Hatam Restaurant

I am only writing this review so the owners can change what they have been doing to this restaurant. This used to be my favorite persian place to go to. However, the last few times we have gone the food has just been horrible. The beef kabob is so dry and tasteless, the chicken was terrible, and the plates they gave us were literally dirty and had food stuck on them.
The owners of this place are so nice but it is clear they are understaffed and have changed a chef or something. I REALLY hope they get it together and get back to the delicious fresh food they used to serve!

My wife and I recently had dinner at the above restaurant.
When the food came out the rice was burnt and the chicken was not even hot.
We sent the meals back and again the rice, the chicken and the vegetables as well were burnt. When I complained to the lady owner she said she was sorry and that was it.
After a bill of over $ 40 we walked out.
The restaurant seating capacity was fairly large and only a few number of tables were occupied and now i know why.

Very tasty. Oh my! I loved it. This was catered at my Sisters work a few years ago. This is my first time eating at the restaurant and I loved it. The food was so tasty. The staff was friendly & the bathroom was clean. You must try it. I also like the music they play.

Love the food. I was able to use groupon so it was delicious and at a great price! Will go back!

My rehearsal dinner is coming up and we are shopping around for a good restaurant to take our group to. One of my friends suggested Hatam. I am glad we went there because definitely this place wouldn’t be the option for our party. Customer service was beyond bad. It took 15 minutes before the waiter came to our table after I tried to get their attention twice. We got there around 9:00pm and the place was not too busy. Then they brought plates which one of them had pieces of rice on it and it was unwashed.
We were still talking when the waiter came to our table and handed us the check and said sorry we are closing at 10:00pm. It was only few minutes after 10:00.
Then the owner turned to one of the waiters and said clean the table now. We are closing!
Customer service is as important as food quality. Food was good but nothing special. I can get the same quality with the better customer service in other Persian restaurant in the area. Never go back again.

Slowest service ever!!! How do you order to go and have to wait 20 mins?!? Makes no sense. If I was going to wait this long for a to-​go order I would have just ate here! Very disappointing for my first experience. The sad part is the place was pretty empty! There’s no reason a chicken plate should have taken this long! Not likely I will return again.

I got take out and I really enjoyed it. The portion is huge, I was able to eat the koobideh combo for three meals. Next time, I’ll enjoy the dinner at the restaurant. The lady at the front was very friendly.

Pros:
Their menus are juicy and very tasty, the meats are cooked just right and so is the rice.
One of the good persian restaurants I’ve been to.
Try their bastani for dessert as well, it’s awesome!
They are very generous on the size of ALL the menus, enough for two meals.
Service is prompt and friendly.
Cons:
Couldn’t find anything wrong with the place.

I was so disappointed. The delivery took close to 2 hours and the amount was not what I was told. I looked at the receipt and it was way more. The food was ok. I didn’t even feel like eating because I was so disappointed with the customer service. Let’s just say I will not be returning. The food was not worth it.

On a Friday night when I was having a temper tantrum, my husband invited me to try a new Iranian restaurant he had recently come across on Unilocal.My husband knows me so well; just thinking of a delicious beef koobideh sure made me forget about what I was angry about. Indeed, Hatam did not disappoint!
As soon as we walked in, we were shown to our table. The restaurant is beautifully decorated and has very comfortable booths, which I love. As soon as we sat, a waiter took our drinks order and brought over complimentary pita with butter. I glanced over the menu and we decided on the cold appetizer sampler which included hummus and a few other yogurt sauces. The hummus wasn’t the best I’ve had, but all the other sauces were absolutely delicious!
For dinner, my husband had the combination chicken and beef koobideh and I settled for the beef. When the entrée came to our table, I was so surprised by the quantity! It was about 4 cups of rice and two large koobideh pieces with the grilled tomatoes. I was barely able to finish a fourth of the plate and ended up taking most of it home.
Concerning quality, the beef was grilled perfectly; it was tender, juicy, and very flavorful. As well, the rice was fluffy, buttery, and delicious. My husband also loved the food, but he argued that the chicken was better than the beef. I guess next time I will definitely order the combination to see what he was raving about.
Concerning the service, it was very attentive. We always had our water glasses full and everything came to our table in a reasonable amount of time. Both waiters that took care of us were very personable and knowledgeable about the menu.
I truly enjoyed my experience at Hatam, and I will most definitely be back to try other things on the menu.

This place I found by looking for places to eat on thanksgiving omg and it was amazing. Love the chicken cabob with rice the roasted tomatoes yum yum!

BEWARE!!! THIS PLACE WILL FRAUD YOUR CREDIT CARDS!!! I’ve come here a few times time but I will never again. I placed an order for pick up they said 20 min my husband shows up 20 min later and is made to wait another 40 min… Apparently they had a large order to process… not my problem… they should have quoted the correct time if I knew it was going to be an hour we would have passed and gotten something else. Then after made to wait an hour for our food they tell him that they don’t have what I ordered (lentil soup) that they have barley. The manager charges us for the barley soup and when we got it home it was the most disgusting soup ever! bland and a gross consistency. I called that they refund us for the soup. And the idiot doesn’t refund up but changes my card again!!! I’m over this place!!! Worst customer service! Worst experience.
UPDATE
BEWARE! After they charged my card and took the number again for refund they charged it instead of refunding it and now reoccurring charges keep happening! This place will FRAUD you CREDIT CARDS!!! BEWARE BE CAREFUL!!! I just found out they have been charging me over and over I haven’t been to this restaurant since the last time I wrote my review and yet charged… even last week I got charged again (we weren’t even in town) UN-​believable!!! These people are disgusting!!! I filed a claim and had to go thru the hassle of changing my card all because of this restaurant! DO NOT GO HERE!!!

I had catering from them for my birthday, 30 people were invited, but 45 showed up and still we had so much food left over! Their portion is good enough to not be worry. Pooyan delivered on time and set up the food amazing! The food stayed warm for 4 hours.
Also I always go to Hatam to grab food anytime with friends or coworkers, they are always great!

Stopped by with my friends to check out this place and we ended up ordering food lol! I forgot what my friends ordered but they were like «it’s not the best but compared to many other Persian restaurants, it’s about average!»
For me, i got the lamb shank with rice and salad and it was good. Frankly, the portion size at this cuisine is incredibly large! You rarely see this in any other restaurants!
The service was good but the waiting was kinda long!

Fantastic place to go for Persian food!
Exceptional tasting dishes, my favorite Lamb shush kabob. I order it juicy. I’m a regular and try to come here at least twice a week. Definitely would recommend :) hard to find really good tasting foods around Mission Viejo, most foods are Americanize, but here it’s very authentic.

Although we had enjoyed many meals at this restaurant and they were highly recommended by other friends for their catering menu. I was extremely disappointed and on the verge of embarrassment to serve the food that was delivered by this restaurant for our party.
We spent nearly $ 400 to feed approximately 15 guests and had much higher expectations then was delivered.
They were over 30 minutes late in delivery the food,
All the entrees were cold with the reception of the rice
No Condiments were supplied
And worst of all the quality of the meat quite frankly was inedible which filet Mignon should have been the most tender it might as well been shoe leather.
Even more disappointing is the fact that we contact the owner of the establishment, they took 0 responsibility for the poor quality of the food and that it was late and simply said that they would make sure it would be better next time.
In my opinion pretty arrogant to think there would ever be a next time.
I would never have them cater another event for me and would never refer them for catering. I strongly believe that an establishment should stand behind their product and if they cant deliver the quality expected they shouldn’t offer that service
ORDER AT YOUR OWN RISK

THE BEST Authentic Persian food around!!! Been here several times & the food ‘never’ disappoints. I ordered the chicken kabob plate with half rice, half salad. SO MUCH deliciousness! My husband & I usually share, however last night he ordered the Lamb Shank plate. Said it was the most tender that he’s ever had! They also serve the most tasty Hummus that goes nicely with their bread.
Nice restaurant, with a decent layout & clean. The only reason I took away a star is that they still have NOT improved in their service!
In addition, they may want to re-​think the up-​charge to order half salad instead of ALL rice.

I’ve lived in the area so long that I’ve been to both Hatam’s locations-​moves. Once in high-​rent district on Alicia Pkwy, when Hatam was a much smaller restaurant and at least 2 – 3 times at the moved location on Jeronimo in a small, much cheaper rent strip mall.
The Jeronimo small much cheaper rent strip mall location is a bigger restaurant version of what Hatam used to be, a bit fancier, but that included a price hike. Unfortunately I do not feel their prices are warranted for the quality of Persian food that your receive. Prices range for dinner from $ 11.99 for the cheaper koobideh to $ 18.99 for chicken/​filet (1 skewer) combo and $ 20.99 for lamb filet (1 skewer). The special Persian stews are smaller and basically all run about $ 11.99 or so and some have a protein in and some are more vegetarian based. Appetizers can range from $ 4.99 for Hummus to $ 12.99 for the special 4-​type appetizer.
Service is somewhat unfriendly, food is slow to come out and I believe this restaurant is definitely not geared towards an American palate. I’ve been told by my Persian friends that there is a definite standard and tendency to overcook and kill meats. Well Hatam does a good job of that, making your meat difficult to cut, even more difficult to eat and of course, it’s not as pleasing to the taste buds or stomach of this American. Unfortunately every time I’ve been my chicken, filet mignon, lamb has been overcooked, sort of dry and basically not juicy or great.
I admittedly always seem to prefer Greek or Lebanese hummus, whether it is due to the spices, the olive oil, the lemon juice, the amount of tahini or just in general, my tastes run to a creamier texture. The chef at Hatam makes the hummus thicker with a less creamy consistency, so it tastes drier. It is also brought-​served with plain, out of the package dry lavash type bread, not so tasty.
I realize my review is sounding not good at this point, so what’s up with the 3 stars?! The rice is buttery deliciousness and you receive plenty and it is always cooked perfecto, not under so no crunch and not over so mush. Some goes to convenience-​location to my home, some goes to the beautiful restaurant inside complete with fountain:
and ceiling fresco:
and some goes to the fact that I’ve had a Groupon at least 2 of the 3 times, so dealio.
Tip: The beef koobideh is nicely seasoned, juicy and of course ground beef is supposed to be cooked with no pink. I do recommend this and I think in the future I’ll take my own recommendation and get beef koobideh for at least a 4 star experience!

Pleasantly surprised with how great the food is, but the service brought it down one star. We had a groupon for this place so we went right before the voucher expired. I believe we ordered combo #128 and #130 — i could be wrong with this but that’s what i heard.
The first thing that came out was the platter of sauces and the pita bread with a side of onion. At first, i was a little confused with the onion slice, but OMG, it adds so much flavor when you dip the pita bread into some sauce and take a bite of the onion. I don’t know what it is. Also, when our order came out, i had a piece of meat, dipped my pita bread into one of the sauces (yogurt-​based) and then took a bite of the onion — PERFECTION. I didn’t eat any rice and I left feeling pretty satisfied, not disgustingly full like at other restaurants.
Service: brought the review down to 3 stars. Honestly, there were so many times when we asked for more pita bread or more napkins and water and only got it after the second or third time. There were even parties that came in a lot later than us that even left before us because they were getting their meal before us. Even when we wanted to pay, the servers didn’t get us the bill and we had to keep asking different people. I think it was the owner that kept coming to our table and asking us if we liked the food, and we did, but then maybe they were trying to rush everyone out because there was some party that was coming in.

As an Iranian who grew up in Iran, I have a very high expectations for Persian food. I am confident to say that Hatam restaurant offers a great quality persian food with reasonable prices. I have tried almost everything on their menu including their baghali polo with lamb, loobiya polo with koobideh, sultani, eggplant stew and fesenjoon stew.
Their service has been very good as well. One thing that I really like about this restaurant is that they don’t have a corkage fee. You can bring as many bottles of wine as you want and they would provide you with glasses w/​o charging you a penny. How awesome is that!!!
Couple of years ago they remodeled the restaurant which made it very pretty and welcoming.
The bottom line is that this restaurant offers you a good quality food with a quite atmosphere. If you want music with entertainment go to Caspian instead.