Pita Pita: Ann Arbor's Best Mediterranean Food

Need a pita? Go to Pita Pita, Washtenaw County's best place to feast on Middle Eastern cuisine - and I do mean feast. This pita proprietor is located among the bevy of ethnic restaurants along Washtenaw Road. Just a few doors down from the now defunct Al Noor, Pita Pita will not impress as particularly stylish or welcoming in appearance, but the food jetted out from its back kitchen more than makes up for the lackluster façade.

The menu offers smoothies, traditional meals with rice and shish kabobs, as well as sandwiches and salads. Sandwiches are under $5, appetizers range from $3-7, and entrees are $10-14. The tabbbouleh consists of fresh parsley, finely diced tomato, and onion, and just enough cracked wheat to hold the delicate ingredients together. Lemon juice brightens the flavor, and the salad itself is light enough to allow for an order of hummus. Pita Pita knows hummus. An ample plate of the creamy dip will arrive topped with a few pickled veggies and olive oil. The warm pita packets greeting you upon arrival at your table can be enjoyed plain, but they satisfy even more as vehicles for the hummus. The menu offers additional standards - Baba Ghannuje, Falafel, lentil soup, and Greek salad, to name a few - but the pita and tabbouleh are too good to reconsider ordering in favor of something else.

With a salad plus hummus and pita already under your belt, one of Pita Pita's sandwiches would seemingly be a lighter way to round out your meal - so you think. At $3.50 for a smaller size, and just $4.75 for the larger size, sandwiches are an economical and equally tasty way to experience the robust Mediterranean flavors. The larger size Shish Tawook is a steal, considering that comparably sized - if not smaller - Subway sandwiches or other fast food grub are in the same price bracket. At Pita Pita, you receive a delicious sandwich wrapped in a crisp, locally made pita. Its contents consist of charbroiled, marinated, moist chicken that has been bathed in a liberal coating of garlic yogurt sauce, with thinly slice pickles to add a unique tang. The flavors and textures meld perfectly. The sandwich would be filling on its own as a lunch, but even as the main course of a filling dinner, you cannot help but want to eat every last bite.

The best thing about Pita Pita? Great, fresh, authentic food for an extremely reasonable price. Why hand your hard-earned money to a cashier for another bland, greasy McMeal when you can feast on a richer assortment of flavors for a similar price?