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ASTORIA, QUEENS

Dar Lbahja

The former Dar Yemma cook's own place — bubbling tagines, bastilla and tangia on 30th Avenue.

Touria Lamtahaf made her name as the cook at Dar Yemma, Steinway Street's much-missed Moroccan dining room, and Dar Lbahja on 30th Avenue is her first place of her own. It cooks like a Moroccan home kitchen: tagines arriving bubbling in their conical clay pots, soups and salads to start, and mint tea to finish.

Moroccan cooking is about sweet against savory and slow heat. Order the chicken tagine with preserved lemon and olives, or lamb with prunes, and a chicken bastilla — flaky warqa pastry layered with spiced chicken and almonds and dusted with cinnamon sugar. If tangia, the slow-cooked lamb of Marrakech, is on, order that too. During Morocco's matches, the room becomes the neighborhood's living room.

Editor’s tip

Share a bastilla and a lamb tagine with prunes — sweet and savory is the point.

Also in the neighborhood

Editorial draft — core details last reviewed October 13, 2026. Confirm practical details with the official site before you go.