Maiwand Kabob has good lamb kabobs as well, but if you want them medium rare, emphasize that you want "RARE" (I know but trust me, you'll never get "rare"), and remind them as you wait for your order. It's still a gamble, but usually most chunks will be at least medium, and still pretty tender. By the way, the samosas are addictive, the vegetable platter has a lovely, silky, melty, flavorful chunk of pumpkin with garlic-yogurt sauce, and I always order the baklava (it has pistachios! And it's not tooth-achingly sweet.)

It's a nice substitute for The Helmand.

Is it me, or are Photographer Gene's photos of Mekong's food particularly gorgeous? And I don't even eat shrimp!

The photos are great but the one used for the review freaks me out – it looks too much like a sonogram. A little too alive.

Great name YumP, how did you come up with it? It's nice to see some new faces.

Love love love lamb when it's not overcooked. In fact I made some lamb burgers for dinner: ground lamb cut with ground beef to make it a little less lamby and fresh grated garlic and ginger, smoked paprika, cayenne, fresh ground Sarawak white pepper, .and minced scallion tops. It was like flavor Napalm – in a good way.

I had some really delicious perfectly done grilled lamb from Kumari. It's so hard to get that kind of thing without it being overcooked. Most Indian places don't have any finesse when it comes to meat.

Indian food and Afghan food aren't the same. Granted both Afghan food and some northern Indian cuisines were influenced by Persian food (amazing what a few invasions does for one) so there are some similarities, but they aren't the same.

I love lamb. However, if you are ordering mutton in Indian restaurants, there is a good chance you are getting goat. Which is also very tasty.

a kabob is a kabob is kebop is a kebap is a kebabbi is meat on a stick.

Thanks for mutton!

Hey what do you call it when you inflict your misery on others to make yourself happy? There must be a German word for it. Oh yeah, blogging.

Hooray! More pho in Baltimore --- and downtown, at that!

Please excuse if this has already been discussed, but why do shrimp in this town always come with tails on? It's so messy when you're eating soup.

Pho pho pho! I don't know if it's proper etiquette but I think the tail gives me permission to pick it up. Even without the tail it's too big to eat in one bite. Don't you think everything in soup should be smaller than the soup spoon?

oh hell the blog is crashy again

Hi TerrierMom, thank you. 'Twas just a bolt of inspiration, and it works on so many different levels...after all, the bar has been set awfully high by you regulars...

Yes,
Its real crashy today. But its not just this one, other Sun blogs are having a tough go of it today.

I agree on the tail being a handle. No way am I going to try to get the meat out of the tail with silverware, and certainly not with a Chinese spoon.

I actually had the Pho and thought it pretty ordinary. Oh well.

Based on this, and the Sun's review, I decided to meet a friend for lunch today at Mekong Delta. It was... an experience. The food was tremendous, if you could get it. We arrived, and the host, quite honestly, told us it would be 30 or 40 minutes before we would get our food. We were a bit hesitant, but decided to go for it. The food took an hour and fifteen minutes to arrive, so long that my friend had to take his meal to go in order to return to work. Luckily, I had the afternoon off. More bizarrely, given the waits for food, I saw at least three times the number of people come in, find out the wait and turn away empty handed.

However, once the food arrived, it was divine. Far and away the best pho I've had in Baltimore, with excellent spring roll as well. The host/waiter/expediter was incredibly friendly the entire time, and was at least honest about the delay (he told one couple to just try back around 2 or 3), but I can't imagine turning away 2 full seatings is the best way to run a business. When I asked about this, the host said they just tend to get slammed around 12 with the lunch rush, that dinner was better, and didn't seem to concerned.

The moral of the story is to go during an off hour, and enjoy far and away the best Vietnamese in town.

Yay finally a post about mekong delta actually getting back to talking about mekong delta!

I posted in chowhound and such so I will just direct you there for a recap of how much I enjoy this place. It honestly is not more than the owner (your host/waiter/etc) and his wife cooking.. off of like two portable burners and such. Between chowhound and now the paper, I can imagine it being totally overwhelming for awhile until they are able to hire more people or manage it better.

I mean if they gotta wait they gotta wait.. Im sure theyre not sweating you earl! I have a co-worker who has been in vietnam extensively and says its the best hes gotten in the area (and very close to the real deal), so either you are vietnamese yourself or just live a life of being underwhelmed.

Just remember. You can always be the one that writes the post that comes back to the original topic. :-) EL

They were a bit overwhelmed at lunch time before the publicity (which I'm very glad to see them get - they deserve it).

To add to Gorelick's comment on desserts, they vary. I had a Vietnamese sweet soup there one day that was very interesting. I liked it, my co-worker wanted it to be sweeter. It didn't taste like I expected, and I bet it'd be really nice in hot weather.