Ethiopiques Café offers unique culinary masterpieces

By ALEXANDER POPP alex@appenmedia.com

JOHNS CREEK, Ga. — The first thing you’ll notice when visiting Ethiopiques Café and Restaurant in Johns Creek is the amazing aroma of grilling meats and exotic spices.

The second thing you’ll notice is how much fun patrons are having sharing communal dishes of lovingly prepared traditional Ethiopian dishes.

Opened in 2020 by three friends, Liza Abebe, Amy Asegidew and Biruk Demeselasie, Ethiopiques Café and Restaurant has quickly become a community staple for interesting ethnic and traditional foods that serve any taste preferences with a wide variety of vegan, vegetarian and grilled meat dishes.

Abebe said the Ethiopiques Café, located on State Bridge Road, was a longtime dream for the three friends, who for years had to travel up to an hour from their homes to find a good Ethiopian restaurant.

“We’ve been talking about opening a restaurant for like, almost 10 years,” Abebe said.

But when things finally came together for the partners and the restaurant was within their grasp, the COVID-19 pandemic reared its ugly head and made everything more complicated for their plans. The partners were forced to close down and reopen in different capacities several times during the first year of business.

But throughout that hard time, the partners said they got overwhelming support from the Johns Creek community, which kept them going and in business.

“If it wasn’t for the Johns Creek community, we wouldn’t be here,” she said.

For the uninitiated, Abebe said Ethiopian food is very similar to Indian and Mediterranean cuisine, only with a much different palette of spices and a serving style that encourages community, sharing and togetherness, with couples, friends and families all eating off of the same platter, using a spongy, sourdough flatbread called Injera to scoop and eat dishes.

Also common to Ethiopian cuisine is a spice mixture called Berbere, which mixes chili peppers garlic ginger. Nearly all their dishes have this spice mixture as a starting point.

“We use some spices that are very different, and yes, it’s spicy, but it’s more flavorful spicy than, ‘I’m dying spicy,’” she said.

Because Ethiopia is such a large and diverse country, there is a wide variety of dishes served around the country.

One of the most popular dishes at the Ethiopiques Café and Restaurant in Johns Creek is the Vegetarian Platter, which offers a mixture of traditional Ethiopian dishes eaten with Injera, a spongy, sourdough flatbread. Also popular is the restaurant’s Kitfo Rolls, rolled strips of Injera filled with meat, cheese and collard greens, and Chechebsa, small fried pieces of flatbread served with honey and yogurt dipping sauces.

“Ethiopian cuisine is good for everyone,” she said. “You could be a vegan, vegetarian or meat lover because we fast 265 days out of the year.”

The most popular dishes at the Ethiopiques Café are the vegetarian platter, which offers a mixture of traditional Ethiopian dishes eaten with injera, and the doro wat, an Ethiopian chicken stew with a rich smoky flavor, tender chicken drumsticks and a hardboiled egg.

“It’s like our national dish,” she said of the Doro Wat.

Another major part of Ethiopian culinary culture is centered around coffee, which shouldn’t be a surprise because the East African country is where coffee, as we know it today, was first invented.

Each Sunday from noon-3 p.m., Ethiopiques Café serves a traditional coffee ceremony to its guests, roasting green coffee beans in the traditional style and three rounds of brewing that produce different strengths of coffee.

Each Sunday, the Ethiopiques Café and Restaurant in Johns Creek serves a traditional Ethiopian coffee ceremony, where green coffee beans are freshly roasted and multiple strengths of coffee are brewed in three rounds.

“It’s a whole ceremony,” she said.

You can visit Ethiopiques Café and Restaurant from Tuesday to Sunday, 11:30 a.m.-9 p.m., at 11130 State Bridge Road in Johns Creek. For a look at their menu and more information about their food, visit them on Facebook or at ethiopiquescafe.com.

At an April 13 work session, the Fulton County School Board looked at a recommended 7.1 percent salary increase for the 2023-2024 school year, with 5.1 percent lasting into future years.

Schools:

Continued from Page 1 bump to increase employee retention. The retention pay bump only applies to Fulton County Schools staff who were employed in the 2022-2023 school year. It would be paid in September 2023. It would cost the school district $14.8 million.

Combined, employees could see a 7.1 percent raise for the next school year, with 5.1 percent lasting into future school years. New teacher salaries would increase from $53,362 to $56,488.

“When I started teaching my salary was $35,000 and I thought I was making a lot of money,” Fulton County School Board District 4 member Franchesca Warren said. “That’s a lot of money for a new graduate or just for a new teacher.”

The school board also looked at hiring and retention incentives for hard to staff schools. The recommended budget would add five schools to the “hard to staff schools” list, totaling 10 schools with the designation.

New teachers could receive a onetime $5,000 hiring incentive, as well as a $250 one-time referral incentive for any staff that refers a teacher to one of the hard to staff schools. Together, the two incentives would cost $490,000.

Warren also asked “what the plan is” for hard to staff schools beyond the pay increases.

Chief Human Resources officer Dr. Gonzalo La Cava said the district is looking at a three-tiered professional development program to provide continued support to teachers.

“When you ask a teacher ‘what is the number one thing you want?’ a lot of the times they don’t tell you money, but they do want support,” La Cava said. “They want a leader that’s engaged with them and is providing a great culture.”

La Cava said the district is also looking at long-term plans to make sure teachers aren’t “forgotten” and can receive constant coaching, and that he knows teachers are excited about the salaries and bonuses they could receive.

If all the salary increases, bonus and incentive plans are approved it would cost the school district $57.8 million.

“I’m pleased to announce this budget recommendation really checks off just about every box as far as the parameters,” Dereef said.

The parameters included identifying opportunities for cost efficiencies, maintaining a competitive compensation structure, to be revenue neutral and continuing with a modified zero-based budgeting process.

The school board also looked at increasing school maintenance funds. The district has projected a 4.5 percent increase in the tax digest, but some board members expect the number will be much higher and could create additional money to spend.

The Chief Communications Officer for Fulton County Schools, Brian Noyes said that may be true, but the school district likely will not know the official tax estimate until after the budget is approved and is operating off a conservative estimate now.

Fulton County Schools

Superintendent Dr. Mike Looney said he has discussed maintenance individually and will “be working with staff to present a proposal that adds additional money towards school maintenance.”