Mudai

By Staff (Feb 12, 2009 )

Mudai
503 W. San Carlos St.,
San Jose
408.292.2282

Ethiopian food is looking better all the time. It first caught on in the mainstream here for its unique flavors and the unusual method of scooping up many dishes by hand with the spongy bread called injera.

But it turns out that injera isn’t just a novel way to eat. The rest of the world is only beginning to discover the health benefits of Ethiopian cuisine, especially the grain teff, which is used to make the injera. Extremely nutritious, high in fiber and adaptable to many environments, teff is as sustainable as it is delectable.

None of this is news to Addis Alemu, the owner of Mudai Restaurant in San Jose.

“This food is healthy,” he says. “It gives you a lot of minerals. The vegetarian items are organic. People are starting to know it.”

When Alemu opened Mudai in January of 2004, he had already run a smaller restaurant in San Jose. He knew he could count on the fact that Silicon Valley

has a huge Ethiopian population, part of a larger Bay Area community that is estimated to number around 80,000. There is enough business just within that community, Alemu says, to support his business.

But he knew the cuisine had a larger appeal, and indeed quickly began to draw other crowds, both those who were familiar with Ethiopian cuisine and those who were just curious. Often the curious become the repeat customers, he says.

Alemu had some experience in the restaurant business in Ethiopia, but it was when he came to this country that he decided to develop his own menu. He has been cooking here for 11 years now and is the chef at Mudai.

“The recipes are very personal to me,” he says.

In Alemu’s native tongue, “mudai” is a word for a little box, such as the jewelry box in which girls put small valuables when they get married. To him, the name was a natural— and not just because it was also the name of his favorite pet growing up, a cow. “This is a place with something valuable inside,” he says.