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Diora, another point of view…
My hubby and I live in Buffalo Grove, just a few blocks from Diora. We were out for a walk one evening in mid-March, on our way to eat at another restaurant in the same strip mall. As we passed Diora, we poked our heads in to see if there was a copy of the menu we could look at for future reference. We met the owner and spent a bit of time talking with him. Believe me, this place is ALL about the lamb. The owner told us he personally goes to a farm in southern Wisconsin to pick up the meat and that it is raised organically. We looked over the menu and my husband was very intrigued, but I really had a taste for some sushi and sake, so we stuck to the original plan to go to the other restaurant. But, Diora's owner did give us a $20 coupon as an incentive to try his place another time.
I personally was never a big fan of lamb -- and after just a glance at the menu you'd have to be in some sort of a coma to not notice that lamb is the centerpiece of Diora's cuisine -- so I had some hesitancy about going there. I'm certainly not allergic to lamb, I've just never cared that much for it. I guess as a kid I experienced too many oily lamb patties or cuts of mutton with cloying mint jelly. But my husband really, really wanted to try Diora, so we went back the very next night.
I have to say, I have now become a fan of lamb after eating that meal. The owner -- we learned his name is Lenny -- helped guide us through the menu on things to try that would best represent the Uzbek cuisine. I should mention that Lenny's wife is the one who is Uzbek, while he is originally from Belarus. He's also been living in the Chicago area since he was a child, so his command of English is excellent.
We started with an order of the now-infamous samsas. I thought these were delicious and were actually very similar to the samosas one would get at an Indian restaurant. For appetizers, we also had strips of eggplant rolled with a carrot-based mixture, as well as an order of stuffed mushrooms. I thought the eggplant rolls were fabulous. The mushrooms were good, but did not set themselves apart from this type of dish found anywhere else.
For our main dishes, Lenny guided us toward the Bayram pilaf and the baby lamb shish-kebab. We had this served to us with each dish split so that each of our plates had a half order of the pilaf and a half order of the kebab. The pilaf was unlike any I've had before, very rich, and included raisins in addition to the peas and carrots I've had in other pilafs. The lamb from the kebab was tender and flavorful and was served with a thin red sauce on the side that I think was tomato-based with herbs and spices, and nicely complemented the meat.
We finished the meal with two desserts, a napoleon that was very good and something called chack-chack, fried dough with honey, that Lenny seemed very proud of, but I thought was just okay. Perhaps I was just so full at that point that I couldn't fully appreciate the dish. It sort of reminded me of breakfast cereal.
I do believe my husband and I were the only patrons this night who were not native speakers of Russian. Some people might be put off by this, but, like many LTH-ers, we actually seek out places that give us the feeling of being in a foreign land. A few other tables were occupied by groups of two or four, but there were two parties of 16-20 people and it amazed us that a restaurant that had only been open a few weeks could seem to feed so many people at once so seamlessly. There was also live music, dancing and a belly dancer as entertainment.
Although we live in Buffalo Grove, we've never been to Chaihanna, so I can't say how this place compares.
We returned to Diora a few weeks later with another couple. I have to say that I don't think they liked it as much as we did. But it's worth noting that except for the samsas, neither one of them ate any lamb. In the end, the moral of the story is that Diora is ALL about the lamb and if you're not going to eat the lamb, well, don't go there.
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