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A moment, please, for the El Manara falafel – a mix of Ord River chickpeas, garlic and cumin, fried to order and available all day at one of Lakemba’s oldest Lebanese restaurants. “The secret,” says chef-owner Amir Sayah, a fixture of Haldon Street since 1989, “is the technique and the quality of the ingredients. You buy a car for $2000 and a car for $50,000. What’s the difference? Big difference.”

Each falafel is crisp and crunchy, light and fluffy, perfectly seasoned and wonderfully moreish. The Lamborghini of chickpea-based snacks, if you will.

Sayah prides himself on keeping everything just as it was when El Marnara first opened, down to the electric-blue service counter that doubles as a drinks fridge and the milk-bar-style menu. Food comes delivered on huge, old-school wood veneer trays. Photos of the Lebanese coast adorn the wood-panelled walls – a beautiful reminder of a bygone era when phones had curly cords and rooms had the word “rumpus” in front of them.

The private dining room out the back seats 10, but the best action is out the front, where you can watch the gentle ebb and flow of diners. It’s a beautiful dichotomy of destination venue and a locals’ local – one of the last bastions of an older Lakemba, once largely populated by Lebanese, Greek and Italian communities, now mainly Bangladeshi and Indian.

“Apart from its deliciousness, El Marnara is also extremely generous.”

That’s the beautiful thing about Sydney: it’s a moveable feast.

People come from all over the city to eat here and with good reason. Apart from its deliciousness, El Marnara is also extremely generous. The mixed plate (it’s been on the menu for 36 years) is packed with juicy grilled lamb and chicken skewers, hummus and tabouli (very hot!), pickles, falafel, garlic sauce, and pillowy Lebanese bread. Extraordinary value for $26.

Order a fattoush on the side for a little extra colour. The version here is jam-packed with red, green and yellow capsicum, plus radish, parsley and cucumber with crisp little pita bread treats on top.

It’s worth noting this is a dry restaurant – that means it doesn’t serve alcohol, and BYO isn’t welcome. They do, however, have a wide variety of Middle Eastern drinks, including tamarind-flavoured Kazouza 1941, which tastes a bit like a Lebanese sarsaparilla.

But if you’re reading this, I’m sure you’re more concerned about what you’re eating. Falafels are a given, and consider the foul. Here, that ultra-comforting dish of dried fava beans and chickpeas is cooked slowly for half a day with extra virgin olive oil (imported from Sayah’s hometown of Iaal in North Lebanon) and garlic, then dressed with a little lemon juice. Between the soft and yielding legumes and the warm bite of the extra virgin olive oil, it’s the sort of dish that makes you drop your shoulders and sink into your seat.

Very little is outsourced here. Pastry for the sambusek (molten parcels of highly seasoned lamb mince) and lahme be-ajeen (lamb mince, pine nuts, parsley and sesame paste, all refreshed with a squeeze of lemon) are made in-house each evening and only in small quantities.

When it comes to the kibbe naya – a specialty dish of minced raw meat (it’s lamb here) with crushed wheat for bite, mixed with basil, onion and capsicum – Sayah doesn’t keep the meat on premises. Instead, he sends one of his cooks across the road to the butcher shop every time someone orders it. He crushes the wheat to order as well. The end result is surprisingly mild in flavour with a silky consistency.

As delightful as all this is, it’s not just about the sit-down lunch. There’s also a whole menu of Stuff in Bread. On my last visit, I went for the hot sausage roll – tiny Lebanese sausages smothered in piquant chilli sauce, wrapped with lettuce and tomato in a piece of Lebanese bread. It’s definitely a sandwich that lets you know you’re alive. I’m still kicking myself for not ordering a side of hot chips, though.

Dessert’s not a fixture on the menu, but a hot tip: they keep rice pudding (riz bi haleeb) and a creamy, wobbly rosewater pudding (muhalabia) in the drinks fridge. Order one of each, take them home and thank me later when you’re fossicking around the fridge for a late-night snack.

This truly is a calm, unrushed dining experience that’s entirely itself. Take friends to eat here. At least two, if you have them, more if you can.