Magic Lamp5020 E. 2nd St.
Long Beach
562-987-3080
I had been to Magic Lamp during Stroll and Savor Belmont Shore. But even though the person serving food at Stroll and Savor was a bitch, I wanted to try Magic Lamp and see how it compares to Open Sesame.
I ordered the Fillet Mignon Kabob Plate, $13.99. The plate includes, rice, hummus, fattoush salad, and pita. The fattoush has lettuce, mint, radish, cucumbers, tomatoes, onions and pita chips. This was an interesting combination of flavors. Not my ideal salad but the items were fresh but they need to take out the mint, the mint just overpowered all the other flavors.
The rice was a bit hard, also like they didn't add enough water or the rice had been standing around too long. The hummus was good but hummus isn't something you can really screw up.
But the fillet mignon was not good at all. Very tough, not tender at all. I think this was from the top round/london broil cut. This wasn't anything close to filet. I asked for the beef to be cooked medium rare and it was cooked correctly. Now I know how to spell filet. But they have two LL in their spelling.
Service is below average. It took awhile for the server to refill drinks. She was pretty friendly at first, helpful, answering questions. But what got me was in a not so subtle way, she came to the table and took the bill. Well I hadn't even bothered paying yet. I was busy talking and really hadn't bothered paying. Now there was nobody waiting for a table. Hell it's a Tuesday night. So it's not like she was "losing" any money. So just to be a jerk, I continued to talk and make the server wait. But she got her revenge by taking a long time to pick up the bill, when we finally paid. That's ok we just took it out of her tip.
I would not go back to Magic Lamp again. The food is below average and this is the second time I've experienced bad service. Open Sesame is much better food and any place is going to have better service.
