Midtown Lunch

When Naan Hut opened at the beginning of the year on Santa Monica Blvd. in West L.A., fans of freshly baked sangak who live or work on the westside rejoiced. The ironing board sized bread is the hallmark of any truly great Persian bakery, and those of us who live or work on the westside were excited to not have to drive all the way to the Valley for fresh baked sangak goodness. As a fan of lunch I was also excited that they were serving chicken and beef kebabs with sangak for $6-8.

Back when they first opened the “menu” was clearly a work in progress, scrawled on sheets of paper hanging on the walls. But the other day I was wandering past the store and noticed they have upgraded to a full printed menu, which not only offers kebabs and sandwich, but also includes something called sangak pizza. “What the hell is that?” you might be asking. Well, it’s exactly what you might imagine it to be…

Unlike Kebab Grill in Palms, which serves saheefa, and Cafe Glace in Westwood, which serves I don’t know what… Naan Hut’s creation is made from their freshly baked sangak.  Presumably, they take a one foot by one foot square of already cooked sangak, top it with a very tangy marinara sauce, standard pizza cheese, and your choice of topping (beef, chicken, or vegetables) and pop it into the oven.  Those who are hoping to see a sangak dough pizza being cooked in the gigantic rotating oven will be disappointed.  The sangak is already cooked before being pizza-fied, and the cheese  is melted in a separate oven in the back.

Despite the sauce and cheese, and being cooked a second time, the sangak maintains much of the floppiness that makes it so delicious while still developing a nice crispiness on the outer edges.  There’s not much char on the bottom to speak of, the cheese and sauce are unmemorable at best, and one can’t help but think of Chucky Cheese while looking at the thing. But the toppings might be where this thing makes it mark.  Beef is just plain ground beef, and the vegetables are pretty standard pizza toppings, but the chicken is little chunks of their chicken kebab complete with delicious Persian seasonings. As a result, the chicken gives the whole pizza a yellowish orange hue that tastes exactly as it looks- pizza with tumeric and and faint hint of maybe nutmeg or cinnamon.  Delicious!

The result will likely make both pizza aficionados and sangak purists cry in equal measure, but as a fun and tasty lunch it passes with flying colors.

Naan Hut, 11551 Santa Monica Blvd, 310-481-9820