I’ve only eaten @ Joe’s once and got a gyro on laffa. The laffa was really good, the gyro ingredients could have been better (I’m w/ @Ns1 on crisping the gyro meat after slicing it off the cone) .
My co-worker who LOVES the falafel @ Ta-eem thought that Joe’s falafel wasn’t as good flavor-wise (I haven’t tried either). Both of us like the salads and pitas better @ Ta-eem.
me too.
Laffa Falafel is the thing to get for me at Joe’s. That sandwich towers above the others, IMHO.
Everything else is so much better at Tel Aviv and Ta-eem.
Sadly I found the Laffa at Ta-eem to be a real mess, and really hard to eat. Way overstuffed. Falls apart immediately.
That place is pretty legit. Believe they have the roasted eggplant we all love so much. Just wish they offered a few more salads.
Did you notice any curry flavor? That’s the main reason I prefer it to Ta-eem.
Yes, this is very frustrating about Joe’s. I’m with you that the diversity of salads and sides is what makes Israel-style falafel and shawarma special.
Used to be they would give you other salads if you asked nicely. But a couple of years ago, they got a lot stricter about about what veggies go with what dishes. That’s why, as I say, my order is now a vegetable combo plate with extra falafel and laffa on the side. That way you get a few different salads.
Wish you’d tried their exceptional laffa. It’s the way to go at Joe’s imo – and Ta-eem, though their laffa is a step below Joe’s.
So glad you enjoyed it! The crunchiness is actually why I prefer the falafel at Joe’s. While I love the falafel at Ta-eem, too, I’ve gotten balls that are undercooked and slightly gummy in the center.
I’m sorry you had a bad experience but I really think it was atypical. Overstuffed? Sure. But I’ve been eating the laffa at Ta-eem since 2012 and never had it fall apart immediately. A simple search of their Yelp reviews for “laffa” will confirm my experiences are the norm.
Hi @Bigmouth,
Thanks for your recs. 
I didn’t notice any curry flavor, but it might’ve been an off day?
Thanks for the heads up on the laffa, I’ll try it next time. But since I tried the Pita and full Plate versions at Tel Aviv and Ta-Eem, that’s why I went with it here as a point of comparison.
It’s interesting, for Ta-Eem, of the 4 times we’ve been there, we’ve never had undercooked Falafel. We like them better than Tel Aviv and only a touch below Joe’s (which was definitely crunchier).
Thanks!
Or maybe they’ve slipped? Truthfully, it’s been a while since I tried the shawarma there. I will say this discussion has forced me to confront the fact Joe’s seems to be trending downward, while Ta-eem just seems to get better and better.
I get it. An apples to apples comparison seems intuitively correct. If you think about it, though, that can arbitrarily bias you in favor of whichever place you try first. Since it’s your first visit, you try all the best dishes. But when you visit the second place, you try the comparable dishes whether they’re the best or not. Not saying that happened here but it’s something to consider.
Don’t get me wrong, it’s not the norm. It actually happened the very first time I ever visited, so perhaps, like @CiaoBob with the laffa, it looms large in my recollection. On subsequent visits, however, the falafels have indeed been fully cooked, if a bit softer than I prefer.
On that note – and I don’t mean to keep bagging on Bob but still – it seems to me complaints about overstuffed laffa are partly on the person ordering. After all, the servers at Ta-eem are just complying with your requests.
It’s sort of the flip side of the strict rules about what you can get on your laffa at Joe’s. Ta-eem gives you the power to have whatever you want but with that power comes great responsibility. 
THANKS A LOT @Chowseeker1999…
All this talk, I had to go to Tel Aviv while I was in Valley Village today.
Yeah their chicken shawarma is quite tasty. And this is coming from someone who’s generally not a huge fan of chicken shawarma.
As for the salads, though OK, they are great if you like a lot of cabbage. I enjoy a few bites here and there. I do like the charred peppers and sauces!
I also got a side of falafel. They are tasty but they are a tad too soft on the inside for me. I like them, because I have yet to meet a falafel I didn’t like, but, like @Bigmouth, I definitely prefer Joe’s for that. Spicier and a tad firmer. That’s just a personal preference.
I’ve only gotten falafel and chicken kebab at Joe’s over the past six months or so and I can’t eat laffa
I’m have to go back there and try some of the other things again.
And I also need give Ta-Eem another shot.
I was tempted to do a Taco Llama bang bang and get one of @Ns1 pastor tacos in the hard shell (Though I think he said it’s only at the location in Van Nuys)
no worries.
FWIW, I did not tell them to put anything in it like fries or extra hummus. I ordered the laffa falafel to stay (maybe the to go’s get a better, tighter wrap?). They asked what I wanted inside and I said whatever is typical, but xtra spicy It was just Isreali salad, cabbage, hummus, hot sauce and the delicious falafel. The thing that came was just immense and shaped more like an NFL football, rather than a fuselage that could be handled fairly easily. After one bite the thing was going, so I dumped it all on a plate and ate about 80% with a knife and fork. It was good, very good but not easy to eat.
Sometimes they wrap it in foil and waxpaper and sometimes they only do waxpaper when you’re eating at the restaurant. The foil definitely helps with keeping it together.
Would definitely encourage you to go again, Ta-Eem is one of my favorites!
OK, on my way back I passed by Falafel Arax, their new location on Moorpark Road in Studio City.
It was kind of like a Falafel Fast Food joint. Interesting, in that all they serve is falafel in various ways.
I got some falafel to go (this is not a good low-carb day)
They were much firmer than the ones I had at Tel Aviv. They were very crunchy, but oil was glistening on the outside. Not spiced like Joes. Their tahini was lemony. Quite nice.
I wish I had taken a photo of the inside.
I go a few times a year - I love the place - and will continue to do so. I just won’t be getting the laffa sandwich. Pita is so great there, eggplant is outrageously great too. And don’t get me started on the chicken thigh plate!
That’s interesting that the SC location only has falafel—the one on Normandie/Santa Monica has a full menu. I usually get the schwarma pita. I like it a lot but it’s different than the Israeli version @ Ta-eem. I still need to try the tongue sandwich.
The Falafel Arax in Glendale offers chicken and beef schwarma.
http://www.falafelaraxglendale.net/
We only had their falafel once: extremely, disconcertingly oily (I’d wondered if the oil wasn’t hot enough). But I recall liking the flavor.
Hi @Gr8pimpin,
Nice! You didn’t ask for some free Fries with your plate of Shawarma? 
Yah if you can, give Ta-Eem another shot, IMHO, they make some delicious food. Make sure you ask for the Green & Red Sauce (Housemade Skhug and Harissa) and sit down and enjoy it immediately (with their wonderful Pitas).
Can’t eat fries. Nor pita… for now. (Raises fists in the air)
Nope you were at the right spot.
So today after late lunch, I dropped the kid off to satisfy his OCD urge for Voodoo doughnuts. I decided that I had just enough room in the gullet to sample Joe’s chicken shawarma and falafel for comparison since I just had Tel Aviv and Falafel Arax yesterday.
For $3.50 including tax i got probably 4oz of shawarma and 2 falafel balls.
The chicken IS INDEED decidedly dryer, but not dry, compared to what I had yesterday. Not nearly as spiced either. The parts with the skin were, as noted by others, the best part. However, in my head I’m thinking “haven’t they ever heard of salt?” Tasted like there was none.
The two falafels I still find superior, though not vastly, to Tel Aviv or Arax. Flavor wise they had that heat that I love. They also are firmer inside, something of a personal preference of mine.
I was drooling over the laffa as they were slinging it for every order.
So, IMHO, the sides would indeed put Tel Aviv ahead of Joe’s, no doubt for the shawarma. But if I want a falafel, or the kabob option, I’m going to Joe’s.
Ok, I’m full.
Bye.
I forgot to mention this about my experience at Ta-Eem. My wife reminded me of another one of her reasons why she didn’t like the place: the hummus. It was watery loose and you HAD to use a spoon to get it onto anything.
Like you all said, it had to have been an off day.
Hi @Gr8pimpin,
Also they serve their hummus with tahini. They might’ve given you too much tahini on top; so you might just ask them for no tahini or less tahini as well (or it was just an off day).
Apologies for blaming the victim. Now that you mention it – and for future reference for anyone who orders the laffa – you can watch them put the various fillings on ala Chipotle. I always make a point of specifying “just a little” of each filling to avoid the football phenomenon you describe.
Also, as @hungryhungryhippos notes, specifying wax paper plus foil can help hold everything together.
Yeah that’s weird and very atypical. Like @Chowseeker1999 says, it may have been tahini.
Hmmm. Tahini is an ingredient in hummus, but I’ve never seen anyone top hummus with tahini, either the sauce or the paste.
Anyways, I’m so behind on this thread. I’ve got a lot of ground to cover. Looking forward to Ta-eem!
