Detroit Free Press: Best New Restaurant No. 3: Saffron De Twah, Detroit
I’ll put it plainly: We need more restaurants like Saffron De Twah.
The blink-and-you’ll-miss-it Moroccan-inspired street food spot on the city’s near east side wins you over the moment you walk in the door — you just have to get past the pockmarked parking lot/food truck graveyard first.
Plow ahead, though, for the rewards are many.
Affable owner/operator Omar Anani landed here on a neglected stretch of Gratiot after years operating the popular Twisted Mitten food truck. Originally intended to be a pan-Asian spot, Anani took a turn toward Morocco after witnessing an influx of Asian-inspired restaurants opening across town in recent years. But the closest Moroccan spot was in Ypsilanti. And since he grew up in his parents’ Egyptian restaurant and knows North African food, it didn’t seem like too far of a leap.
So Fat Panda became Saffron De Twah — a phonetic interpretation of the original (French) pronunciation of Detroit.
I’ve never had Anani’s Asian food, but the idea that what he serves at his restaurant today was essentially a Plan B is a little bit crazy to me, especially when you consider the value.
For $8, you can order a Moroccan fried chicken sandwich the size of your face, sticky and sweet from a slathering in caramelized honey butter, crisp and punchy from harissa slaw, all rounded out and softened by the toasted challah bun. The same eight bucks will get you a similar fried catfish sandwich that’ll have you licking your fingers clean, or one of the better vegan dishes in all of the city — cauliflower shawarma batbout. Really, you could put a pile of rocks into the pan-fried pocket of lightly pliable bread that is batbout and it would still be delicious, but Anani marinates cauliflower in shawarma spice and then cooks it three times before stuffing it inside with a savory green tahini sauce and sumac onions — sure to satisfy even meat eaters despite being a vegan dish.
If you feel like splurging, Saffron De Twah’s most expensive — and popular — menu item is the lamb tagine, which will set you back $13. This dish -- made of couscous, a medley of cooked and raw vegetables, sliced olives, and ras el hanout-spiced lamb that's been cooked to fall-apart-tenderness for 10 hours — was on my list of favorite bites from the first half of 2019.
But it’s not just the novelty of Saffron’s offerings that set it apart — it’s the irresistible familial hospitality. It is Anani himself who greets you most days with a smile and the patience to explain an unknown ingredient, flavor or cooking technique. Often, his parents are behind him in the kitchen, helping their son’s fledgling new business get off the ground — no doubt out of love, but also perhaps as repayment for the help he offered them in their Grand Rapids restaurant years ago.
A few months back, a friend called me after his first visit to Saffron De Twah. “Omar is just the kind of restaurateur you want to see succeed,” my friend said.
In an era of multi-million-dollar restaurant build-outs and big PR budgets, it’s refreshing to go somewhere that’s just this innately good and novel, that’s anchored by the bonds of family, built out of love and developed through one-on-one interactions with the community.
Again: We need more restaurants like Saffron De Twah.