The Helmand

Delightful food, quick service, and a great ambiance. Overall highly recommend this place if you’re in Baltimore!

I’ve had this place bookmarked for quite some time now, my friend was in town so I finally decided to try it. We weren’t so sure about reservations on a Friday night but went anyway. We arrived and the place was packed. Fortunately we were able to get a table for two. I was delighted to see multiple options for vegetarians. We ordered the leek ravioli and vegetarian sampler to share. The flavors of the food were lite and the use of spices added a great pleasure to our palate. Half way through our meal I thought we should at least try the pumpkin dish so we ordered that too. Everything was great including the ambiance, service and staff. I would highly recommend for a date, especially if you’re open to trying something new.

This is one of the best places in Baltimore. When we came in we were immediately seated. The waitress came to order our drinks right away. I suggest the pumpkin appetizer. It tastes like a desert. Our table decided to share family style. We ordered 3 appitizers and 3 entrees. The beef is one of the best beef I have ever had.
Service: 9
Food: 10
Atmosphere: 8

Afghani/​Middle Eastern food is one of my favorite cuisines… and this place is the best of the best for so many reasons. I’ve been twice so far. Everyone’s dishes were cooked and flavored to perfection. The staff really cares about your experience. The owner or head waiter? (if he isn’t the owner, he cared for us so well that it makes me feel like he owns the place) is attentive and warm.
ALSO it was my friend’s birthday and they surprised her with a birthday dessert — but did not charge us for it. I was really surprised that they didn’t and we thought that was so kind. I read a review here saying that someone was mad that they charged for a bday dessert… but shame on that reviewer because you shouldn’t expect it to be comped! (Also, to make it a surprise, I snuck over to ask the first staff person I could find without my friend seeing… and he successfully communicated the message to our waiter, which is so rare!)
They split our checks without any hassle at all and remember what everyone had.
I can’t explain it but the food is just so good… the chicken falls off the bone perfectly and the spices are spot on … everything is just right.

After always seeing positive reviews of this place, I decided to give the Helmand a shot. I got the Mantwo with bread to start off with. Delicious. Service was friendly and willing to answer any questions you might have. For my entrée, I got the shalgam challow (lamb), and my mom got the Mourgh challow (chicken). I tried both, and they were really good. Great combination of different spices and flavors. I would come here again in the future. The rack of lamb looks awesome! Highly recommend this place.

The lamb is good. But I am a little confused about the food between Afghanistan and India.

Excellent, got off a plane and headed to Helmands. Did not expect to enjoy this Afghan meal so much!

What happened to this place? New chef?
Salad turned back .it was not only different than I ordered but cheap vinegar poured on top. Second one, with pomegranate seeds, was horrible, too. Buy some expensive balsamic and put a tiny bit on top.
Entrée was, at best, fair.
Previously I had eaten here three times. This was a poor experience and I do not think I’ll eat here again.

The best is the pumpkin stuff! I can’t remember what its called, but its an appetizer and I highly recommend it! The staff is very nice and attentive.
My only complaint is that it is too dark and crowded, people are seated right next to the door.

Did you know that I had a birthday party here and they charged me for my surprise birthday cake (who does this?) OH WAIT, the president of afghanistans brother does lmao. Failure to adhere to basic restaurant ethics #scrubs
Food ⁷⁄₁₀ (would give 8/​10, but presentation was poor, ergo the deduction)

From the moment I walked in, I knew I was going to love this place. The atmosphere was warm and the staff friendly. We had a reservation and I’d recommend it, because by 7 the place was packed.
We started with the spinach and Kaddo Borwani (pumpkin with yogurt). So good. I don’t remember our exact entrée, but it was delicious as well.
We ended the evening with Turkish coffee and cardamom ice cream (with dates and figs mixed in).
Do yourself a favor and try this wonderful Afghan restaurant!

We had a lovely winter dinner at the Helmand and enjoyed the food as well as the service.
We found street parking on a Saturday night without issue, and were seated right at our reservation time.
We shared naan and kaddo borwani, the baby pumpkin with garlic yogurt appetizer. It was intensely flavored and quite simple, definitely nice to share — a large enough portion of something that’s a bit too garlicky to eat all by yourself.
Based on lots of review reading, I couldn’t pass up the lamb special with apricots, and it did not disappoint. Spicy and full flavored, this was even better as leftovers.
The other entrees in our group were chicken kabab and koufta challow, which are lamb and beef meatballs with a spiced tomato sauce. The koufta was delicious, a nice contrast of sweet against meaty when sharing with the lamb special.
The chicken kababs are not bad, but are less juicy and tender than some of our other local options (Maiwand, particularly) and the rice is also not as interestingly flavored.

Such good food. I got the lamb kabob, colleagues got the lamb with roasted turnip, korma mahi, and another dish of lamb. We started with this pumpkin dish and eggplant which were both so good! Really nice ambience and service. Also enjoyed our wine selection. Unfortunately, and I hate to say it because I don’t want to discount the food, but we did witness a giant cockroach on the wall. I flipped out but I talked to the owner or manager about it and they recognized the issue and said that it’s an old building and they do everything they can but it mostly comes from the place above and isn’t a reflection of their sanitation. I don’t know. It seems like Baltimore has to deal with issues like this so I’m trying to be understanding but i also was disgusted. It was mid/​post meals so nothing we could do about it. So just take this knowledge with a grain of salt.

I don’t understand the 4 star rating.
We did not have that experience. The appetizers were very good, nothing great or outstanding. Yogurt sauce on all three of the appetizers that we got was very good to excellent, but it was really the best thing. The lamb sabzi was disappointing, the meat was tough, and it did not have much flavor. The sea bass and the sauce it was in was not well prepared and way too sweet. It really look like it had food coloring in it. The best part of the meal was the desert, which was cardamom flavored ice cream with chopped dried fruit in it. Your mileage may vary, but we didn’t have a good experience and we’re really disappointed given the high marks.

Very good food but veeery slow service on a busy night. We waited for a table for almost 30 min when we had a reservation, and then we waited for a long time for food, and then again after we gave our credit cards after we got the bill.
Sigh.

My friend and I decided to revisit the Helmand after a few years. I remember it differently. Today, the food was good, but it came out suspiciously fast (within 10 minutes of ordering it). The food was lukewarm (clearly microwaved or reheated) and not the same quality as we remember from years past. The naan was more like a pita bread, came out at room temperature, tasted packaged and cost $ 6 for the large sized basket. My friend ordered a lamb dish and I ordered a vegetarian dish.
The ambience was very nice, but we were disappointed that the quality had gone down significantly. Like another reviewer said, the food was like lukewarm takeout served on nice plates.

Awesome food! The Helmand has made us addicted to Afghani food, which we have never had before. Our waitress was incredibly helpful in pointing out favorites to try for our first time. The Kaddo Bowrani appetizer of baby pumpkin is definitely a must! I had to stop myself from licking the plate clean.
Between three of us, we ordered a few things to share amongst the table: a chicken special that was simmered with apricots and other fruits, a beef kabob, and a lamb kabob. We all agreed that the chicken was the best out of the dishes, with a wonderful sweet/​savory sauce and big pieces of juicy apricots: so good! The beef kabob was our next favorite, and was definitely packed with flavor. The lamb was our least favorite. While it was very flavorful, we found it to be a bit drier and not as tender as the beef. The challows for each meat were a bit different, but we enjoyed each of them. The green chutney is something I would sincerely like to order by the gallon to put on literally everything I eat; it is so good!
While we were incredibly impressed by the flavors, we weren’t too impressed with the portion of meat in some of the dishes. In our chicken dish, we counted only 3 chunks of chicken– just enough for each of us to try it. For a dinner more on the expensive side, this was a little bit disappointing. Nonetheless, the atmosphere makes it great for a date night, and I would recommend people coming here while in Baltimore!

The ambience, service, and food here are outstanding. The restaurant itself is beautiful in its presentations from its décor to the music to the tiny candle on every table. I feel the staff takes great pride in working at The Helmand and I got a vibe that everyone was very happy to be there. Even when our candle blew out, someone came quickly to relight it for a lovely dining experience.
To start, my friend and I had the Kaddo Borwani pumpkin appetizer. It was very unconventional looking, but it tasted delicious! The yogurt was so sweet, but is very addicting. I could’ve easily eaten two of the appetizers myself, loved it.
For my entrée, I had the Mantwo. It’s described as a pastry so I was expecting a flaky almost hours devours type dish, but the Mantwo pastry shells texture was more like a dumpling, very soft and with filling. I had three sizeable shells that sat on top of a yogurt and meat sauce. I really just liked the yogurt in all the dishes, it’s very unique. Overall, the dish was really yummy and really flavorful, which is what I love about middle eastern food in general. On the side I had rice with cilantro so mixing those flavors in with the Mantwo was really good.
My only complaint is our table didn’t get the complimentary naan. I don’t know why, I thought every table received naan. I want to come back and try the lamb.

Decided to try this place out during restaurant week, although once there it was clear that it made zero sense to order off of their RW menu. It was cheaper to order off the regular menu and you were able to get more interesting foods.
Food was really, really good. Service left a bit to be desired but the place was packed so I’m just not sure they were prepared for the rush. I’d be interested in seeing how they do on a normal night and I’d certainly come back for the food alone.

I am not sure why I have been avoiding Afghan food. That’s silly.
A bunch of us headed over after listening to an empowering Wes Moore at the Enoch Pratt Library. We were hungry and basically devoured the bread the moment it hit the table. Thank goodness for the Kaddo Borwani. They pan fry baby pumpkin and sprinkle it with cinnamon and sugar before they put it in the oven and bake until it is perfectly tender. They top this yummy goodness with a garlicky yogurt sauce.
We split a gorgeous bottle of Pinot Noir from the Languedoc region. It was a little light bodied for me. It won’t be my first choice next time, but it was fruity with a very smooth finish. Everyone at the table was discussing their favorites and the difference between Challow and Pallow. Challow is rice with cinnamon — so sweeter and Pallow is rice with cumin — so a little smokier. There are a tons of options — beef, lamb or chicken for meat choices and even more vegetarian choices — mushrooms, eggplant, peppers, etc.
I went with the Gorwan Salad. The salad is baby field greens with cucumbers, tomatoes, and peppers with a creamy red onion dressing. The marinated beef tenderloin wins in this dish; incredibly tender and flavorful. They serve it with grilled corn on the cob and whole red bliss potatoes. All my friends got a little mad that I went with the salad and not one of the rice dishes.
It doesn’t matter what you order, get a side (or 5) of the «green sauce» — which I am mostly sure is cilantro — my favorite herb.