Restaurant review: Haji-Baba, Avondale

Entering Haji-Baba is like stepping into another world. Photo / Getty Images

Address: 135 Blockhouse Bay Rd, Avondale
Ph: (09) 828 5853
Haji Baba Facebook page

To enter miragha Sarwari's little pizza shop in Avondale is to step into another world. Traffic snarls at the five-way intersection outside (the tiny restaurant is accessed from Crayford St) but inside, flames lick the back of the wood-fired pizza oven and Afghan music issues from a cheap stereo perched precariously on a stack of papers.

Behind the counter, impeccable in his crisply ironed black linen qamis, sits the proprietor, with stacks of flexible, doughy naan bread and boxes of baklava within easy arm's reach.

Haji-Baba isn't his real name and it took me some time to sweet-talk him into telling me what is. He has been here more than a quarter of a century - "I had to leave [Afghanistan] or fight, and I didn't want to fight," he says - and speaks proudly of his kids' educational and career achievements, which have been built on the back of his hard work as everything from taxi driver to grocer.

I went to Haji-Baba at the suggestion of a reader who reckoned the pizzas are the business, even if they aren't classic Napoletana. The quality of that bread - it was agreeably rubbery, but soft within and toasted like a dream - was enough to convince me it was worth returning.

Most of the custom is takeaway, which is just as well since there's only one table, but the Professor and I sipped green tea while we waited for our pizza. Sarwari was even more playfully evasive about the spice that he'd added to the tea, which we could see but not quite place; only as we left did he relent - it was cardamom.

I was puzzled about the concept of Afghan pizza since it is not mentioned on Wikipedia's Afghan cuisine page; I was drooling for korma stews with sour plums; dumplings; kofta kebab; and sour cottage cheese called quroot.

But pizza it was. The menu runs to familiar names like pepperoni and meat-lovers', but I asked for something in the Afghan style and ended up with a thick-crusted pie, less cheesy than your standard issue, topped with spicy chicken and big slices of punchy jalapeno. It made for a hearty meal no Italian would recognise, but a pleasure in its own right.

More authentic fare is available in the form of a Kabuli palau (which under various names is a staple anywhere from the Balkans to India in the east and Tanzania in the south). A fragrant dish of broth-soaked rice, topped with slow-cooked spicy lamb, almonds and raisins, it fully justified a return trip. I needed to go anyway, to check that the sticky baklava was really as sensational as I had first thought.

Pizzas $8.50-$14; palau $12

Verdict: Delicious pizzas, even if no Italian would recognise them.

Cheers

By Joelle Thomson

Wild wines under $25

What does a wild fermented wine taste like? And would you want to know, let alone drink it?

The question was answered at an event at Kelmarna organic garden in Herne Bay this month. The new Stoneleigh Wild Valley wines contain fewer chemical additions than usual. This is good news for drinkers but the words need clarification.

The word "wild" means something; the word valley, not so much The grapes in these wines were grown in Kaituna Valley in Marlborough. The word wild is the interesting bit. Three new Stoneleigh Wild Valley wines were made unconventionally.

Instead of throwing packs of commercially bought yeast in tanks to kick-start the fermentation, winemaker Jamie Marfell put the grapes in tanks and waited. Put something sweet (ripe grapes) in a warm place (stainless steel wine tanks) and wait for the yeasts in the air to sniff out the sugar and do the wild thing. The result is a wine that is more savoury and less fruity. This is partly because the warmer temperature of the ferment (dialled up to encourage wild yeasts to participate) de-accentuates fruity flavours. But the new Stoneleigh Wild Valley sauvignon blanc is full of fruity bells and whistles plus is more full-bodied than many savvies. The chardonnay has yet to be released and the pinot noir is a light-bodied red with smoky flavours. They cost $18.99.

Marfell describes this project as crazy due to its risky nature: what if the ferment didn't work? But after 20 years of winemaking, he was keen to give it a go. And these wines are winners.

Top drop under $20

2015 Stoneleigh Wild Valley Sauvignon Blanc $18.99
Top new Stoneleigh sauvignon; full bodied with interesting notes of smokiness, celery, fennel and tropical fruit. Tasty.