Twenty-five years, three locations, one pandemic, hundreds of 5-star reviews, inflation, and zero compromises: Mazza has endured them all. Led by Ali Sabbah, Mazza is Salt Lake’s long-standing, favorite Middle Eastern restaurant, surviving the  highs and lows of an ever-changing economy. 

Like most businesses, Mazza suffered from the COVID-19 pandemic shutdown. Just before March 2020, they remodeled and opened a third location in Sandy, and were just getting out of the red when some businesses — restaurants especially — were required to shut down. Government agencies offered loans and subsidies to help local businesses keep their employees and prevent an economic collapse. Loans, however, come at a cost, because they eventually have to be repaid. 

To boost efficiency, two locations were closed, and only the original 15th and 15th location remains. This site is self-sustaining, but the loan and improvement debts are overwhelming. Kitchen and dining upkeep, employee raises and keeping up with inflation have crippled progress. In early 2025, Mazza launched a GoFundMe to restore equilibrium. Within a few weeks, they collected 30% of their $500,000 goal, enough to pay down some loans and give the employees a long-awaited and well-deserved raise.

“We’ve used some of the money to pay some of the high-interest loans,” Sabbah said, “I have a couple of small ones that we’re going to be paying soon. We were able to actually give our staff a little bit of a raise. Not much, but every little bit helps these days.”

It’s not only the debts that have been a burden, but prices have increased everywhere, and for everyone. Rent for their former 9th and 9th location doubled. Food prices increased. 

“We’re probably spending about 15 to 20 percent more on food costs [since 2020],” Sabbah said. This hurts not only business expenditure, but the employees’ quality of life too. “If you are spending that much on food costs, then your employees are going to need to be paid more because they have to spend more on food costs too.”

To top it off, monthly insurance premiums have increased from hundreds to thousands.

What keeps Mazza alive even under crippling debt? It’s obvious. Exceptional, award-winning culinary style.

First comes the quality.

“You have to buy good beef … the right cuts,” Sabbah said. “We trim our own lamb here. We get rid of all the gristle and fat, instead of buying from a supplier that is going to charge for doing a lousy job of trimming your lamb.”

The beef and lamb are grass-fed and halal. Coming from Australia and New Zealand, it’s not something he’s willing to compromise on. 

Second, the method. 

“You could take the same ingredients, and you’d be surprised how different, how much better a dish can come out,” Sabbah said. 

For example, the August special, Beef and Okra, is something you won’t find anywhere else. “I put some of my things in, the things that I’ve learned, the ingredients that give you deeper flavors,” Sabbah explained. “It’s not only about just assembling things and sending them out. What we offer are things that no one else offers; dishes that I worked on developing for years until I got them right.”

Sabbah has no formal training. He learned to cook from his mother, books, and through his own exploration. “I already loved to cook, so I understood the relationship of flavors and tastes and things.” 

But to run an award-winning, enduring restaurant, you need more than a passing fancy for food. “If you really want to progress, you really have to put some of yourself in it,” he said. “You think of a recipe, you like certain ingredients, and you say, ‘What can I do with those ingredients in order to create something that’s kind of unusual?’”

Through prosperity and adversity, the customers keep coming. Running Mazza hasn’t been easy, but Sabbah says it’s where he belongs. 

“The community has been really amazing,“ Sabbah reflected. “My clients, whom I consider friends, have been really amazing. I love having a restaurant, cooking, having people over, talking to them, seeing how everybody’s doing, running the small affairs of the restaurant. This is what I want, what I always wanted.”

Feature Image of Ali Sabbah by John Taylor.