When Nadir Naimi talks about his new restaurant Sheeba, the words “authenticity” and “customer experience” frequently crop up.
The first franchise of a growing, family-owned chain to open outside its home state of Michigan, the Yemeni eatery served dinner to its inaugural patrons in Vienna at 111 Church Street NW last Friday (Aug. 21).
The reception to the public soft opening “was the best,” Naimi told FFXnow on Monday (Aug. 24), catching his breath after a busy weekend.
“It was a lot of work that went in here with my hands, and to see fire in the kitchen was amazing,” he said. “And to see the staff introducing themselves to each other, it really makes me feel like we’re building a team. It just felt amazing that first day — friends and family night — and then opening to the public the next day. It was great.”
The experience on that first night was also slightly overwhelming, with more curious customers stopping by than Naimi and his team had anticipated.
Initially planning to open for breakfast and lunch on Saturday, Naimi instead decided to continue operating during evening hours only, from 5-10 p.m., for at least another week.
In addition to giving staff time to properly train, the soft opening has given Sheeba Vienna’s owners a better sense of “all the things that we don’t have,” as Naimi put it. Patrons have been asking for guest Wi-Fi service, for instance, and as of Monday, the restaurant was still waiting to receive garlic sauce to go with its shawarma sandwich.
Despite those gaps, Sheeba’s cuisine has been a success from the start. According to Naimi, he didn’t receive a single complaint about the food during the restaurant’s first four days of business — an assertion backed up by glowing initial Google reviews.
He hopes to begin regular operating hours of 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. on weekdays and 10 a.m. to 11 p.m. on weekends this Saturday (Aug. 29), but it will depend on how the first full week of service goes.
“The utmost priority is the customer experience,” Naimi said. “If I don’t feel that we are ready, I will continue to do the dinner service for as long as necessary.”
As he previously told FFXnow, Naimi’s family has experience in the restaurant industry, previously owning Alf Layah in Chantilly and Babalu in Tysons, but the 26-year-old had been itching to start a venture of his own.
With his uncle on board as a co-owner, the pair was set on opening an original concept and had gotten as far as incorporating a limited-liability company when they came across a video of Sheeba founder Ismael Aljahmi discussing his plans to start franchising.
Built on Aljahmi family recipes, Sheeba was established in Dearborn, Michigan, in the early 2000s and now has four locations in that state, with a fifth on the way in Flint. The Vienna franchise is the first not opened by the Aljahmi family, though plans have been announced for a Bronx outpost in New York City.
A talk with Aljahmi, who turned out to be a friend of his cousin’s husband, convinced Naimi and his uncle that a franchise would be a stable way for him to get started in the industry.
“He was very supportive,” Naimi said of Ismael Aljahmi. “We share the same passion, same vision, same restaurant concept — really, very similar, at least. So, we decided to go with him, and now, it’s a family restaurant, from his family to ours.”
Since it’s a franchise, Sheeba’s Vienna location offers the same set menu as its Michigan counterparts, serving a mix of Mediterranean and Yemeni dishes. Breakfast options, such as hummus with lamb or chicken, shak-shookah (spiced scrambled eggs with onions, tomatoes and parsley) and kibda (lamb liver), are available all day.
Kabobs, shawarma, falafels and other Mediterranean dishes more commonly found in Northern Virginia are available, but Naimi is emphatic that customers should try the Yemeni dishes, noting that his decision to open a restaurant in the first place stemmed from a desire to introduce his culture to a wider community.
For those unfamiliar with Yemeni cuisine, rule number one is that lamb is king.
“It’s so integrated in Yemeni cuisine,” Naimi explained. “The word ‘meat’ — at least in Yemeni dialect — means ‘lamb.’ So, when my family is speaking English, and they’ll ask me, ‘Is this meat or is it beef?’ It’s like that. So, we mean lamb. All meat is lamb. So, the lamb is going to be one of the best things that you get here.”
At Sheeba, lamb comes in different forms, from a roast (hanneth) and sauteed chunks (fattah) to stews (agdah) and diced with onions in tomato sauce (galabah). For newcomers, Naimi recommends the hanneth and fahsah — a traditional stew of shredded lamb and mashed potatoes, served to in-person diners in a hot stone bowl.
Most dishes come with rice and/or fresh bread baked in the restaurant’s tandoor oven.
Non-lamb options are on the menu as well, including vegetarian dishes like the mushakal, a vegetable stew with root veggies, zucchini, celery and okra.
The emphasis on authentically representing Yemeni culture extends to Sheeba’s lack of alcohol, something that Naimi admits “has been controversial” among customers used to sipping on a wine or cocktail when visiting more upscale establishments.
While he imagines alcohol service would be beneficial for the restaurant’s profit margins, staying true to Yemen’s culture as a predominantly Muslim country takes precedence.
But as a concession, Naimi says he’s been talking to other restaurants in Vienna, including others on Church Street, about potential partnerships. While nothing has been solidified yet, his plan is for customers who take their Sheeba receipt to another restaurant or bar that serves alcohol to be able to get a discount on their drink.
“I want to introduce you to our culture. Staying authentic to the culture, we will not be offering alcohol in our restaurant. Authenticity comes at a price,” Naimi said. “And if you want an authentic experience, come to Sheeba.”
