Zaki On The River

I went to Zakis tonight to treat my son after a basketball game. It was a huge mistake. I should’ve known when there weren’t any other customers, but decided to give it a try anyway. I ordered the Philly cheesesteak which barely had any meat at all. I tasted my son’s chicken fingers-​super bland. My other son had a burger which was also super bland. My mother ordered the omelet with grits and for some reason the grits came out ten minutes before the omelet. Then when she asked the server to warm them up, the server didn’t return them until the entire omelet was gone! The atmosphere wasn’t pleasant at all. The server had some guy just sitting there at a table the entire time talking to her and interrupting her while she was working. He also creeped me out because he wasn’t eating but just staring and jumped up and followed my children out the door as they were going to the restroom, which is another major issue. The restrooms are outside and absolutely disgusting! I’m 9 months pregnant and had to hold it until we got out of there. I’m just curious what type of owners care so little about restroom facilities. Made me wonder how much they care about the cleanliness of their kitchen. Save your time and money and don’t eat here. It’s not worth the risk, especially if you’re used to places where creepers aren’t hanging and a decent restroom to use!

Did a gyro for take-​out and I sincerely wonder if they even knew they ran a Greek restaurant. First of all, it took over 20 minutes and the place was EMPTY at noon (yeah, first clue). The gyro was chips and chunks of dried out meat, very little tzatziki and about as bankrupt on quality as the Greek economy. I usually give a place three trys. but not this one, not even for free.

Cute place for a quick bite to eat. The staff was super sweet. The drive thru is convinent. It’s on the Hillsborough River, and has a picnic table on the river side. The table makes for a cute picnic. Never really super busy and it is a decent option when you aren’t feeling like pizza, Chinese or McDonald’s.

Took my two children here late on a Sunday night. Receiced a warm and friendly welcome by all of the staff and the owners. There are a few picnic tables by the river if you would like to eat outside. The interior is very nice, classy and clean family atmospher. The food blew us away. I had a cuban sandwhich which was to die for. I was so surprised as I’d never been before and I guess I expected the usual. Love the fries! One of my boys got a beef Kabob sandwhich and I could not believe that he actually ate the onions and peppers! Thanks Zaki! And the chicken strips that my youngest were hand breaded and he said they were delicious. We got a ton of food for very reasonable prices. I usually am too busy to write this stuff but I felt they definatley deserved a rave re view. They also have steaks and fresh pastries. A MUST TRY! ps: big breakfasts on menu with great prices, all day breakfast. This is hopefully going to be the next thing I try there. Good eats.

UPDATE: Although I originally enjoyed the food. I can no longer eat at this restaurant after hearing the cook utter «Got someone watching?» in response to a request from the cashier for a side of sauce.
I have had food from Zaki’s about ten times. I ate on-​premise once, the rest order-​out. The food can be great; really great — they have their strengths (gyro, foule (!!!), «jumbo hot burrito») and weaknesses (poppers, grilled meat platter). The owners seem pretty great and I hope this restauraunt succeeds.
What is really holding this place back is their execution. For instance, if you order poppers and grilled meat platter to go, they’ll start them pretty much at the same time, and the poppers will finish well ahead of time and sit there and become worthless while the meat platter is finishing. I’ve had this situation happen several times, and it’s very frustrating. I just don’t order anything fried anymore; if I order a gyro, I pay attention to the other items to try and get things that take a similar amount of time (like the jumbo hot burrito), so that I don’t get a completely soggy sandwich while it waits for other items to finish.
Another problem with this restrauraunt is the physical facility — their bathroom is outside and not well-​attended. It feels like this was once a gas station. I ate there once and was pretty fed-​up with the situation until the food came and was amazing. I decided to only order out from Zaki’s.
For specifics:
The gyro is packed full of meat; it’s a really big delicious sandwich.
The «jumbo hot burrito» is basically a Philly cheese steak sandwich in a tortilla. Very good. ^EDIT^ I just ordered the burrito for the second time and it was completely different — fried chicken strips, rice, bell pepers and a spicy sauce in a tortilla.
The foule is so absolutely wonderful. I can’t describe it other than to say they it is a very well-​spiced warm bean dish with pita slices.
The greek salad is okay. They have a nice large slab of feta, but unfortunately, it’s just about the blandest feta I’ve ever had. The only lettuce in the salad is iceberg, which also holds this dish back. The potato salad toping is decent, but also rather bland.
The fried mushrooms were f***ing disgusting. NO!
The grilled meat platter is a bunch of rather dry chunks of beef and chicken on a bed of basmati rice. The meat even seemed possibly steamed (maybe under a foil tent?). The rice was pretty good.

We have been here several times and have always been impressed with the deliciously prepared food and the down to earth service. The selction never stops to amuse me, especially with their weekly special where they present a different specialty dish from different countries. It is a family friendly restaurant where you can even order food for catering when you want to impress your guests. 5stars all around and thank you for finally adding your official page to Unilocal

great price for generous food portions — love the food — the owner came over to my table to thank me and my family for our business