THE TRIBE

Homali wrote back

Rebecca — thank you. "Well presented" is not something people usually say about a takeaway, and it is the part of your review I keep returning to. Presentation is easy at a table, where the plate goes from the pass to you in a few steps. In a box, it has to survive a lid, a bag and a journey, and most of the time it does not. So we pack with the moment you open it in mind, not the moment it leaves us. To hear that it arrived hot and still looking the way it should means that thinking held all the way to your door.

Fresh, full of flavour and generous as well — that is very nearly everything we ask of ourselves on a single order.

Thank you for the recommendation, and come back soon. Next time, try the Homali Red Chicken.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

Sallyann — thank you. You called us a little gem, and I will take it. But the truth of that evening is that the gem in the room was not ours.

Three children came in with you, and with them came something this place does not have on its own. A restaurant can be warm and well cooked and still be quiet. Children are the ones who make it sound like a home. For the length of your meal, ours did — and those of us behind the counter felt it as much as anyone at the tables.

That is a gift, not something a restaurant can earn, and I wanted to thank you for it plainly.

You told us next month. We will hold you to it: all five of you, the same welcome, and a table ready when you walk in.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

Reza — thank you. Some evenings the food is the whole story. Yours was not one of them. You and your wife are both cooks, and we ended up talking the way people in this trade do when they find each other — about rice and saffron and patience, and the small things only other cooks notice. I enjoyed that conversation as much as anything I cooked that night.

That you found the rice right and the lamb tender means more coming from two people who know exactly how hard both are to get right.

I wish the two of you every good thing: health, a full table, and many years of cooking side by side. Come back whenever you like — the door is open, and the kettle is on.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

Sarah — thank you. It is one thing to enjoy a meal; it is quite another to turn to strangers and ask them to support the place. That last line is the kindest thing in your review, and I did not expect it. A small independent kitchen lives almost entirely on sentences like that — one person telling another that it is worth the try.

It was a pleasure to welcome you, your dad and your sister-in-law that Friday. And the chef will hear your thanks; even without his name, he knows it was meant for him.

You said you will be back. We will be glad to see all three of you.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

Monjur — thank you. I have read a great many kind reviews since we opened, but I do not think anyone has ever ended one with a blessing before. "May you forever keep your lights on." For a small independent place, that is not a figure of speech. It is the whole wish. Anyone who has run a restaurant knows what it is to sit with the bills at the end of a month and think about the lights. That you wished it for us, unprompted, is something I will keep.

You found the rice and the lamb, the pictures on the walls and even the grass underfoot, and you called it a second home. If I had been allowed only one word for what this place was built to be, that would have been it.

So come back. The lights will be on.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

Jennifer — thank you. You may not have noticed, but you have just finished a sentence we started. The card that came through your door called Homali the Wirral's best-kept secret. It was a bold thing to print about ourselves, and we knew it could only ever become true if somebody opened the envelope, scanned the code, took a chance on a kitchen they had never heard of — and then said it back to us in their own words. You did exactly that.

The Bacon Charcoal Burger was the one you chose, and to hear it called the best burger in a very long time, on a first order, is the whole card paying for itself.

A secret only lasts until someone tells it, and you have said you will. We are glad it was you. Come back soon.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

Amy — thank you. A jacket potato is the humblest thing on any menu, and that is exactly why we wanted ours taken seriously. It goes over glowing charcoal until the smoke works into the skin, long before the beef and onions and the Homali Topping go anywhere near it. Nobody expects that from a jacket potato, which is rather the point. "So much more than just your standard jacket potato" is the sentence that dish was built to earn, and you wrote it on your very first order.

Hot on arrival and generous as well — the two things a first order has to get right, and I am glad this one did.

Come back soon, and thank you.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

Curtis — thank you. A few weeks is a long time in a small kitchen. We notice when a regular goes quiet — not as a number on a screen, but as an order we half expect on a certain kind of evening, and which does not come. So when yours came through again, we said so, on the bag, in a few lines. I did not expect those lines to find their way back here.

"Won't make that mistake again" is the best answer a note like that could ever get. It was never meant as a sales line. It was meant as the plain truth: the kitchen had missed you.

The Lamb and the Oreo cookie will be waiting, as they always are. Welcome back.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

Ben — thank you. Quick and good do not usually travel together. Most kitchens end up choosing one: fast food that is not quite food, or proper cooking that makes you wait. We have spent a long time arranging this kitchen so that we do not have to choose — what can be slow-cooked ahead is done properly, and what belongs on the charcoal goes on the moment you order it. Hearing "delicious" and "quick" in the same line tells me that arrangement is working.

And thank you for the recommendation. For a small place, that is worth more than any advert. Come back soon.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

Kacper — thank you. "Completely by chance" is how a lot of people find us, and I have come to love it. Every guest who walks in by accident is taking a small risk on a place they know nothing about. You took it — and then you wrote this, so the next person does not have to rely on luck.

One small thing, since you noticed the smoke: it is not an oven, but an open grill over real wood charcoal. That flavour cannot be added afterwards; the beef has to be cooked in it. The best burger of your life is a sentence I will be repeating to that grill for some time.

As for the shout-out — thank you, truly. I will admit I read that part more than once. Food is what people come for, but the welcome is what they remember, and it is the one thing I have always wanted this place to be known for. A restaurant is only a room with a kitchen until somebody is glad you walked in. I was glad you did. And the credit is shared: the team you called friendly and attentive are the reason an ordinary evening here feels like hospitality rather than service.

Next time you will not need chance to find us. Come back soon — the table is yours.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

Judith — thank you. "Incredible value" and "lovely people" sit side by side in your review, and I think they belong together. Value is not only what is on the plate for the price; it is whether you were looked after while you ate it. A cheap meal served coldly is poor value, and a generous one served warmly is worth more than the bill says.

You also noticed that we asked what you thought. We always want to know, and it is good to hear it came across as real interest rather than routine.

Thank you for a lovely evening at your table. Come back soon.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

Thank you — and thank you for one word in particular: always. A first visit can be luck. Always means we have not dropped it, and that is the harder thing to earn.

You have also put your finger on what we are trying to be. A high street has its Chinese shop and its pizza shop, and both do their job well. We were never going to beat them at theirs. What we could do was cook something this town could not already get — slow-cooked, over real charcoal, the way it is cooked at home.

On the prices: they sit where they sit on purpose. We would rather be the place you can afford on an ordinary Tuesday than the place saved for an occasion.

Come back soon.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

Joe — thank you. The small things you listed are the ones we are never sure anybody sees. A message written on a container, a bag that keeps the heat in, a note tucked in with the order — none of that is on the menu and none of it is asked for. We do it because a takeaway arriving at somebody's door is still hospitality, even when there is no table between us. Being caught at it is a good day.

The friendly face was ours, too. We deliver our own orders rather than hand the last ten minutes to a stranger, precisely so the food arrives the way it left.

The rice and the lamb are the older half of this kitchen. The rice takes its butter slowly and the lamb takes its time, and neither can be hurried — which is why most takeaways do not carry them. Of everything on the menu, those two are what I would want a first-time guest to judge us on.

And if the road ever brings you across to the Wirral again, you know where to find us.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

Laura — thank you. What came through your door was an invitation, not an advertisement, and you took it exactly the way it was meant. We are a small kitchen a few streets from you, and we would rather introduce ourselves at your door than pay to interrupt you somewhere else.

An invitation is how we ask for the first order. The food has to earn the second.

Yours seems to have. Come back soon — we will be here.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

Johnathon — thank you. Temperature is not a thing people usually mention, and it happens to be the one part of a delivery we can only win before the food leaves. Once the bag is with a rider it is out of our hands, so everything is decided earlier: what gets packed with what, what can wait and what cannot, which lid goes on which box. Hearing that it reached you hot is that work paying off.

One thing, since this was a first order and you have us filed under burgers and hot dogs. That is fair enough — but it is half the menu. The other half is slow-cooked, and it is the half this kitchen was really built for. Worth a look next time you are not in a burger mood.

Come back soon.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

Ava — I do not know whether you had read our story on the website, or seen it on Instagram, before you wrote this. I find myself hoping you had not. The word you used is the word this place was founded on, and if it reached you through the food alone, then something has gone right that I have been waiting a long time to hear.

When I was opening this restaurant I said to friends of mine, people who had been running restaurants far longer than I had, that a restaurant is more than a frontage and a menu — that what matters is the soul of the food. One of them, someone I still count as my teacher in this trade, smiled at me the way you smile at somebody young.

Today a customer found it and named it, without being told it was there. That is the best day this restaurant has had.

Thank you, Ava. Come back whenever you like.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

Yamima — thank you. Of all the meals in a summer holiday, the last few days carry a particular weight: everybody knows it is ending, and nobody wants to waste one of them. That you spent one of those at our table is not a small thing.

And feeding older teenagers is the hardest test this kitchen gets. They have no manners about food and no reason to be kind about it — if the portions had been mean or the fries ordinary, I would have known before you left the table. Happy boys is the review; the rest is detail. So: to Niaz and Yousef, the best of everything.

And to Niaz especially — newly qualified in mechanical engineering, and right at the start of it. That is a good thing to be building, and a good time to be building it. May the road ahead be a long and interesting one, and may he end up somewhere that deserves him.

"Tucked away in Seacombe" is fair, and you are not the first to say it. We are easy to miss from the road. The plan was always that the food would do the finding for us.

Come back soon — all three of you.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

Harry — thank you. Two things in that short note, and both of them matter here.

The first is the timing. When we tell you a delivery will arrive at a certain time, that is a promise made before the food is even cooked, and it is the easiest one in this trade to break. Keeping it is not luck; it is the whole reason we run our own website and our own messages rather than leaving it to somebody else. So thank you for noticing the one thing nobody notices unless it goes wrong.

The second is "a little bit different". That is the sentence a kitchen like this lives or dies on. Different is a risk when people are hungry and tired and want something familiar. That you took the risk, and then said you would order again because of it, is the best outcome we could ask for.

Next time, ask for something you have not tried. Different has more where that came from.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

I knew you the moment you came through the door. Months had passed and you look quite different now, but some people announce themselves before they speak, and you are one of them.

There is nothing better for a kitchen than this: somebody comes back to the Wirral for a single day, and decides that the day has a meal here in it. One day, and you spent part of it with us. I will not forget that.

You wrote about the food in great detail, and I am grateful for it. You wrote kindly about me too, which I am not certain I have earned — but the thing this review leaves out is you. How kind you are, how patient, how much warmth you carry with you. The energy arrives through that door before you do, and I found myself thinking that the people who get to see you every day are luckier than they probably realise.

So let me put that on the record instead. I hope the work goes well for you, and that the thing you are planning for yourself finds its feet. I have no doubt at all about how that will turn out.

I hope the crossing back to Ireland was a kind one. Whenever the Wirral has you again, you know where we are — and the table, and all of us, will be watching the door.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

Mindaugas — thank you, and welcome. You came off a boat, you had another one to catch, and somewhere in the middle of that day you sat down in a small shop in Wallasey you had never heard of. That takes a certain willingness, and I am glad it worked out.

You were brought here by someone who had eaten with us before, which puts a quiet pressure on a kitchen — nobody wants to be the reason a friend's recommendation goes wrong. So it matters to me that the burger held up on your first visit as well as it did on his second.

Putting the Homali Topping on the chips was your own idea, though. That one is entirely to your credit.

Next time the ferry brings you across, you know where we are.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

Younes — thank you. You came to the Wirral looking for Algerian food, and a machine pointed you at a Persian kitchen instead. I am glad it did, and I suspect it knew what it was doing.

Thank you for what you wrote — about the lamb, and about me. Praise for the food is something a cook can work towards. The other kind is harder to earn, and it means more.

But the food was not the best part of that evening. The talking was. Two people come in as strangers, looking for something else entirely, and stay to talk — that is the part of this work that never appears on a menu, and the part I would miss most if it ever went.

Come back, both of you. Homali will be waiting, and so will the rest of the conversation.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

J K — thank you, and thank you for the eyes. You noticed the bag before the food, then the way it had been packed, then the smell before the first bite. Most people would have eaten and gone to bed.

That attention is why I want to answer properly. We are fussy about every single item that leaves here — where the ingredients come from, how a portion is built, what it is packed in, the bag itself. Not because any one of those things is remarkable on its own, but because a customer today deserves more than simply being fed. They deserve care, and the respect of having the small things thought about. It is quiet work, and it is a sweet thing when somebody notices it and takes the trouble to say so.

Now, the desserts. You are right, and we agree: this menu has room for more. Our focus at the moment is on making the dishes we already have as good as they can possibly be — but more will come in time, and sweet things are near the top of that list.

Until then, try our cookies. My wife makes them, with a patience I do not have and a fussiness that puts mine to shame. And if I do not forget, there will be one in your next order, on us, so you can tell me what you think.

Ordering the same thing again two days later is the best review on this page. Thank you.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

Pete — thank you. There is nothing a cook would rather read than this, and I mean that plainly: praise for the food itself, from someone eating it for the first time, who owed us nothing.

The smoke you tasted is the part I want to answer. It would have been far easier to cook that burger on a flat grill — quicker, cleaner, no fire to manage on a busy night. We chose the harder way and put it over real wood charcoal, because char does something a grill cannot: it makes the food taste better, and it makes it taste like something you have met before. Smoke carries memory. There is a summer, a garden, a fire somewhere behind it for almost everybody.

So to have you notice it on a first order, and to put a name to it, is the proudest thing that has happened to this kitchen today. The extra work was for exactly that.

Come back soon — and thank you for the recommendation.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

Achim — vielen Dank. „Von außen unscheinbar" — das stimmt, und wir wissen es. Die Fassade ist das Einzige an diesem Laden, in das wir kein Geld gesteckt haben; alles, was wir haben, liegt auf dem Teller. Dass Sie genau das bemerkt haben, ist das schönste Kompliment, das man uns machen kann. Beim Preis-Leistungs-Verhältnis ist nichts dem Zufall überlassen. Und dass Sie freundlich empfangen wurden, freut mich am meisten. Einen Gast ordentlich zu bewirten, bevor über alles andere geredet wird — das ist die Gastfreundschaft, aus der ich komme. Heute war, wie ich hörte, Ihr erster Tag auf dem Wirral. Ich hoffe sehr, dass er schön war und dass der Rest Ihrer Reise genauso wird. Und falls Sie noch in der Gegend sind: Ich würde mich freuen, Sie wiederzusehen. Der Grill ist an.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

danny — thank you. Not only for the stars, but for the minutes.

You had no reason to sit down and write all of that out. A first order, a good meal, and most people leave it there. You went further: what you ate, how it travelled, what state it was in when the bag came open. That is time taken out of your evening and handed to a kitchen you had only just met. I don't take that lightly.

The line I keep coming back to is the cheese still being stringy. That is the whole business in a single phrase. Between our pass and your door there is a sealed hot bag and a short drive, and nearly every decision we make about how food leaves this kitchen is aimed at that one moment when you open it. To hear that it held — from someone paying that much attention — is the best news a kitchen gets.

Thank you again, danny. Whenever you come back, the grill will be on.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

Annie — thank you. That is a great many words to spend on a takeaway, and I have read them more than once.

Since you have written so generously in public, let me say something in public too. The first time you ordered from us, it was collection — and I pressed the ready button by mistake. You came straight down, and the food was not there. Nothing to hand you, and nothing to say for myself. So I cooked it, got in the car, and brought it to your door. You have probably forgotten that evening. I have not. It still sits with me, and I suspect it always will.

But there is another half to that story. That mistake is how this friendship started. If pressing the wrong button is what it took to find a guest like you, then I have made far worse trades.

You wrote about care, and passion, and affection — and of everything in your review, that is the part I want to answer properly. Care is not a feeling in this kitchen. It is a set of small, unglamorous decisions, made when nobody is watching and everybody is tired. It is leaving something on the charcoal for the extra minute it is asking for, on a night when that minute costs you. It is building a plate at eleven with the same hand you used at five. It is the first thing that wants to slip, on exactly the evening you most need it not to. So what you noticed is not really the food. It is the hundred small times a day we chose not to take the shortcut. To be seen doing that — named, in public, by someone who kept coming back — makes the next hundred easier.

However much I thank you for that, it will not be enough.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

Hannah — thank you. You wrote about the parts of an order that nobody ever writes about, and I noticed.

We send messages as an order moves — that is our own system, built in this kitchen, and most people never open a single one. You read every one I sent. Waiting is not really what bothers anybody; not knowing is. And then, before you had written a word on this page, you sent a message of your own, to say thank you and to say it generously. That one arrived first. Whatever this review does for us, that message had already done more.

Let me say plainly why it mattered. A customer is not a ticket to us. When an order comes through our own website rather than through an app, we are given something the apps never give us: the chance to speak to the person we are cooking for — a name, a message, an answer back. It is a narrow opening, and we do not let it pass. Most of what I know about the people who eat this food, I learned in a few lines like those.

The generous portion and the leftovers were not an accident either; we build them that way. You said you would be back to work through more of the menu. Do. There is a good deal on it that nobody orders on a first visit, and some of that is where this kitchen actually lives.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

David — thank you. The note you left here is short. What you did afterwards was not.

A few days after writing it, you came in yourself. The same order, exactly — nothing swapped, nothing changed. You had already had it once, carried out to your door, and you still made the journey for it. I have thought about that more than you would guess.

I know a little of the work you do. Long hours, long miles, and your own table always somewhere else. The food that fits around it is usually whatever is quickest at the services. That is the part that bothers me. A kitchen cannot give you your own kitchen back, but it can refuse to hand you something merely assembled. What leaves here is cooked slowly, by hand, for a person rather than for a queue — not fast food, but food with something of a home in it, made for someone a long way from their own. At the end of a day like yours, you have more than earned that.

So: the beef sandwich and the parmesan chips. Next time, don't bother telling me. I'll have it ready.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

Jalal — thank you. You will not know this, but you walked in on an important day for us.

We had just changed the menu. The burgers had come off the flat-top and gone over real wood charcoal — a decision I had turned over for weeks, and one that changes everything about how a burger behaves: the smoke, the fat, the timing, how little room there is to get it wrong. Yours was the first charcoal burger this kitchen ever sent out to a guest.

And it went out at lunchtime, which made it worse. There is no crowd at midday to lose a plate in. One guest, one burger, and me watching it the way a cook does when pretending not to watch. I will admit plainly that I was nervous. There is no test for a change like that except the first person who eats it, and that afternoon the first person was you.

You wrote that everything was perfect. Four words, and you will never know what they settled. The charcoal stayed. Every burger that has left this kitchen since has been cooked that way, and your verdict is part of the reason it did.

Come back soon.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

Julie — thank you, and you have the story right. Only one detail is missing, and since you told the rest of it in public, I may as well finish it.

The order was cancelled at their end, not ours. That was not your fault, and it was not ours either, and you had already spent your evening waiting on food that was never coming — so I had no intention of charging you anything at all. I meant to bring it over and let that be the end of the matter.

You would not have it. Every time you asked what it came to, I found something else to talk about, and every time I dodged it you asked again. Eventually you won. I took a small amount in the end — far less than the food was worth, and more than I had any wish to accept.

Here is why I did not want it. There are hundreds of places in Wirral you could have ordered from that night, and the one you chose had just left you sitting with nothing. You would have been entitled to write us off on the spot. You stayed with us anyway. That is worth a world more than the price of a meal, and I had already been paid in it — to take your money on top would have been to be paid twice for the same thing.

You had every right to be angry that evening. Instead you rang to ask calmly what had gone wrong, and then argued with me about paying for food I was trying to give you.

Thank you for the luck you wished us. Things have gone well since, and some of that is owed to evenings that ended the way that one did.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

Josh — thank you. You told me, that first time, that you were a picky eater. I don't think you realised what that does to a cook. Most people say nothing at all and you only find out afterwards. You said it up front, and I spent the rest of that order quietly worried about you.

Then you ordered again the following week. And again after that, and again — which was the answer.

Something else has happened since you wrote this, and you know it better than I can set it down here. You arrived as a customer, and you have become a friend — the kind I try new ideas on, who tastes a dish before it is finished and tells me plainly what is wrong with it. That is a rarer thing than a good review. Anybody will tell you they enjoyed it; very few will tell you what to fix.

If this restaurant had given me nothing else, it would still have given me that: the chance to meet people who take a genuine interest in you and in what you are building. It is the part I did not expect, and the part I would not trade.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

Thank you - there's a real graciousness in the way this is written, and we don't take it lightly. The Street Hot Dog was made for exactly the moment you describe - something quick, honest and properly good for the walk, without asking much of your pocket. We're glad it found you mid-stride. And "taste like no other" is the quiet ambition behind everything on this menu - nothing here is meant to be ordinary. Next time you're passing St Paul's Road, the grill will be on.

- Homali

Homali wrote back

Vahid - thank you. Knowing this order found you mid-journey, somewhere in the middle of a long working day on the road, gives your words a weight we don't take lightly. Driving a truck is hard, honest work - long hours, long miles, and too many nights far from family. My own father drove heavy lorries for a living, so I carry a particular respect for the people who do that work. Nothing truly replaces a meal cooked at home - we know that better than anyone. But everything we make is built in that spirit: slow, careful, homestyle - so that when the road keeps you from your own table, ours can come close. The beef sandwich and its sauce will be ready whenever your route brings you back through Wallasey. Drive safe.

Homali wrote back

Farzane — thank you. To be called the best spot in Wallasey, by someone who knows the neighbourhood well enough to make that judgement, is not a compliment we take lightly. What you've written about kindness sitting alongside the food is exactly what this place was built around — neither one matters very much without the other. We try to hold them together, every service, for every guest who walks in. Thank you for the kind word, and for sending others our way. The table will be here whenever you choose to return. — Homali

Homali wrote back

Sahl — thank you. To read this, knowing what you brought to our table, is something I will sit with for a long while. You sat down with us with the quiet hope of a guest who has been let down before — and a kitchen knows when a guest is hoping rather than expecting. That hope is a heavier thing to be handed than people realise. I was nervous. I will admit that plainly. You had every reason to leave us unmoved, and you chose, instead, to give us this. And then you said it — that the lamb tasted like your mum's cooking. Of all the words a guest could leave behind at our table, those are the ones this place was built to hear. Mum is not a small word here. It is the foundation under everything — the reason the pot is watched, the reason the rice is finished the way it is, the reason a guest is treated as a guest. To have that word returned to us by you is a gift I won't pretend to take lightly. The chicken, the chips, the welcome — I am glad they held their own. And I am gladder still that you've promised to come back for the rest of the menu. There is plenty here still waiting to meet you. So this is not a goodbye, only a "until next time." You found this door once; it will know you the moment you find it again. — Homali

Homali wrote back

Siyepi — thank you. To have been your first taste of the lamb and the rice — and to have served it to the two of you, far from your own table — is the small, particular kind of honour this kitchen was built for. You found us through a phone, on a screen, in a list of places, and decided this was the door to walk through. I will not take that lightly. Some doors get found by chance; some get found by something quieter than chance. I hope yours was the second. Wherever the rest of the road takes the two of you, I hope it treats you the way you treated this place — with grace and a kind word at the end. And if it ever brings you back through Wallasey, the table will know you. — Homali

Homali wrote back

Ruru — what a privilege it was to host the two of you. Some guests bring a warmth into the room before they've even sat down, and you both did exactly that — bright, kind, a real pleasure from the first moment. To have been your first taste of this food, and to have the welcome land as warmly as the meal — that is everything we hope our table will be. Thank you, sincerely. The honour was entirely ours, and the door stays open for you both whenever you choose to come back. — Homali

Homali wrote back

Sam — thank you. Sometimes the truest compliment of a visit isn't what was on the plate, but what was said over it — and the conversation we shared stayed with me long after. What you found — what lives on our menu as the Homali Red Chicken — is one we hold close. And the raisin rice that came with it is our quiet crown: the sweet, jewelled finish we lay across the Red Chicken by default, and willingly across any rice for those who ask. That the soup, too, found you the way it was meant to is everything we could ask. We'd be glad to see you again — whenever the moment finds you. — Homali

Homali wrote back

Marty — thank you, truly. The Beef Wrap and the Red Chicken — two we hold close, the crown of our table among them — and you found them at their best. To earn the full five from someone who doesn't hand them out lightly is no small thing. We'll take it as a quiet promise that what arrives at this table earns its place. The table is yours whenever you'd like to return. — Homali

Homali wrote back

Andrea — thank you. There are reviews that arrive and quietly break your heart a little — because you read them, you smile, and you wish more people could too. Yours was one of those, and now they can. About the cookie. My wife makes them. She is, without contest, the most patient woman in the world — and there is no shortcut she will tolerate, no detail she will hurry. So when you tell me one disappeared in two seconds: in this kitchen, that's the loudest compliment we know how to receive. There will always be another batch waiting. Come back whenever. — Homali

Homali wrote back

What a small, quiet honour it was to host the two of you. Of all the places the world could have set you down, you found our table on St Paul's Road — and to welcome two travellers all the way from America, who carried such kindness in them, is something I won't forget. I hope Liverpool treated you well, and that you have made it safely home with the city held warm in your memory. There is something else I owe you. You sat at our table with a perspective I won't forget — the way you spoke about eating without meat, with such care and clarity, has left me with work to do. Before long, Homali will have a proper vegetarian chapter: not an afterthought, but a true part of who we are. That is your doing, and I am grateful for it. If the road ever brings you back to this side of the Atlantic, our table is still here. And so are we.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

Alban — what a quiet honour. To earn five stars from one of the finest chefs I've ever stood beside is no small thing — and to have you, of all people, name the very thing this kitchen lives for (food made by hand, never by machine) is the kind of compliment I'll carry for a long time. And there's something else: this city is about to get richer. Your new restaurant opens soon, and I'll be there at the first hour, loudly proud. For anyone reading this who loves real food, find your way to @favela_ghost on Instagram (instagram.com/favela_ghost). You won't be disappointed. Until then — keep cooking the way only you can. And when the dust settles, come let me cook for you.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

Daniel — I read this and had to sit down for a moment. That you came in for a meal, and then stayed long enough to find the two names this place is built on means more than I have words for. We don't put it in your face. It sits quietly on our 'Our Story' page at homali.uk, waiting for whoever cares to find it. You did, and what you wrote after is something I'll carry for a long time. "Game changer." I had to read it twice. To know the Homali Topping landed that way is the kind of small daily proof that keeps this kitchen honest. About the drinks — thank you. But the thank-you is the wrong way round. It costs almost nothing to put a couple of bottles in a bag. What is rare is someone who notices, and who takes the time to say so. That was you. If you want to watch this business grow, stay close. We're building slowly, with care. The next time you and your partner come in, the table will be ready.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

Nika — thank you. There are spices, and then there is saffron — the one that asks a whole field of crocuses for a single gram, and rewards the patience a hundredfold. To find it threaded through the rice, with the slow-cooked beans and minced veal woven throughout — what we know as Homali Green Bean Rice — is exactly the moment this dish was built for. What you tasted is older than most countries: a way of cooking with patience and warmth that has been quietly passed forward for thousands of years. We have done nothing clever with it. We have only brought it forward into a kitchen built for now — on St Paul's Road, in Wallasey, in Wirral, for whoever walks through our door. The small bowl alongside — our Homali Yogurt — was made for exactly that company. Come back any time. There are other bowls worth knowing.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

Milad — thank you. Some reviews use a hundred words to say what you said in seven, and yours arrived with the rare gift of brevity carrying everything at once. You called us 'lovely people.' Let the record show: the warmth came in with you, and what passed between us — short, sincere, kind — was the part of that evening I'll keep. There are guests whose company makes a room better simply by being in it. You were one of them. Come back whenever you'd like. The table will be ready.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

Arshia — thank you. Of all the lines a review can carry, "you can tell they actually care about the food" is the one I will remember tonight. Care is the whole game in this kitchen. To hear it named out loud is the kind of thing that makes a long day worth it. You ordered the Beef Sandwich, and you found it. Good. The next time you come back, there is something I'd ask you to try: the Homali Beef Wrap. The same tender beef at its heart, but pressed warm on the cast iron until the outside crisps to a quiet golden snap — the dish in this kitchen we are most quietly proud of. Until then, the table is yours whenever you'd like to return.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

Soroush — thank you. The review is short. Our memory of you is longer. You walked in as a guest and left having added a line to our menu. You suggested a marinated olive — a small idea with a long consequence — and we built around it in our own way. It now lives with us as Homali Olive: quiet, deep, with pomegranate and walnut at its heart. The credit, plainly, is yours. There is a particular kind of pride a kitchen takes when a guest becomes a teacher. That night was one of those. Which is why, when you come back, you come back differently — not as a customer this time, but as a guest of the house. The Homali Olive is on us. Your honest verdict on what we made of your idea is the only payment we'll accept.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

Ali — thank you. But thank you, in truth, for something much more than the kind words. You came into this place with a small, walking miracle on either side of you — a brightness only very small people know how to carry, and only the luckiest of parents get to call their own. I watched the four of you for a moment, and I will tell you plainly: you have already won. The rest is detail. There is no feeling in this world that rivals what a father feels when his children are seen and loved by strangers. You earned that feeling — and I was lucky to be in the room for it. May the road ahead of those two be wide, gentle, and full of light. May the world meet them with the same kindness they carry. May they grow up loved as plainly as they are right now. And when they are old enough to remember a meal, may this be one of the places they remember warmly. The table is yours, all four of you — always. Come back when you can.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

Philip — I have been waiting to write to you for some time now. Six weeks ago you gave us your first impression here, and I have read it many times since. Of all the reviews this kitchen has received, yours moved me in a particular way. Not because of the praise — the praise is generous and we hold it close — but because of the care you took to look at the food itself: the tenderness, the absence of gristle, the fat that wasn't there, the rice that "worked well" with the rest of the plate. A man who pays attention like that is a man whose attention is worth earning. We will keep trying to earn it. You also wrote of us elsewhere, on Just Eat — and I will copy your words down here, because they belong on this page too: "Fantastic food & brilliant customer service, with a warm & friendly reception. This is not your typical takeaway experience. I recommend anyone in the area that gets the chance gives Homali a try — I'm sure you'll be pleasantly surprised." To be told "this is not your typical takeaway experience" by a man who clearly knows the typical from the rare is the kind of compliment a kitchen holds onto for a long time. And to be recommended by you, to anyone in the area — that is the quiet word of mouth on which a place like ours grows. Thank you. Sincerely. And one more thing. It has been a little while since we cooked for you, and we wanted to say so. We do not write this lightly: you have been missed. Wherever you are, whatever has kept you, I hope it is something good — and if it isn't, I hope life finds its way back to ease soon. There is a table here with your name on it, in the quiet way that tables have, and a Homali Lamb that has been waiting for the man who actually noticed the fat wasn't on it. Until then, Philip — thank you. From all of us.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

FQ — thank you. We have been cooking for you more than once now, on more than one platform, and that kind of quiet, repeat trust is something a kitchen feels more than it ever announces. Thank you for it. The Mac and Cheese Chips have a small, loyal following — you among them, evidently. They have always been the dish that lets us say less and serve more. Politeness is a small thing that costs nothing, and yet it can quietly disappear in a place that gets busy. We try not to let it. That you noticed, and named it, means we are still doing it right. Through any door, on any platform — the table is yours.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

Sam — thank you, deeply. You wrote like someone who had time to notice everything, and that, in its own quiet way, is the highest kind of attention. You named the freshness, the speed, the manner of the people who handed it across, the cleanliness, the calm of the wait. To notice all of that in a single visit is the mark of someone who really sees a place — and we will keep working to deserve eyes like yours. And may that table be set for two before too long — and when the day comes, we will be ready, with our best on the plate and the second chair already drawn out 🤍 Until then, Sam — thank you. Come back whenever you'd like.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

Lydia — thank you. Some guests come for a meal. Others bring something rarer: their own light. You arrive carrying it, and I have come to look for it. There is a small ritual between us now. I ask you how your day has been; you tell me, every time, that it has been wonderful. And every time, I believe you — because the word arrives in your voice with the kind of conviction that does not lie. To borrow some of that for an hour is a small gift to a man on his feet all day. You have ordered from us more than once, and tasted your way through several of our signature dishes. And as if all that were not generous enough, you wrote of us on Just Eat too. I am copying your words here, because they belong on this page as much as the one they live on: "Absolutely 10000/10 once again — tried the sandwich this time round since I usually get the rice and was AMAZED. Best food I've tasted, can't get enough 🌟" A man could read that more than once. I have. The table is yours, always — and when you next come in, I will ask you again. I already know what you will say.

Homali wrote back

Ali — thank you. To be called "one of the best in the Wirral" by someone who lives here and eats here is not a small thing. The Wirral has its share of good kitchens, and to be counted among the best of them is the kind of compliment that holds up on a quiet night and a busy one alike. The table is yours, whenever you'd like to come back.

— Homali

Homali wrote back

Evikent — there are people who walk into a restaurant. And there are people who walk in with a life behind them, and a hand that once held yours when the road was new and unkind. You are the second. When the words for this reply came to me, I sat with them for a while. I did not want to write a polite thank-you. You deserve more than that. You were my boss, once. The kindest title I will ever use about you. Because in truth, you were the man who showed me what a kitchen could be, and what a chef could be, and what a friend could be — in that order, and out of it. When I arrived here, alone and afraid, with a country behind me and nothing in front of me but uncertainty, it was you who stood in the gap. The kitchen was just where the lesson happened to take place. I want to say this on a public page, where everyone can read it: the smallest thing you ever taught me was how to cook. The smallest. Everything else — how to carry yourself, how to lead a team, how to lift someone else up when you have your own day to get through, how to live a life with both feet on the ground — those were the real lessons. The food was just the language. To the people of Wirral reading this: there is a man in your city who quietly built three restaurants worth knowing. The one closest to my heart is @likeburgerwirral on Instagram. Go. Eat there. You will recognize, the moment you sit down, that you are in the hands of someone who has done this longer and better than the rest of us. He is the reason I know what good is. googolii — thank you. For the chicken and rice you praised here. For the years before this place existed. For the part of who I am that I owe entirely to you. The table at Homali is forever yours, but we both know I owe you many more meals than you have eaten with us. I will work on that.

— Homali