Food reporter’s notebook: Best Sacramento-area restaurant meals I ate that you should try

I traveled to Peru last month, where I shoveled ceviche and lomo saltados into my grill on a long-awaited vacation. But one doesn’t have to go that far from Sacramento to find exceptional food.

Sometimes it requires a trip to El Dorado Hills, where dishes incorporate saffron from the owners’ family farm in Afghanistan. An Eastern European restaurant in Carmichael has changed with the times while going beyond well-known dishes. Fish tacos are worth noting, too, at a restaurant just north of the Elk Grove border in a South Sacramento strip mall.

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Bamiyan Afghan Restaurant

Driving back from Lake Tahoe on Highway 50? Consider a stop at Bamiyan Afghan Restaurant, Mousa, Najla and Kareem Amiri’s sit-down spot near the El Dorado Hills Town Center at 1121 White Rock Rd. — but note that it’s only open from 5-9 p.m., Thursday through Saturday.

The Amiris’ extended family runs an organic saffron farm in Afghanistan. The red seasoning is a notable ingredient in several Bamiyan dishes. It’s also sold to-go at the restaurant. You can see and taste it in a yellow lentil soup, chicken shish kebabs, housemade baklava, even a glass of pinot grigio infused with the world’s most expensive spice.

I tasted it in the saffron pea soup ($6.50) and saffron shrimp dinner ($23). The yellow lentil soup was pleasant and punctuated by bits of ginger throughout, while the shrimp were a little meager but rescued by a delicious pumpkin purée side.

The kalebi pallow ($21) was the star, a cardamom-spiced rice dish mixed with slivered almonds, raisins, carrot strips and a choice of meat and side. I chose two terrific charbroiled chicken breasts and tomato-stuffed eggplant, pudding-like inside a crispy skin.

Zecky’s Fish Tacos

After surfing in Pacifica the other week, a friend and I went on the hunt for the best post-ocean California meal: fish tacos. As we chowed down, my friend asked if any Sacramento taquerias specialized in the kinds of seafood we’d enjoyed together in Baja California last summer.

A little research turned up Zecky’s Fish Tacos at 8065 Elk Grove Florin Rd., Suite 120. Zecky’s also carries mulitas, huaraches, quesadillas and other items one can top or stuff with meat. I had seafood on the seso, and ordered just that at the South Sacramento strip mall restaurant with a beachy vibe.

Zecky’s uses swai for fish tacos ($1.65 on Tuesday and Saturday, $3.25 otherwise), which were nicely breaded and buttery with a pleasant kick from a deep red salsa. You could say the same for shrimp tacos, or get one of each with refried beans, veggie-flecked rice and a drink (try the pulpy cantaloupe aguafresca) for $9.25.

It’s been years since I had a Mexican-style shrimp cocktail ($11 for a medium, $14 for a large), and Zecky’s was a fine reintroduction. Big, plump shrimp floated under a layer of avocado in a ketchup-forward mixture, scooped out from their plastic cup by a tostada or cracker.

Firebird Restaurant

A small Ukrainian flag and donation boxes now greet customers as they walk into Firebird Restaurant at 4715 Manzanita Ave. in Carmichael. Formerly known as Firebird Russian Restaurant, its name (and identity, sort of) changed last month after Moldovan American owner Alexandru Sirbu wanted to distance his business from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Firebird is one of the few restaurants around Sacramento where one finds food from former Soviet countries, and probably the most elevated, with a roomy event space for hosting banquets. As borders changed over the years, many dishes have taken root in multiple Eastern European nations.

Take borscht ($9.50, or $11 with beef), for example, the fermented beet soup that’s Ukrainian in origin but commonly eaten in Russia, Poland and Belarus. Firebird’s version is mildly sour and served warm, a pleasant starter whose homeyness meshes well with the brown bread served to every table.

Firebird’s zrazy ($20) feels like a comforting throwback, more akin to grandma’s meatloaf than anything trendy. Huge twin logs of ground chicken roulades are stuffed with mushrooms, then egg-washed and fried before being served with fennel-cabbage salad and buttery white rice.

Some Russian dishes remain on the menu, like shuba ($13), nicknamed “herring under a fur coat.” It’s a neat, colorful stack of shredded potatoes, carrots, cheese and beets, chopped herring, olives and eggs but fused together with mayonnaise. It was listed under “salads” on the menu, calling to mind the Midwest’s loose interpretations of the word. In this case, though, the flavors came together beautifully, creating a dish that was creamy, acidic and earthy all in one bite.

This story was originally published May 2, 2022 at 5:25 AM.