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One component of reviving my ethnojunkets involves the always fun task of checking out locations where restaurants along my food tours have closed and new ones have opened in their stead. Such is the case for Afrosiab Café which is firmly ensconced in the former digs of Café At Your Mother-in-Law at 3071 Brighton 4th St, Brooklyn.

Named for the settlement of Afrosiab in Samarkand, Uzbekistan (dating back to about the 6th century BC), Afrosiab describes its cuisine as Middle Eastern although the choices on the menu point to Uzbek food.

My dining buddy and I ordered Jiz Biz; we’ve enjoyed a dish of lamb offal – spelled djiz-biz – many times at Azerbaijani restaurants, but the menu here described this simply as lamb chops. And indeed they were. Accompanied by fried potatoes, sliced red onions and tomatoes, and grilled wedges of Uzbek bread, it was an artful presentation.

Achichuk, Uzbek tomato and onion salad.

More reports of revisiting Little Odessa to come….