MED Restaurant

Duo has a new addition to its family, and they named it MED!

Located in City Center, in Hazmieh, you can either enjoy your time there in its trendy interior, or at its spacious, but light lacking dim terrace, and get pampered by their friendly and professional staff.

Even though, MED, is the abbreviation of Mediterranean, still this new restaurant has much more to offer than just oriental Lebanese food, alongside a salad bar, for those who desire!

We tried quite a few items and were quite satisfied of how they performed with our taste buds!

A beautiful aromatic start with the MED CAKE GARLIC BREAD, a large freshly baked loaf, stuffed with creamy garlic, emmental cheese and herbs. This insanely delicious appetizer will forever change your perception of the traditional garlic bread! A must have over and over again, and over again!

MED CAKE GARLIC BREAD

Mixed with sweet chilli sauce, the SHRIMP TAPAS, are soft and flavorful, served with bread slices, and so were the CREAMY SPINACH TAPAS, with chunks of mushrooms and parmesan cheese. Just spread a spoonful of that luscious dip onto a a piece of bread and you cannot be any happier!

The QUINOA TABBOULEH SALAD had a distinguished amazing secret ingredient, or maybe not! Fresh, light, perfectly seasoned and simply wonderful!

Both the GREEK PIZZA and THE PIZZA BEEF PEPPERONI had a thin dough with a moderate flavor.

GREEK PIZZA

BEEF PEPPERONI

An assortment of grilled veal, makanek and tawouk skewers, served with French fries,  is what they call their MIXED GRILLED PLATTER.  Completely fresh, using the highest quality ingredients.

In cute small pots, hot and straight from the kitchen, they served us BEEF STROGANOFF, which I think that the chef should revisit the recipe, but the CHICKEN CREAMY MUSHROOM SERVED WITH RICE, and in pots, as well, was delicious.

BEEF STROGANOFF

Desserts, desserts, desserts and more desserts! We felt like little children in a candy store!

A splendid crispy APPLE PIE, an explosion of chocolate cake with chocolate ice cream and caramel sauce create an intensely rich and mouthwatering DARK CHOCOLAT VOLCANO. Filled with melted chocolate and topped with vanilla ice cream, and then crushed to share OUR SPECIAL MUFFIN, with smiles on our faces! The MED ORIENTAL TWIST, with sahlab ice cream, a renovated recipe of our traditional maamoul, a warm soothing taste of the orient!

MED has so much more delightful items to savour, from starters, salads, pizzas, pastas, burgers, sandwiches, a kids menu and a variety of original main courses, which is worth a second and a third visit, if not more, to dig into those pleasures.

Tsunami Backyard Hazmieh Review

One of the very few restaurants in Lebanon that never fails to deliver the best and never disappoints!

Their new place in Backyard Hazmieh has the same feel like all of their other venues, but with an addition of outdoor seating, allowing you to enjoy great sushi with a feel of spaciousness and relaxation!

The Japanese are very sensitive people with an extreme attentiveness to detail, and the owners of Tsunami ensured to portray the Japanese etiquette and proper form, through the quality of their ingredients used, their friendly waitresses and their efficient service!

We started our dinner with Tsunami's Rice Paper Duck and White Fish Carpaccio. I have to say the White Fish was so fresh and the taste was superb.

Rice Paper Duck

White Fish Carpaccio

We tried a variety of salads from the exotic Mango Salad, Tuna Tartar and Fresh Crab. To be honest, the Women's Mistake was my personal favorite. I just have a weak spot for good salmon.

Mango Salad

Tuna Tartar

Fresh Crab

Women's Mistake

Then we got into the main show, Sushi.

The menu selection is extensive, and each item we tried was freshly prepared to perfection. There are so many maki & sashimi items to choose from and I assure you that whatever your order, you will enjoy!

The Octopus Tempura Maki was a gem. That octopus on top just took it into an entirely new level.

Octopus Tempura Maki

They call it the Skyline, and I've destroyed the entire city!!

Skyline

Avocado Spicy Shrimp

Wrapping up our dinner with a Sweet Banana surprise, dressed and fried, with vanilla ice cream on the side... A true rock star!

Sweet Banana

If you are after an immaculate sushi experience, then make Tsunami your next destination!!

The CORNER Restaurant Review

When you have shopped till you dropped at Beirut Souks and you need to reward yourself for strolling all the shops and carrying all those shopping bags, you must head to The Corner, a newly opened concept by the Boubess Group.

Located at the very top of the Souks, far away from the noise of kids playing and the cluster of all those cafes and restaurants at the Souks' lower part.

This new eatery is trendy looking with an outside terrace and an upper garden, providing few more options to sit at.

At first glance at the menu, you feel that it's quite similar to the one at Cozmo Cafe, but if you dig into it, you would realize that it has more additions and varieties, not to mention a much higher caliber of ingredients especially the meat and the chicken.

We had a sweet passion fruit based non alcoholic drink, that came in those amazing milk glasses of long ago...the juice was so refreshing and good that it will always be our meal starter at The Corner!

From a distance, we saw flames and heard the sound of sizzling, and there came our mixed fajitas chicken and meat platter with pita bread and all the accompanying condiments. What could be better than making your very own delicious wraps!

Mushroom and Swiss Burger please, and a dream came true! Brioche like bun created and freshly baked at the eatery, perfectly spiced exquisite Angus meat, fragrant mushrooms and generous Swiss cheese. A truly refined burger,  that would ensure a next visit! The very few times, the French fries were not the star, however good they were!

The chicken escalope is on the average scale, and to be honest, I've had better! It lacked flavour and juiciness!

If your mom makes the best fudgy moist chocolate cake, then be sure she is in for some serious competition! Frankly speaking, I never thought anyone could come close to my mom's baking, like this awesome homey cake!

Love is in the air...you got me at first bite...call it what you like! Their strawberry cheesecake has been definitely prepared in the skies and sent down to earth!

Fluffy cream, strawberry vanilla ice cream, fresh strawberries and sprinkles of chunks of biscuit like crumbles, all living inside an elegant deep white plate! I can't wait to have it again and again and again...


The Corner has so much to offer so better not miss on a divine meal!

Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge Review

Mobile phones have drastically advanced over the past few years from using them to just make calls, into mini mobile computers having great high resolution screens, speedy processors and high speed connectivity. They simply transformed into what we now know as "Smartphones".

Being one of the leading manufacturers in the mobile industry, Samsung has pioneered one product line after the other, from the Galaxy S series to the Note series and with great success..

To date, Samsung have reached the 7th generation of their Galaxy S smartphone and the S7 Edge variant promises a smooth Android experience, Edge screen features, great battery life and water & dust resistance capabilities.. But does it deliver?

Let's find out.. 




Screen

The S7 Edge features a very bright 5.7 inch Amoled display. It's crisp, colors pop and scores high in outdoor screen visibility.

The edge display, despite making the phone better looking and almost bezel free, drove me crazy at times as I accidentally started those edge features that Samsung cooked into the software.. 

I was very excited about these edge features, yet eventually ended up turning them off. As for the curved edges, they won't affect the screen's ease of use in any sort in case you're wondering.

Battery

Battery life is sufficient, I never ran out of juice all day. To be honest, I have Samsung's wireless charger at the office, so my phone is constantly charged at my desk.. At home, I need the battery to hold through the rest of the night after a day of heavy use; therefore, I plug it into the fast charger, giving me the additional battery percentage I need within 30 minutes. If you're not a heavy user, one charge per day shall keep you on safe grounds.

Build Quality

The device definitely feels premium with two sheets of glass bonded together by the aluminium edges, but you feel like it's a drop away from total destruction.. Sorry Samsung but I'd rather have an all metal Galaxy S phone (ehem S8).

I went with the black model, so slick, and the phone feels good.. the only drawbacks are the smudges and slipperiness.. But you can easily evade this by throwing a case on.. Problem Solved!! 

Speed & UI

I've been using the phone since May 2016, it was super fast and smooth back then.. Today, it's still a fast phone but not as it felt during the first 2 months.. It could be the 128 GB SD card I'm putting inside the phone to fit all the pictures I have!! As for the look of the skin on top of Android, I still prefer Google now launcher over Samsung's Touchwiz UI (if they still call it like that), so I have it installed along with a basic theme making it look as close to vanilla Android as possible.

Camera

I'm sure you heard great things about the camera and yeah it's true.. It's the best camera on a smartphone.. Photography is a HUGE and imperative  factor for me when deciding on my next phone upgrade, especially that I use my phone very often for my food photography, scenery shooting and the casual snaps.. 
I was holding the latest generation iPhone prior to the S7 Edge, and the pictures used to be fine, and with some editing, they turned out great..

But with the Edge's new 12 MP camera, pictures are great as snapped, and with some very light editing, they become awesome.

Water resistance

To be honest, I just don't have the heart to submerge the phone in water.. I know the phone is IP68 certified, but I would never ever get it close to water..

If you do use yours for underwater photography, please share your feedback with me, maybe someday I'll harden my heart and do it... Or maybe not!

Conclusion

To wrap it up, the Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge is a great phone.. It's fast, battery is fine, camera is awesome and the screen is excellent.

Indeed some of the features that Samsung included in this phone might not be very useful to you, but might be someone else's cup of tea, just like wireless charging has become so important for me, it might never add a letter to your book of interest.

Do you want the latest and greatest, and like to be on the EDGE of what technology has to offer, and by chance happen to have $600.00+ USD to spare? If yes, then this is amongst your top picks!!