Nolensville Road

Here's an interesting coincidence...the SO and I spent the weekend in his part of town and after dropping my car off for new brakes, we decided to go exploring on Nolensville Road. There are tons of ethnic groceries, restaurants and bakeries and I was on the hunt for some m'semen for Claudia (okay, for me too). Well, as we were making our way up and down the road, Claudia was blogging over at Music City Bloggers that Good magazine named Nolensville one of the tastiest streets in America! Though, oddly enough, I didn't visit any of the places Good highlighted in their article.

Our first stop was the Monsal Bakery at 5741 Nolensville Road (in the Kroger shopping center at Old Hickory Boulevard). We picked up all sorts of baked goodies, including some kind of creme horn, a cinnamon-spiced biscuit-y thing (so good), a cream cheese and fruit filled turnover and a few other pastries. We also got a flan and a Mexican Coke (ie, sugar sweetened instead of high fructose corn syrup).

After a few bites in the car, we headed much further up the way to House of Kabob at 216 Thompson Lane (just east of Nolensville, past the library in that little shopping center). In its previous iteration (the name escapes me), it was a Persian restaurant and it appears it still is. You can get green rice with any entree (instead of what comes standard), they serve doogh, and there are several appetizers that aren't offered at other Middle Eastern Restaurants.

They start you out with a plate of pita bread, some cheese, butter and cilantro, which we thoroughly enjoyed. For lunch, I ordered a plate of green rice along with a couple of appetizers--the must'mooseer (a yogurt dip with sundried shallots) and some feta and walnut spread garnished with olives and tomatoes to eat with pita (a new favorite of mine). I don't think I spelled that first appetizer correctly (and can find a hundred ways to spell it online) and I can't remember what the second one was called at all. Sorry 'bout that. I can tell you that both were very good, though (the yogurt was a good accompaniment for the rice).

After lunch, we headed south again toward the Baraka Bakery. We had a little trouble finding it, even though I knew it was also near the intersection of Nolensville Road and Old Hickory Boulevard. After a couple of tries, we found it way back in the corner of the L-shaped shopping center adjacent to Lowe's.

And though Baraka didn't have the m'semen (he did say he knew a Moroccan man and would check on its availability for me), they offered some great goodies to tempt our sweet tooths (sweet teeth?). Baraka is known for supplying a lot of pita and lavash to area restaurants and groceries, but it also has an extensive international cookies and candies section (as well as other grocery items and a fairly good selection of Middle Eastern cheeses). The candy selection beats the heck out of any place I've ever been. I don't know what it is about a foreign chocolate bar, but I'm drawn to one like a bee to a flower. It was difficult just to choose two. But I ended up with a couple of exotic bars, one of which has some vanilla creme in it. A picture of some sort of vanilla drink was on the label--I'm not sure what it is since the label is printed in every imaginable language except English.

We also got some cookies. I got some orange cookies dipped in chocolate--the SO doesn't like chocolate and orange, so this is the one flavor combination in a snack that will remain unmolested at his home. For the SO, I found some intriguing cookies from Poland: plum-filled gingerbread dipped in chocolate. Wow. These little heart-shaped devils are awesome. A little spicier than American gingerbread which helps to keep from binging on them. The SO remarked that they taste like Christmas cookies. I'm thinking now that I should have the same rule for Baraka Bakery that I have for Bobbie's Dairy Dip--if I want to go there, I have to walk to get there. That little rule helped me cut way back on my ice cream consumption last year. It's a handy device.

Incidentally, I also wanted to check out the Aurora Bakery, but discovered it was closed. If anyone has any idea if it's moved, please let me know. I'd still like to check it out.