Open Sesame

Los Angeles, United States

4.3

Closed now

20 reviews

Accepts Credit Cards

Contacts

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Telephone:
+1 323-525-1698
Website:
www.opensesamegrill.com
Address:
7458 Beverly Blvd, Los Angeles, CA, 90036
Fairfax
Nearby public transportation stops & stations:
0.7 miLa Brea
1.9 miHollywood/Highland
2.1 miSunset & San Vicente
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Bussiness info

Takes Reservations
Yes
Delivery
Yes
Take-out
Yes
Accepts Credit Cards
Yes
Good For
Lunch
Parking
Valet, Street
Bike Parking
Yes
Wheelchair Accessible
Yes
Good for Kids
Yes
Good for Groups
Yes
Attire
Casual
Ambience
Intimate
Noise Level
Average
Alcohol
Full Bar
Outdoor Seating
Yes
Wi-Fi
No
Has TV
No
Waiter Service
Yes
Caters
Yes

Today

Today 11:00 am – 11:00 pm
Closed now
Local time (Los Angeles) 4:29 AM Friday, November 29, 2024

Business hours

Monday 11:00 am – 10:00 pm
Tuesday 11:00 am – 10:00 pm
Wednesday 11:00 am – 10:00 pm
Thursday 11:00 am – 10:00 pm
Friday 11:00 am – 11:00 pm
Saturday 11:00 am – 11:00 pm
Sunday 11:00 am – 10:00 pm

Description

Specialties

We specialize in Authentic Mediterranean Cuisine from Lebanon.

We have many Vegan, Vegetarian, Gluten Free and Raw choices.

Our food is prepared and served fresh daily and all our meats and poultry are 100% Halal.

We serve award winning Beer and Wine, both domestic and international.

Since 1999, Open Sesame has specialized in off-​site Wedding Receptions, Large Corporate Events (up to 800 people) and Home Entertainment.

We use only the freshest ingredients with no added preservatives, prepared in a wholesome and flavorful way. We go above and beyond the expected to ensure that your event is tailored to be the exact experience and budget you desire.

History

Established in 1999.

The very first Open Sesame is still located in the bustling neighborhood of Belmont Shore, where it has established itself as a crowd favorite for authentic Mediterranean cuisine.

We offer generous portions which features a variety of Mezza, Charbroiled Kabobs, Lamb Chops, Filet Mignon, Chicken Tawook, Shrimp and our famous Shawarmas.

The menu also includes a wide selection of Vegan, Vegetarian and Gluten free Dishes.

In addition, the great atmosphere and beautifully themed décor complement the overall dining experience. The menu may be simple, but honestly this «culinary oasis of Mediterranean delights» is guaranteed to give your taste buds a welcome respite from the bland and mundane.

Open Sesame Catering is also the perfect solution for all your events — no matter how large or small!

Meet the Business Owner

Ali K.

Business Owner

It all starts in our scratch kitchen with authenticity and tradition.

In our family the passion is passed through generations using food as the vessel.

Our food is a result of forefathers and their pursuit of culinary perfection.

We meticulously combine spices and herbs, hone our knife skills, dissect wines and spirits, and perfect the art of service to prepare ourselves for the next time you sit at our table

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20 reviews of Open Sesame

No registration required
Place rating: 4
Los Angeles, CA
This place is pretty delicious. I ordered a dish with steak and chicken. It was so tender, moist, and flavorful. The pricing is decent as well. We got the falafel appetizer by checking in on Unilocal and that was good too. I’m a monster when I eat and the portion here did me well. The rice is delicious too.
Place rating: 3
Los Angeles, CA
Really wanted to give this place a five star, because the food was good. I really struggled between 2 and 3, because of the service.
The patio was very nice with heating at night. We ordered the Mezze plate, which had a good portion of various dishes, all were good. However, it took forever for our entrée dishes to come out. We finished all the apprizers, had refilled our drinks, and the meat still didn’t come out. It was at least 30minutes after we had ordered when finally got our kebob and lamb entrée. We had the sultan plate, which consisted of tiger shrimp, filet mignon and lamp chop. The shrimps were my favorite. The salad, rice and hummus that came with the entrée plate were good and in large portions.
Although the food was slow, we still enjoyed the experience. However, when we got our check and was going to sign for the tip amount, we saw that a 18% tip was already charged to the bill. This made us feel extremely uncomfortable. I understand that restaurants sometimes charge tip automatically when the party size is 6 or above, but there were only 3 of us there for dinner, and no where on the menu says they would charge tip on the bill. We were in a hurry to leave and didn’t want to bother asking the waitress about it. Honestly, I normally would pay more than 18% when service was nice. This action of the restaurant or the waitress has totally damaged the great experience we had for the evening.
Place rating: 5
Arcadia, CA
I’ve been to this place several times, and have been going to the Belmont Shore locations for several years.
Service — Absolutely wonderful. Pleasant and welcoming always. I appreciate how the service is consistently great with the Belmont Shore locations.
Food — Can’t go wrong with anything on the menu. My go-​to apps and entrees are the yogurt dip, Baba ghanouj, chicken tawook (with spicy hummus, rice, and the Open Sesame salad), chicken shawarma, and pita wraps.
Dessert — Oh. My. God. The chocolate lava cake with almond ice cream. ORDER IT. DO NOT LEAVE WITHOUT ORDERING IT. It’s so moist and perfectly baked. Simple and not overdone with chocolate drizzle, and absolutely perfect in every way.
Place rating: 5
Orange, CA
Best Mediterranean food ever. No place can beat the service the quality of food. If you think you know Mediterranean but haven’t tried this place try it out. All those I bring to open sesame fall in love with it. 100 000 stars
Place rating: 3
Irvine, CA
I came here by myself and I waited 30 min+ for my food! The restaurant was not super busy and yet the service is too slow! It is not my first time at Open Sesame, but my first time in this location. Please do something about the service… I am definitely not going to come to this location again.
Place rating: 5
Los Angeles, CA
I love this restaurant! If you enjoy hole in the wall restaurants, with a touch of class, this is your spot!
I came here for an afternoon lunch and upon walking in, you feel as if you’ve traveled into the story of Aladdin. The décor and style definitely takes you away.
Their menus were probably my favorite thing. It wasn’t your typical style of menu but rather the owners knew what they were doing. They gave their menus a unique look and «Open Sesame» is exactly what you think when you’re about to open their menu; their selections are vast and adventurous. There is something for everyone, unless you don’t like Middle Eastern food.
They have plenty of vegetarian/​meat/​chicken options. Many dishes and varieties to choose from. I tried their soup and vegetarian burger which was delicious!
Plenty of seating inside and outside.
Very chic and elegant in style and service. Everyone here was very polite, friendly, and attentive.
I can’t wait to come back here and try more of their dishes.
Place rating: 5
Los Angeles, CA
Excellent Mediterranean food. The potato appetizer is great, Chicken Tawook too.
It takes some time for the entrees to hit the table, but it’s worth the wait. Highly recommended.
Place rating: 5
Los Angeles, CA
Beautiful entrance, beautiful food, and beautiful people that work there. I was craving Mediterranean food, and this place stood out to me when I looked it up. I said to myself, «I need to try this ASAP» — I mean all the pictures looked delicious. I was hanging with my girlfriend, and she and I agreed instantly that this was the place to go.
Upon looking on the outside, I was super impressed at how beautiful it is. It makes you feel like you’re in a authentic place. Upon entering, we were greeted by a young lady who was so amiable and sweet — wish I had asked her name. The décor inside is so beautiful — it has a sleek/​bohemian style to it.
The menu is the perfect size — not too much, and not too little. I ordered the Shishkabob, with hummus, and salad with feta cheese and olives. It was DELICIOUS! I cannot get the taste out of my mind! It was just out of this world! Service was spectacular! please come here if you ever want to try it out!
Place rating: 5
West Hollywood, CA
This place is awesome. It is Saturday and currently super busy, but the service is fantastic. Our waitress Skyler gave us great recommendations. For my entrée I got the Chicken Tawook. It was delicious. It came with salad and spicy humus. In addition to warm pita bread. This place is definitely worth checking out. Fantastic service and tasty food.
Place rating: 3
West Hollywood, CA
I want to come back and give this another chance. I came in for lunch and was not overwhelmed by the lunch specials, so I could come back for dinner at some point. I will say everything was fresh and flavorful, but just missing something that left an indelible mark on me.
I had the larb and DC had the filet mignon. Check in on Unilocal for a free appetizer.
Service was pleasant and the price point fair.
Place rating: 5
Costa Mesa, CA
We walked in without a reservation, bad idea on Saturday night ! Make sure you make a reservation. Fortunately, there was space at the bar.
Ruby, the bartender, was amazing. She recommended several plates and explained everything in detail. She was also super friendly and quick. Everything we asked her to bring she did it quickly.
We ordered the raw kibbi and the sultans plate. Both were delicious. The lamb was the best part of the meal, I would definitely recommend it.
The dessert we got, crisp akawi, was savory. It was like having a cheese empanada, it was yummy.
We will be back. The overall experience was excellent !
Place rating: 4
Santa Monica, CA
Great middle eastern food! Really loved everything we had! Great for vegetarians!
Place rating: 4
Arcadia, CA
Guys, Lebanese food is delicious! I came here earlier this year with a bunch of friends and we had a great meal here. Street parking here is such a hassle so we all did valet parking, which is $ 5.50. We had a reservation (since we were a large group) and there was a long table waiting for us. The staff here is really nice and friendly.
We got the following appetizers to share:
– FRIED POTATOES: Our famous potatoes, sautéed with cilantro, garlic, roasted chili and lemon juice.
I love potatoes so we had to get this to share. How can you go wrong with fried potatoes? Answer: you can’t.
– FRIED CAULIFLOWER: Served with onion, tomato and tahini sauce topped with sautéed pine nuts and almonds. Served with pita.
I am not a fan of cauliflower, so I was very pleasantly surprised by this dish. It was quite good.
– GRILLED HALLOUMI CHEESE AND WATERMELON: Grilled halloumi cheese and watermelon slices.
Refreshing and delicious.
For my entrée, I got their CHICKEN SHAWARMA PITA SANDWICH: marinated chicken cooked on an upright spit, thinly sliced with garlic sauce, tomato and wild cucumber pickles. This was quite flavourful and delicious.
A couple tips:
– Check in on the Unilocal app and you get a free appetizer!
– Get a lot of garlic sauce. A lot. It’s so delicious.
Enjoy! :D
Place rating: 4
Orange, CA
Came here for the first time for date night. We sat outside where they had a cute set up and a heater above us.
Starter: if you check in you get a free appetizer! We got the arayes which was eh, okay. We asked for yogurt dip and it tasted better.
Entrée: I got the open sesame combo. The beef kabob was tender and had a lot of flavor. The chicken was good once paired with the garlic (so good) or yogurt dip. My least favorite was the kafta. It was just okay. My bf got the Ali’s favorite. His dish was delicious. The sauce they use to sauté the steak was tangy.
Cocktail: Sesame standard cocktail was so good and refreshing because it has muddled cucumber. Highly recommend.
Place rating: 5
Los Angeles, CA
I confidently consider myself to be a potato expert. I don’t have a degree in it or anything, but I have potato street smarts and a deep love of these stem tubers. And that is why I can tell you right now, the lebanese potatoes served at Open Sesame are the best potatoes you will ever taste in your whole life. You will probably be sad that you ordered anything else because you need more room for these potatoes.
Friendly place, great food, nice décor, and they have really quality paper towels in the clean bathrooms. Full bar that I could fancy sitting at and enjoying cocktails. But even if this place had none if that going for it, these potatoes would win it a 5 star rating.
Place rating: 4
Los Angeles, CA
Pretty good Mediterranean food. Came with family so got to try a couple of things (=
APPETIZER
Fried Cauliflower (4 stars): Really flavorful. Sauce it comes with goes with it well.
DINNER
Chicken Tawook (4 stars): Tender chicken! Good garlic sauce but I have had better. Wild cucumber pickles were fresh, not too sour.
Grilled Tiger Shrimp (3.5 stars): Cooked a little too long… it was a bit chewy. I’m pretty picky on how my seafood is cooked.
Lamb Chops (4.5 stars): Really juicy, not chewy at all, they cooked this really well.
Spicy hummus (5 stars): Creamy! So good.
Open Sesame Salad (4 stars): All of their salads almost sound the same. Not a fan of mint but it was actually pretty good in here. The feta they use is really good.
DESSERT
Pistachio ice cream (3 stars): If you like rosewater ice cream you’ll like this. I am not a rosewater fan /​= I feel like rosewater just takes over any other flavor, so you don’t taste any pistachio really.
Ashta ice cream (3.5 stars): Liked this better than the pistachio one.
Baklawa (4 stars): Good baklawa, not overly sweet. I’d recommend this for dessert.
SERVICE
Our waitress was really nice. Everyone who bought out food was great. They forgot to bring out one of our appetizers, but she was sincerely sorry about it so it didn’t bother us.
ATMOSPHERE
Sat outside so not sure how it is on the inside but it looked small. They have heaters outside but it gets pretty hot since they can’t control the temperature on it.
PARKING
Street (meter) parking is limited. Valet is $ 5.50 and all they do is park it in the back alley)= But had to do it after wasting 10 minutes trying to find street parking.
*Don’t forget the Unilocal check in for a free appetizer (=
Place rating: 5
Glendale, CA
My hubby and I came here for a late lunch today and were totally impressed. When you walk in, you feel like you are in another country. It has a great ambiance — dim lighting, good music, beautiful exotic décor. We were seated right away and Skyler was our waitress. She was so attentive and friendly and super bubbly. We really liked her!
The food was so delicious. As a vegetarian, it’s often hard to find Mediterranean/​middle eastern food that has a good variety. We started with the hummus and it was so flavorful and perfect. I love that they added fresh garbanzo beans in the center with olive oil and sumac. We also had the falafel which were very good — they were moist on the inside and very crispy on the outside and you could taste all of the spices inside. The tahini was very well-​made. Finally, we had the zaatar flat bread which was cooked to perfection — not too oily and not too dry. Yum!!!
The price is very affordable as well. They give you a free appetizer with checking in though we would come here without that! Amazing place, amazing service. Can’t wait to come again!
Place rating: 3
Los Angeles, CA
More of a 3.5 star rating. The food and ambiance was good but I don’t know. Something was missing!
I started off with the Yalla Baby Yalla cocktail which was sweet but kind of had a strange after taste.
The fried potatoes (appetizer) were good but the bottom of the bowl had so much damn lemon juice that it just totally turned me off. Even with the garlic sauce, I couldn’t get over the overwhelming acidity.
I had the lamb kebab which was actually really good. The basmati rice was also really nicely made but the salad was also very acidic. Towards the end of the meal, my tongue actually felt really sensitive due to the amount of acid. It kinda felt like it was cut which is why my rating is kinda low. Cut back on the acid please!
The environment is nice and the waiters are attentive. Kinda pricy but that was to be expected at a restaurant in this area haha.
Place rating: 4
Los Angeles, CA
YUM been wanting to try this place for awhile! Good authentic food!
Moroccan iced green mint tea was delicious!
If you check-​in you get a free appetizer, awesome!
Appetizers:
Got the watermelon and grilled cheese (3 stars) — I just wanted something light– this was pretty good, middle eastern cheese is def different and I like it! Would maybe try something else though next time.
Spicy Hummus (5 stars) — super fresh and also got more with our entrees that was their special house made and oh so good.
Entrees:
Chicken Tawook (4.5 stars) — really good flavor and tender, garlic sauce that comes with it is amazing (I love sauce & garlic hahaha), rice was good, the salad was amazing with it too. The one I get near my house is still the best, but this one comes really close to it!
Chicken Shwarma (5 stars) — Ok usually shwarma is really dry, not this one, this was actually the best I’ve tasted! They split it in half too and did this with the tawook.
Lamb Chops (5 stars) — Really good, tender and simple! My brother loves this!
Pita Falafel (3 stars) — My mom said this was better the first time she came too, a little inconsistent :(
Tabouleh (4 stars) — It was my mom’s second time, she said it was better the first time, but I enjoyed it.
Dessert:
Of course I really wanted dessert haha. They all looked so interesting and I wanted to try something different and crispy and flakey!
K’naafeh (3 stars) — I wish I would’ve stuck to baklava (one of my favs), says it’s a wheat pastry so I was thinking something flaky like baklava, this is more like a cake, the orange blossom with it was good, but this was just waaaaaay too sweet for me, got it with the cheese too. Interesting dessert but next time I’ll stick to the baklava. :(
Place rating: 4
Corona, CA
One of my favorite foods: Lebanese. That being said, I was excited to try Open Sesame.
**THE SETTING**
There are 2 locations. One in Long Beach and this one. It’s located on Beverly, facing the street. Street/​metered parking. It’s much smaller than I thought. That wasn’t a problem, I just thought it would be bigger. There’s an outdoor seating area, when you walk up the steps to the restaurant.
**THE SERVICE**
My server was waiting on the whole house when I first arrived. More servers arrived a little later. She acted as the bartender and handled all the tables well!
**THE DRINKS**
I ordered the Sesame Standard. Nice and zesty. Perfect amount of citrus taste, fresh. I recommend it.
**THE FOOD**
I’d read good things from fellow Unilocalers about the lamb here. So, I knew that’s what I would try for sure.
–Pita bread: nice and soft, good.
–Foul M Damas: (Fava and chickpeas, can be eaten as a soup) this came free with my Unilocal!check-​in. A nice bonus. It was very good. Subtle flavor, good serving size. It came with a vegetable plate that included: cucumbers pickles, radishes, tomatoes and onions.
–Lamb Chops: I ordered them medium rare and they did not disappoint! Very good! Also, the price (for the amount and size of lamb you’re served) is great. The meal came with rice and two sides and I chose hummus and salad, both good as well.
–Dessert: Ashta, or Rose flavored ice cream. Yummy! Highly recommend!
They cater and their food is great, so keep that in mind!
I will be dining here again!