made sure all of our food was new — no scraping every last drop out of a bucket of 12 hour old hummus here!
Making fresh falafels to order with an ice cream scoop, all the tahini and sambal olek I can shake my fist at, dolmas, fragrant rice and potatoes and a bed of veggies — all to go in to my tummy full of blueberry vodka at midnight? I LOVE YOU. Let’s run away together and start an obnoxious FB profile called Tiffyboosh, where all the photos are of us having delicious times together.
Falafel Crew 4 Life.

If we had such a clean, trendy place back in Vancouver, I’d be eating more of these falafels ;)
And when these places have a website, that’s the extra star. Believe in marketing.
Ordered the chicken shawarma, this is enough to fill for 2 ppl. And the garlicy sauce, truly yummy.
Lots of seating and a better place to grab some food late at night instead of rotten ronnies lol.
Kinda hidden from 17^th ave, lots of side street parking.
It’s worth a repeat.

I always wonder what new name this place will be. In the 5 years I’ve worked downtown on 17^th, Tarboosh is the 3^rd Donair place to serve that style of cuisine, though from a turkish point of view from what I can tell.
The chicken schwarmas are priced not bad, at around $ 10 a sandwich more or less, and they have the other items like donair, lamb meat and so on, and the spices on the meat are about right. They also have a good selection of vegetables over all, and they use an especially nice large pita wrap that enables them to fill up the wrap completely with as little leakage as possible. Add the fact that every time I’ve been there, I’ve encountered a few turkish national there as well, which speaks volumes when the actual ethnic community supports the place.
My only complaint would be the fries. I’m not quite sure, but I believe that they either need to try a different oil or drain it way longer. It could have just been a bad batch, but my order of fries as so incredibly greasy that it actually soaked through the wax bag it was put in and covered the inside of the plastic bag that was in. Needless to say, I kinda loss my appetite for french fries right there.
So overall, it’s a decent place to try out, especially after bar hopping and you want a late night snack. For me, I’m sticking to it during the days.

The first time I went to Tarboosh was last night and they almost let me pay for my falafel in balloons (almost).
If you see that Pizza Hut around 11^th and 17^th, turn north and look for a little red awning on the corner, you will have found one of the best shwarma places I have been to in a long time.
They make the falafel fresh (point); they wrap everything in a whole wheat pita (point); then wrap it tighter in a thin triangular piece of pastry that holds it together (point); they have good toppings like pickled yams and parsley (point); and when it’s full, they give your wrap nice grill lines on a panini-​style press (point).
The sauce portions are generous and garlic-​ier than anything I have ever tasted ever — so if you don’t like garlic stay far far away from the garlic sauce. I do like garlic, so I was probably way way too close to the sauce.
Even the french fries that come with your meal are delicious and they will give you extra garlic sauce to dip them in — which, ps is excellent mixed with the ketchup but not mixed with your breath.
I like Tarboosh, the staff are swift, the food good, the portions generous enough to feed me and my sister post-​party and there is lots of delicious, delicious garlic. I think next time though, I’ll bring gum.
T.

Before we ate all the cream puffs we had just picked up in Mission, off we went in search of some chicken/​lamb shawarmas! You know when you are just in the mood for something and nothing else will do? Well, we needed THIS food to fill us tonight. We had seen a road sign for Tarboosh before on 17^th Ave and steered the car right to there. Parking was available on the side street (10^th St SW). The place had a steady stream of customers which was a good sign but never got too busy. I imagine late night, 1am– 3am they would be packed. We took a seat and enjoyed our chicken and lamb shawarmas. VERY good. we were able to choose our own ingredients and I was even able to make mine extra spicy with chili sauce. I enjoyed the array of fresh additions and the wrap itself was warmed and very fresh yet still able to hold up to the heap of meat, sauce (garlic, hummus, tzatziki) and veggies. These were LOADED! Price on par with Calgary. We also bought 6 vine leaves which my hubby said very good. I thought he was taking them home, he said he thought they were an appetizer! I brought home a spicy beef patty and I will tear into that tomorrow. All around a good choice and we would give them our business again. No complaints about service, washroom nor seating.

I have recently had a couple of visits to Tarboosh after passing the giant sandwich board pointing around the corner of 10^th street to FALAFEL AND SCHWARMA. For some reason something about this sign always makes me feel like it might be a trap and my falafel loving self will actually be kidnapped if I turn that corner. Luckily this is not the case.
My first visit to Tarboosh was admittedly a little bleak, but it was at around midnight after my friend and I got so into some wii tennis matches that we forgot to eat dinner. She lives just a few blocks away from these guys so we walked over. Aside from witnessing too much exposed chest chair and tacky gold chains on the gentleman providing customer service, it was okay. They were knowledgable about what, as a vegan, I could and could not eat. Upon getting our food home (I felt too uncomfortable to sit in, the space is strange), we discovered that the falafel while a little dry was good, and we fell in love with the grape vines but I fall in love with every grape vine because I am a grape vine harlot.
The next time we visited was actually during the day, about a week ago which was far more pleasant. We caught who I believe to be the owner of the place, I believe (because she thought it was our first time in and PROMISED we would be back because she makes all of the food herself), and got falafel plates. These were okay. The serving of hummus wasn’t a lot, and the salad served with it was a little bit on the gross-​washed-​ice-​berg-​lettuce side. But otherwise everything was pretty tasty and probably some of the better fast food options in the area.

Located just north of Pizza Hut on 17^th you’ll find this little shawarma eatery. It’s actually bigger on the inside than it looks from the outside and scattered among the cafeteria-​esque décor is about 10 small tables and two couches. Of course one can always take out and most customers here do.
This is a family run business and they do a decent job of satisfying their customers. I had a beef shawarma with guava nectar juice. Though I have had better shawarma in the city (e.g. Falafel King) and the meat portion seem to be a bit stingy, the guava nectar was stupendous. Never had anything like it!
Perhaps it’s a bit strange that the thing that impressed me the most here was a bottled juice.

I don’t know how many times I’ve passed the big sign on the corner of 17^th Ave and 10^th St that says «Shawarma, Falafel, Donair, Tabouleh & more» with a big red arrow pointing north. Today I just happened to pass it when my stomach was telling me it was time for lunch.
I walked towards the door expecting to find the donair shop I’ve been accustomed to finding in Calgary — small, hot, smelling of donair meat. To my delight, I walked into a room decorated in reds, whites and browns. Seating is ample with a combination of bench seating, high bar tables and lower café style tables, and even a leather chair and sofa set.
Tarboosh features a different lunch special every day of the week (Mondays it’s okra with beef served with mama’s rice for $ 9.99). They’ve got a menu for dine in or take out and they’re open late on the weekends for you late night appetite folks.
I was über impressed with the service. As the woman behind the counter put my chicken shawarma together, she kept up a bit of friendly chatter and even complimented me on my hat. Dear Tarboosh, flattery will get you everywhere, especially when your food, service and establishment are all this good.
Next time you pass the big sandwich board sign, follow it down the street a ways and shawarma yourself in friendly falafel goodness.
On my eat-​o-​meter, I give them 4 yums up.

There is lots to like here, including – as was on offer at Pharaoh’s, the resto that Tarboosh has replaced – freshly-​made falafel. Unfortunately the outside pita on my chicken shawarma (they do the double-​wrap thing like Shawarma Knight does) was stale and the whole thing sort of broke apart as a consequence. I also got a chix shawarma plate that had a microscopic serving of very good hummous– I’m happy to pay for more, but you need hummous!
Tarboosh is open very late, at least until 2a and sometimes 4a.