We visited on a Saturday around 5:30 PM. At first, I was a little nervous since the place was completely empty--but I quickly noticed a steady stream of pickup orders, which reassured me that this spot is loved by locals. The décor is small and notably simple, but the food is what truly stands out. Everything was hot, fresh, and absolutely delicious. The prices were very reasonable for the quality and portions. We ordered a mixed platter and the hummus with shawarma--both were fantastic. The meat was flavorful, and the hummus was smooth and rich. Definitely a place we'd return to for a casual, satisfying meal. read more

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Based on yelp reviews I found Al-Sham Palace. We stopped for a late lunch /early dinner. It was empty except someone waiting for a carry out. We were greeted by a very nice young lady but she seemed surprised and somewhat taken back that we were there. She brought menus and asked for a beverage order. A coke and Diet Coke became an unknown brand in a small can served without ice. We ordered swarma sandwiches with fries and the beverage for an additional $3.50. When the orders arrived they were warm and very flavorful. We were still the only guests. Every table featured a Muslim table decoration that really made no difference to us but eventually we began to feel like we were strangers there. We noticed there were other folks in the kitchen and the waitress was not actually preparing our food. It was tasty and was spiced a little different than I have had before. The waitress brought our check on a portable card reader and I left our usual tip. We both felt a little out of place. The Yelp reviews were very positive but based on my search for middle eastern food in an area we have never been to, I was hoping for a more traditional food and service. read more

The ambiance is nice but lacking somehow. I am all into decorating according to the type of restaurant. We basically were waited on by two gentlemen who were both extremely nice and attentive. Now for the food...... it's awesome. The beef is tasty. The chicken is very well seasoned and tender and the lamb is cooked just right. The hummus is plain but very good and so is the baba ganoush. The salad is also flavorful. I do not like cilantro but it was so tasty I ignored the cilantro. We had the walnut baklava and another tasty treat though not sure of the name and they were both yummy. If you are in New Tampa this place is definitely a must try!!!! read more

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This place is always on the list, great food excellent service. The dining room is comfortable and offers the perfect sense of privacy. The food is consistently great read more

Best Mediterranean kitchen I have visited Clean restaurant, excellent service fresh cooked food An outstanding visit recommend highly Reasonable prices read more

This is a hidden gem for sure!! There isn't anything I haven't liked from this place and I've been coming back just to try new things!! My current favorites right now: Vegetarian: basically ALL of the appetizers or dips are amazing, the falafel is a huge hit with my kids (and me too!), and I can't seem to ever get enough of the Tabouleh! SO GOOD! Carnivore: I love the Mixed Grill Entrees, the Shawarma and the Kibbeh (when they have it) is delicious!!! My son even got a burger from here once, and he couldn't stop talking about it. The garlic sauce.... OH MAN I could eat that with a spoon! And they always give me extra bread when I ask, which I appreciate every time. I also highly recommend trying the desserts too. This place is underrated and is a local small business that needs their neighborhoods to help support them! Please stop by this place and give them a try - you will likely be coming back soon!! read more

Decent food. Service wasn't bad. They need to improve the ambiance, but other than that it's ok.

Just OK. Good prices but the food was meh. There are many good places around here with Mediterranean food and this one just wasn't impressive. Food was bland. read more

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Great family restaurant. Service and food were perfection. The chicken was so tender and flavorful - it was all very delicious.

The food was much worse than what i've previously had elsewhere. The kabobs were pretty awful and sadly, the Shawarma was very different and worse than a different place i've been to that got me into middle eastern food. The service was fine but overall, my wife and I are disappointed..but we'll try the other spot again. read more

Come here about once a month. Tried others. Visited yesterday, absolutely spot on. Had delicious Arabic salad and hummus with pita to start. Nicely savory, pita bread thin, warm, and tasty. Wife had chicken schwarma and I had chicken shish platter. Shared a piece of pistachio baklava to finish. No complaints! service outstanding. We both left pleasantly stuffed and will come back again! read more

This location is a long, narrow booth style restaurant inside of an older strip mall waaaaaaay up in North Tampa. You can tell that many families visiting here dine-in every weekend to spend quality time together. Almost all of the customers appeared to be regulars, which is a good sign. The prices are comparably low to restaurants that serve similar dishes in Tampa Bay, so you will get the chance to try more items when dining here. I don't know much about Syrian cuisine, but the food here was fairly calm in flavors in comparison to other restaurants I am tried. Maybe it is just this restaurant, but the grilled meats and dips were lacking in herbs and spices. I felt like often, I was just eating plain hamburger meat, even in the Kibbeh and spiced and grilled kabobs. My favorite dish here was the falafel, freshly fried and light. Second would be any of the eggplant dips served. If I do ever return, it would be for just the vegetarian platter, as the meat dishes here are bland. If you live all the way up here, I'm sure it is great, but for those in Tampa and St Pete, it is just too far. read more

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We live nearby and get takeout from here often. We usually order the chicken shwarma and chicken shish tawook wraps with light sauce. Very fresh and tasty. Their cheeseburgers have a charbroiled taste, which we enjoy. Their french fries are also sooo good! Nice little spot! read more

We were looking for a local restaurant to do a quick, nutritious take-out dinner after a long day. Based on other reviews, we decided to try Al-Sham Palace and we are so glad we did! There was something for everyone on the menu, and the prices were reasonable. And the food! Good size portions and excellent taste! We had the lamb shish kebabs and the chicken swarma. We picked rice and steamed vegetables for our sides - great choices! We will definitely be making Al-sham Palace and part of our regular take-outs! read more

Good Mediterranean food in New Tampa. Friendly staff. It's an intimate place with nice decor. The food did not take too long to come out. Very authentic. We started with the hummus and pita which was very tasty and fresh and had the Chicken Shawarma Sandwich that lasted me dinner and lunch the next day. They have a very large menu with lots of offerings. It's located in a strip mall so there's plenty of parking around in the plaza with many other shops and restaurants. Closed on Mondays but open Tuesday to Sunday for lunch and dinner. read more

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Blown away by this food!!! We ordered in last night, 15 minutes prior to the restaurant closing, and we received excellent service, without being rushed. We both ordered the gyro entree, which came with hummus, spiced rice and a side of yogurt sauce. The quality, flavour and portion sizes really blew us both away, because we weren't expecting takeout food to be so phenomenal. I always feel like restaurant food tastes better when one dines in, but this food was kitchen-to-home excellence! *The gyro meat was tasty and tender. *The pita bread was soft and absorbed the flavours of the meat. *The yogurt dip was creamy. *The hummus was rich and the perfect consistency. My partner also tried their Philly cheesesteak. Being a Philly native, he considers himself a cheesesteak expert, and he was extremely impressed. He said that it was better than some cheesesteaks that he's ordered from restaurants/chains which "specialize" in Philly cheesesteaks. We live less than 10 minutes from this restaurant, so we are going to make a point of dining in next time. read more

Al-Sham Palace - Gyro Sandwich with spiced rice and hummus - Mediterranean Near Me - Tampa, Florida

I had dinner with my family here. I like the food but they hadn't warned me the spice was too hot. The inside is clean and quite. The service is a bit slow I guess maybe it's due to the way the food is prepared. However Overall we have good experience. read more

Bad experience hung up on me multiple times after trying to speak with the manager. Never again

Reasonably priced food that tastes great. Everything is fresh and the restaurant is clean and welcoming.

Excellent food. Great service . The food quantity is sufficient enough to fill you up

We ordered food here for a party we were having at our party. We were so pleased with how everything turned out. Everyone loved the food. The staff were so nice and helped me figure out how much food to get. Will definitely be back! read more

My experience wasn't as good as some others. I was the only patron for most of my meal but two other tables did join. Service was friendly. I ordered the grape leaves, shish tawook and hummus and baba ganoush (their version is spelled differently). The grape leaves were not like the traditional Dolmadas from the Greek region. This is Syrian so the flavors are a bit different which I was actually very excited for. The grape leaves had rice spices and tomatoes. They were topped with a ton of lemon juice and oil. They were extremely sour. I love all foods with citrus atop but this was too much. They were also rolled very loosely. Not a huge fan of this version. The shish tawook was marinated chicken and then grilled. Really well done. So tender and juicy I would order this again. It also came with two sides. The hummus was bitter. Nice and smooth but bitter. Their version a baba ghanoush was really well done. All served with a heaping basket of pita. I likely won't visit again when Wesley Chapel has so much to offer but I'm glad I gave it a try. read more

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We enjoyed trekking all the way out here for a fun Saturday afternoon Syrian meal! The coffee, eggplant dip and hummus were extremely tasty. Be careful with the coffee since there are grounds underneath your thick beverage! The eggplant dip is incredibly tasty and we are now on a mission to learn how to make it ourselves. But, even better is the garlic sauce which you can obtain only if you ask. It's made with lemon, olive oil, salt, garlic and egg whites which makes it lighter than the Lebanese variety of garlic sauce. Delicious! 50 cents per serving and we got many! Life is good since we were able to try Syrian food in Tampa! read more

Al-Sham Palace - Mtable which is an eggplant and yogurt and parsley and yogurt and olive oil dip. Yummy! - Mediterranean Near Me - Tampa, Florida

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Al-Sham Palace is an unassuming little restaurant which offers very good middle-eastern cuisine. To start my dining buddy and I had a falafel platter, which was served with tahini, picked vegetables and Falafel. The falafel was fresh, and while it was not the best I've had in our area, it is very good. I also had a mint-lemonade, which had VERY fresh mint. Delicious! The pita is ok -- nothing inherently wrong with them, pretty standard. We also had keftke and shish-kabob (Lamb). Both were quite good and the salad was served with a lemon-olive oil dressing, which was light and delicious. I love tahini sauce, and theirs is very good. Service was prompt and friendly! The interior is interesting to look at, and is not like any other place in our area. Recommended --- if you're in the area on Bruce B Downs, give it a shot! read more

We went for a dinner on Friday night at Al-Sham Palace. We were confused whether to have food inside the restaurant or to take-out. But seeing that all the Covid19 guidelines were being followed we decided to have food in the restaurant. For dinner we ordered Eggs with Vegetables, Shish Tawook and Shish Kebab. The service was pretty quick. First we got the salad which comes with the entree. The whole order came in around 5 minutes. The food was amazing. Best part was Shish Tawook. But there is one suggestion. With Shish Kebab i ordered lamb and i believe lamb can be cooked more as it was hard to chew. Rest everything was amazing. Loved the dinner. read more

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Food was fresh and excellent quality. Chef Yousef friendly and professional. The staff was outstanding. The resturant was clean and the ambiance inviting. read more

This is a really cute place. The outside is kind of simple but the inside is really cute. The service was good and the music playing on the tv was a nice little touch. Now on to the food. I think everything was cooked very nicely I just couldn't finish the food because it had no flavor. Everything tasted really bland and I just like my food to be full of flavor or at least have some salt. Like I said this is a nice place and the service is great I just don't think the food was for me. read more

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Food was fantastic. I had the chicken shwarma and loved the hummus. I will definitely be back.

The food is extremely delicious you need to try it in you life time the service is the best especially this one lady that l believe owns the place and is super sweet the atmosphere is nice all though there not much natural light do to the fact that there in between to stores there make it still look amazing and the food over shadows anything else it's sooooo good read more

Enjoyed our lunch at Al-Sham. The falafel, hummus, pita, rice, and vegetables were all very good. The atmosphere is a bit dull, and our server seemed confused with some simple questions (possibly a language barrier). The prices were reasonable. read more

The food was outstanding, I had a mixup with the food ordering company, so I was charged twice, but they were able to work it out and get me refunded and charged less for one of the orders! Would dine here again every time we visit Tampa. Wish we could say we had something like this near our home. Great job and customer service! read more

Very Good. This was a pretty clean restaurant with a plain ambience and a somewhat limited menu. Everything I had was delicious. I had the shish kafka, rice, and a salad. The food smelled good and it tasted even better. Good prices. Serving staff was friendly and helpful. I am looking forward to a return visit. read more

We love this family owned restaurant. We eat there several times per week. Not a bad thing on the menu. All fresh and truly halal food. If the menu is unfamiliar, the staff is willing to make recommendations and we've never been disappointed. read more

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The staff was very friendly and it is a little hole in the wall. I had the chicken Shawarma and it was a little dry. My brother had the gyro and he wasn't thrilled though the fries were cooked perfect. My sister in law had the grilled mix and she loved it. So maybe next time will be better and I will update this review. read more

Al-Sham Palace - chicken Shawarma - Mediterranean Near Me - Tampa, Florida

Let me lead with the positive... food was good..not great and very fresh as far as the salad, babaganoush (so?), stuffed grape leaves and hummus. To be very fair, the stuffed grape leaves were better than most I've ever had including my own family's from Lebanon. The Gyro meat was deceiving as it looked like dark wet cardboard but it tasted great ! There was a Lebanese butcher in the strip mall so I'd hoped that they would source locally and not mail it in with prepackaged gyro meat but... the lemon mint slushie was adequate as well but would've be better if it wasn't left to melt on the counter as the only server (M per the check) walked past it 3 times.... So I got up and got it myself. She said nothing when she returned to our table with appetizers which was equally as strange as ignoring food and drink that was up. Never came to clear plates so they just piled up and we progressively ran out of room. Instead she just get kept realigning the trays of baklava on the counter and reorganizing anything that was on the counter. Seven times to be exact. I would say it wasn't worth the $50 spent for lunch but then again we didn't leave hungry. The poor service really negates us from returning and going to Fire Up Halal Grill instead. It's clear that the server is a family member and this is not her passion, which is understandable. However, she's the face of the organization at present and this is bound to hurt business. The owner should take this into account. If yo I get take out, you'll probably be fine. read more

Rare Ethnic Food #34 This Mediterranean Cuisine but specialty on Syrian food. Syrian Cuisine is a bit different than Lebanese. They are similarity but alway minor differences. The Syrian has more heavy spice that I like. It actually marinated into the meat. The special item we had is not the so call "Babaghanoush", it call Mtable. It is grilled eggplant, tahini sauce, yogurt and garlic. It drizzle with olive oil. I love this dish. We have the mixed grill with Shish Tawook (chicken cube), Shish Kefta (grilled ground beef) and Shish Kabab ( Beef or Lamb cube) I like the marinated, it went deep into the meat. They have the best chicken cube in town. We also have the grilled fish sandwich which is less than $6. Great value. Fish fillet is big. Love it. This restaurant own by husband and wife. Please give them a visit, you will like it. read more

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We ordered the platter for 2- the meat and chicken was good! It was strange that it didn't come with rice- but we ordered it as a side and that was good! The kibbe and baba ganoush was really good! The grape leaves and hummus were not as great for me- the grape leaves definitely tasted as though they were from a can. All in all a yummy place to eat! read more

Good food, their prices need an update here though. The difference is 30-40% higher on certain items. For instance, Shish tawook entree is actually 16.99 not 12.99. read more

Outstanding meat shawarma.Wow.The flavor and juices are so tasty.Sorry forgot to take picture.I will be back for sure.The meat is the star of the sure.The hummus is pure and excellent. read more

Tried this while visiting family. Wish they had a location where I live! Great variety and great variety of flavors.