What's Hot and Sizzling in Kabul? The new steakhouse

At Popolano Italian restaurant - Kabul's only chain restaurant, with two branches - the prices are much more down to earth. 350 Afghanis (or $8) will buy you a medium chicken tikka pizza. Chicken tikka, of course, is a tangy Indian concoction that's as necessary to any pizza menu in Asia as pepperoni is in the US.

The international flavors are a reminder of Afghanistan's golden age, in the 1960s and early '70s when Kabul was considered one of the most cosmopolitan cities in the Islamic world. The restaurants also reflect a contemporary Afghan reality: After agriculture, the aid industry is the second biggest sector of the economy, according to the Essential Field Guides: Afghanistan.

For most of these restaurants, the key ingredient is security. US embassy staff, for instance, were banned from visiting local restaurants because they were perceived to be prime targets for terrorist attack. But now restaurants that cater to foreigners have taken on that paranoid-comfortable Fort Knox feel, complete with armed guards, iron gates, and closed-circuit TVs.

All of this, unfortunately, is outside the price range of ordinary Afghans. Those pork chops, for instance, would cost about a week and a half's salary for a recruit of the new Afghan National Army (and pork is verboten by Islam anyway). Some restaurants serving alcohol, such as Hot and Sizzling, won't even allow Afghans to enter, out of respect for Afghanistan's strict Islamic traditions, and to avoid being shut down by Kabul police.

Yet even for Afghans, today's Kabul is a far cry from Taliban times, when the Afghan capital had just two restaurants - the Herat and the Khalid - and a scattering of smoky, open-air kebab shops. At the New York Restaurant, a kebab stand in the central park district called Shar-e Naw, 150 Afghanis (or $3) is enough to buy kebabs for a family of five. And at Moussa Burger, which doesn't actually serve burgers, one can buy spicy fried chicken and fries for two at about the same price.

But there are some things that don't change. The menu at the Herat, once a favorite spot for Taliban commanders and Arab fighters - particularly those from the elite Brigade 51 of Al Qaeda - still has excellent meat-filled manto dumplings for about 50 Afghanis, and rice pullao for 70 Afghanis. The flatbread is free. There is a separate purdah room for female guests, a VIP room for anyone who considers himself a VIP, and a dining room complete with a raised platform where Afghan traditionalists can dine cross-legged, on the floor, leaning up against cotton-filled pillows.

"I'm so happy there are more restaurants in Kabul," says Herat owner Azim Niazi, somewhat surprisingly. "During the Taliban times, there were fewer restaurants, because there were fewer people here. Now, the Afghan people are coming back, because it is peaceful here, and the number of restaurants is increasing. That benefits everyone."

And while most of the staff at these restaurants are themselves foreign - Chinese waitresses at the Chinese restaurants, Thais at Lal Thai, Indians at Delhi Durbar, and Filipinos at Hot and Sizzling - Mr. Niazi says that all of this foreign restaurant business does have a trickle-down effect on the economy, eventually.

"The economy is like a chain; if the chain is complete then it is strong and it benefits everyone," Niazi says. "So if a foreigner comes to town and opens a restaurant, he may buy his food from outside the country, he may hire his waiters from outside, but he still has to hire a few Afghans to cook food in the kitchen, to clean up the tables. I may not get the benefit from that personally, but some Afghans will get the benefit."

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