Springfield has many good restaurants, a lot of which reside on Commercial Street. One of C-Street’s best culinary gems is the aptly named Lebanese restaurant, That Lebanese Place. 

That Lebanese Place is located at 338 E Commercial St, just a short distance from Drury’s campus.

The inside is quaint, but with interesting seating and decor. They have tables and rounded wooden booths that give the place a cozy feel. The walls are lined with several maps of Lebanon and other pictures, all with inscriptions in Arabic. We were seated next to a curious poster that featured several different pictures of Arabian Thoroughbreds. The most interesting decoration though, are the one dollar bills taped all along the ceiling. It’s unclear how the dollar bills got there and the meaning behind them was never revealed to us–we had fun guessing though. 

The food is pretty incredible and reasonably priced. They have a lunch special from 11am-2pm from Tuesday-Thursday every week, and this is a deal that you should definitely take advantage of. They also have plenty of vegetarian and vegan options.

One of the only downsides of That Lebanese Place was the service. The waitress was very nice and helpful, but service was a little slow and we were waiting quite a while after the meal to pay. However, the food is most certainly worth the wait.

Sammie

 I had the Mushakal sandwich with Baba Ganouj. The sandwich is made up of a fried blend of chickpeas, onions, garlic, spices, fresh vegetables and pickled turnips topped with tahini. It is labeled as vegan on the menu. The sandwich was very good, and I enjoyed it immensely. I was a little worried about the pickled turnips, but they went perfectly with the tahini and all of the flavors blended in nicely together. 

The most-loved Baba Ganouj

The Baba Ganouj was served on the side with pita chips and that was also very good. The best way I can describe Baba Ganouj is that it’s like hummus, but instead of mashed chickpeas, it’s made of mashed eggplant. It tastes similarly to hummus, but is a little richer, and I personally liked it better. The pita chips were a little too crispy for my liking, but that’s just me being picky. Overall, it was truly a lovely meal at a decent price.

Sammie’s Mushakal sandwich

Cheyenne

I ordered the lamb kebab lunch special which came with their signature spiced rice and pickled vegetables on the side. In place of the usual yoghurt dipping sauce, our waitress kindly substituted the most wonderful tomato sauce I’ve had to date. This was preceded by either soup or salad–I chose the salad. The dressing on that salad was an olive oil and vinegar mixture that hi-lighted the acidity of the tomatoes and cucumber, while giving just enough spice that the radish slices weren’t out of place. I had to push it away so I wouldn’t fill up on just salad. 

Look at those veggies

The star of my lunch was the lamb. It was tender and sweet, flavorful with just the right amount of char on the skin. There were about five or six cubes of lamb with the lunch portion, but I could have eaten an entire bowl of it. Dipped in the tomato sauce, the lamb simply soared. When I finished the lamb, I even poured that sauce onto the yellow rice–which, in its own right, is delightfully spiced. Around half the menu had a vegetarian or vegan symbol next to dish names and I didn’t feel as though my dietary restrictions were a hassle to the staff. I’ll certainly be going back to That Lebanese Place. 

Cheyenne’s lamb kebab

Written by Sammie Ellis and Cheyenne Heavener