Two dining experiences in one
Restaurant a year in the making and worth it
Northern News Services
Published Wednesday, March 19, 2014
SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE
Last week saw Yellowknife expand its dining options by one. Or is it two?
Yousry Abdelmegid takes pride in the carefully sourced foods and ingredients he brings to the menu of the new MainStreet Pizza and Deli in Yellowknife. The new location had a soft opening last week, but a grand opening will be held soon. - Walter Strong/NNSL |
MainStreet Pizza and Deli, owned by Yellowknifers Yousry Abdelmegid and Saif Jutt, is really two dining experiences in one.
Specialty stone crust pizza, deli sandwiches and wraps are one half of the MainStreet equation. The other half is an East Indian food menu, with beef kebabs, vegetable pilau, chicken tikka, goat, vegetable or chicken curry and homemade Naan or rice with every East Indian dish.
"Today was supposed to be a soft opening," Abdelmegid said after the new restaurant's first lunch rush last Friday.
"We didn't do any advertising but we were busy anyway."
"We'll have a grand opening once we are fully ready and trained," Abdelmegid said. "There was a bit of confusion."
There wasn't any confusion over how great the food tasted coming out of the kitchen. New regulars walked away with fresh meals to go, or sat down for lunch in the small, newly-renovated dining area.
Everything is made from scratch in-house at MainStreet, from the curries to the stone-baked naan bread.
Fresh ingredients, fresh naan prepared and baked daily, traditional East Indian recipes, and a traditional stone bed pizza oven combine to make the new MainStreet location a unique addition to Yellowknife. But before you get to any of those details, there's a prior element to food preparation you won't often see duplicated anywhere else in the city.
All dishes at MainStreet are Halal, meaning they were prepared according to strict Islamic rules concerning food ingredients and the treatment of meat and poultry animals.
"Halal calls for a very humane treatment of animals from birth to slaughter," Abdelmegid said.
It also calls for animals not raised in high-volume feedlot conditions, or fed food by-products of other animals. Happier, less stressed-out animals should mean more tender and tastier meat.
Halal applies to any processed foods that might come through their kitchen as well. Nothing in MainStreet will have animal by-product in it, whether it's the cheese on your sandwich or ingredients in the spread.
"It costs a bit more, but you taste the difference," Abdelmegid said.
He's serious enough about this to have personally inspected the facilities in Alberta and B.C., where he sources meat and poultry to make sure the facilities live up to his standards.
Opening a new restaurant in Yellowknife isn't a straightforward proposition. General remoteness and a tight skilled-labour supply means nothing happens quickly.
"We've worked on this project for more than a year," Abdelmegid said.
"Between equipment supplies, stock supplies, and finding contractors to do the work, it's a real challenge. I know people who went broke before they could even start their businesses because of all those issues."
MainStreet Pizza and Deli is where the Stock Pot used to be, but that's the only similarity. The interior has been completely redone, along with the installation of the kitchens' centre-piece stone-crust pizza oven.
"It's not just a regular pizza oven, it's a stone crust pizza oven ... the traditional pizza oven," Abdelmegid added.
"The pizza cooks on a hot stone, not just in hot air. It's the only one like it now in Yellowknife, I think.
"There have been others, but the operators shut down for different reasons."
Abdelmegid and Jutt expect pizza to be a big item and will be open late on Saturdays for pizza orders. As of last Friday, Abdelmegid and Jutt expected that pizza wouldn't be available until this weekend because of supply chain hold-ups.
MainStreet Deli and Pizza is open six days a week, Monday to Saturday, from 7 a.m. until 10 p.m., with extended Saturday hours.
