Byblos Bar & Grill

I was a little confused since I came to their tiny location first which only a few blocks down, but eventually I got here — saw the bar area up front and took a seat at one of the tables. The place definitely has a dark décor of sorts — not very much lighting, but it’s a fine choice for a lunch.
Our waitress was super friendly and talkative. She even offered me samples of a few things. As far as food, I thought the gyro sandwich was pretty decent — I got it with a spanakopita on the side and was not as impressed with the spinach pie, but the lamb gyro was decent. The meat was a tad on the saltier side, but the flavors came together well. It was reasonably priced at $ 8 as well. I’d probably recommend the sandwich over the rice/​lamb option which is far more expensive.
Coffee was delicious, but she forgot to ask me if I wanted refills :(. I’d come back here if someone wanted to, but nothing specifically about the experience would draw me there so if they really want to impress, I’d suggest rethinking some menu items and really offer something that would make them stand out. When I saw «lamb,» I began craving the street food from NYC like The Halal Cart offers, so if they had a menu option that could emulate some of that… I’d definitely be a repeat customer.

Came in around 12:30 for a lunch meeting, and to my surprise the place was empty save for the person I was meeting with. This was my first time here, but I had heard wonderful things about the place, so maybe I just expected there to be more people.
Our waitress was super attentive without being too overbearing, and we made it pretty easy on her, there only being 2 people in the restaurant.
I got the lamb gyro (always a lamb gyro) and it was great! Lamb cooked to perfection, incredible tzatziki sauce, and a good proportion of all the ingredients.
Overall great experience, would be interested to see how it is during a busy period of time.

This place has some of the best falafel I’ve ever had, served with good tahini and salad. The lamb gyro was very tasty, and the steak fries were perfectly cooked and nicely seasoned. Can’t wait to come back for dinner… The service was excellent too.

We went to this restaurant based on the positive reviews. The first part of our meal, the sampler platter, was great and the service quite good.
The main course was another matter as it appears, somehow, our order was lost, forgotten or both. This would be understandable were the place packed but there were only people at 3 tables.
It seems that our meals were then rushed as the kebabs were undercooked and lacking in flavor. I would add that the entrees are way overpriced, even compared to New York City.
It could be that our experience was an anomaly but it wasn’t even close to acceptable.
That said, the waitress was very attentive and did what she could to make the best of a bad situation.
To the owner — this sort of thing shouldn’t happen.

Probably the worst Mediterranean food experience ever. Other than the spanakopita appetizer, which was great but small portion, kabob meat unseasoned, just plain bad, kitchen backed up when restaurant was empty, overpriced and when we asked about salmon special server told us they hadn’t even made one and cautioned against ordering it. Will never return.

Had dinner at Pastability and went for shisha &beer at this place. The environment was fine but a little bit cold to sit outside. Cheerful night and a good place to lay back in the chair and enjoy some smoke and beer

I recently tried Byblos Bar and Grill. Food was top notch. I love this type of fresh unique food. We tried the Vegetarian Platter to start. Four selections of Lebanese favorites. We had hummus, baba ganouj, falafel and spanekopita. All was amazing, including the pita bread and zatar oil that comes with the meal. The chicken kabobs were decent and the gyro plate was very tasty. Great wine and beer selection including a full bar. Atmosphere was where the night faltered. Front door was open on a hot night that begged for air conditioning. This also let flies in which is never comfortable for eating. Overall atmosphere needs attention but service was great. Staff was very friendly. The food really was outstanding and for that alone, I will give it another whirl.

I don’t know why Byblos gets bad reviews. The food has always been excellent and their fries are the best in town. Beer selection is better than I expected from such a small place. The bartenders and waitstaff are excellent. They remember your name when you come in and they’re very attentive. The place even has decent hookah. Do yourself a favor and check this place out. Get the gyro with the double-​fried fries. And try the hookah!

Awesome food and great service! The kabobs are top notch and everything was fresh. Will definitely go back!

We went to this place looking at the reviews which were good. We made a reservation for 10 people and arrived at 7:00. It was our 4^th of July dinner — then we were off to see the fireworks. We had a decent table outside and our waitress was very sweet. We ordered drinks as we were looking at the menu and then were told, as she brought the drinks out, that they ran out of Falafels (which is why we chose this place) spanakopita, rotisserie chicken and kibbeh — what else was there to get?!! A Middle Eastern restaurant running out of these basics is like McDonald’s running out of fries. I wish we had known bc we never would’ve ordered drinks and just left the first thing. We ordered a selection of appetizers that took over half an hour to arrive (hummus /​babaganoush /​lebbeneh with pita) there wasn’t enough pita and when we asked for more — it took another 15 minutes. We then waited another half an hour for our salads and tabbouleh and then another 45 minutes until the main entrees arrived, half of which were cold when they arrived. We had two super hungry (and at that point cranky) kids, a baby who needed to go to bed bc we were there over 2 hours. Mind you the restaurant was practically empty the entire time — only a drunk stranger from the bar who wanted to leave his half empty beer bottle in our table. Really cannot say anything nice about the experience other than the food that we did eat, that was hot, was actually good. The manager came out to apologize with free baklava bites — but didn’t take anything off the bill. We missed the fireworks and decided to write this review.

So good. I have been to their Café as well, the food quality and freshness of ingredients is optimal in both locations. Service was great. The waitress was very attentive. I ordered the Sambousek small plate. These were some glorious fried meet patties, not greasy at all, filled with ground sirloin, and wrapped in their divine not thick yet pillowy homemade dough. It comes with a side of creamy cheese spread… tasty.

Went down to Armory with my husband and decided to stop in for a drink. The smell of the food had us hooked and we ended up ordering an amazing appetizer and two unforgettable entrees. The service and the food were great, can’t wait to go back again soon!

I have had several meals there. Chef Mike is unbelievable!
My favorite place to go for great Mediterranean food or seafood, great servers and the place is spotless. The food is consistently great! I highly recommend it!

Have only tried a couple things on the menu but so far everything has been very good. I think what stands out the most is how friendly/​inviting everyone is. Both times I went, I received unprovoked recommendations by the staff which I found very helpful in deciding what I wanted. Seemed they were genuinely interested in having me try some of their favorite dishes and that they take pride in their food and the experience they afford their customers. I also felt very relaxed in there which is pretty impressive considering this is a new location for them. I usually associate «new» with a chaotic atmosphere. Not the case here. Definitely worth checking out. Probably going to be a great summer spot.

We had a group lunch here — this location was once the Black Olive (and, before that, a Quiznos). I only bring that up because there’s occasional Unilocal confusion about addresses and such.
First, our waitress was awesome. She was friendly, adorable, and pleasant as could be.
Second, everything else was pretty much terrible. Soup of the day was, at $ 5.50 for about a cup of incredibly salty, glorified chicken soup, a harbinger of things to come. The mains were terrible — pita wraps where the pita was clearly just out of the refrigerator and past the «use by» date, — $ 9 – 10 wraps with barely an ounce or two of meat, and excessive amounts of onion and radish. The wraps were small, with nothing on the side — garnish, pickle, etc., despite their high price (even for downtown).
The waitress was clearly instructed to push the «sides» — three bucks for add-​ons in addition to your $ 10 wrap, and she apologetically informed us she had to ask each and every member of the party if they wanted a side, even after we tried to wave off said sales pitch.
Ambiance was strange — we were the only folks there, but were shoved in a corner with rickety tables, a bit too small for all of us. The music was a bizarre mix of acoustic 90s music (not like DMB… think Natalie Imbrigulia singing «Torn» — if you have no idea what I’m talking about, consider yourself lucky) and random international music, then returning to acoustic esoteric 90s «hits.» Oh — also, very loud, because our one party — the only people in the entire restaurant — certainly wanted to hear this provocative mix of music at top volume.
Having said that, I feel bad for these folks, as I’m sure they want to do well, and they clearly hired (at least one) very friendly waitress, but the price and quality of food are extremely disappointing. I don’t think this location will last without major changes.
Perhaps I’m over-​analyzing this, but during the entire hour we were there, not a single customer came in. I’ve never encountered a restaurant downtown with fewer patrons… it was kind of shocking.

This new place is really nice, the food was amazing. The service was great. My husband and I came to the restaurant expecting authentic food and that is exactly what we received. I recommended their kabob platter. The owner was very professional as he visited our table and introduced himself.

Staff is Still Figuring it out.
The wait staff was sweet, attentive, and clearly as exacerbated with the kitchen as we were. Poor girls didn’t even have drink trays.
We waited for a while while our 6^th member joined us, during which time we got a few rounds of drinks and were excited at the prospect of the delicious food we saw coming out of the kitchen.
Unfortunately, we placed out order at 6:44 with 8 tables of 2 – 4 in the house, half of whom had already been served. Expecting only a few tickets ahead of us we waited for our food before the show.
The house salad arrived quickly. And was fine. Needed cracked pepper. Dressing was good, and not drowning the salad.
Almost 50 minutes later, we still hadn’t seen food. And there was little more than an extra tray of pitas casually tossed on the table and an occasional assurance that food would be out any minute, starting 20 minutes after our salad arrived.
Finally at 7:35 we couldn’t wait any more or we would miss our show, so we asked for our check, and food to go if it was ready. 20 minutes later after telling the waitress to stop trying to figure out how to split the check in 3 and running one card we left.
The owner was appropriately apologetic, and finally got us our food as we were reorganizing out on the sidewalk. He really needs to completely clean out the back of house. Even the chefs attitude was poor. Chef should be embarrassed to have trouble making one turn of the dining room (maybe 30 heads) in the 2 hours time we were there.
The food was rather poor. One entrée was wrong, one was missing entirely (still not ready?).
The Lamb Shwarma, a personal favorite was downright awful. Mostly gristle, and terribly overcooked.
The spanikopita was ok. Too oily though, like much of the rest of the food.
I’ll go again for the atmosphere and waitstaff, but not until the kitchen has made a serious overhaul.