East Bay: Aromas, relaxation are the hook in hookah

Rick DelVecchio, Chronicle Staff Writer - Friday, May 20, 2005

The editor wanted to know what's up with the hookah bars. I got the job and set out on Thursday evening to seek and explore. I hoped I wouldn't choke.

A BART ride to El Cerrito Plaza and a mile walk west to the edge of Interstate 880 took me to the Pacific East Mall, home of the founding establishment in the East Bay's Arabic-style water-pipe smoking lounge scene: the Hookah Hut.

Squinting in the glare of a dozen Asian eateries, I wandered, thinking I'd taken a wrong turn. But the sign for Stogies Smoke Shop gave me a fair idea I'd come to the right place.

I entered Stogies and was home free when I spotted a dark back room where several smokers lounged on soft chairs and watched TV. This was the Hookah Hut -- not the whole thing, as I learned later, but the first chamber in a multi- roomed environment dedicated to the art of relaxation.

There's no alcohol in the Hookah Hut, and the tobacco is no-tar, low- nicotine -- and not even a whole lot of smoke. In hookah, as I found out, the tobacco burns low and slow, time stretches and it's all about savoring the flavor.

I asked the Stogies counter clerk who the boss was. She glanced at the tall man without any hair half-hidden behind a stack of smoking accessories. "J.J.?" the clerk said.

J.J. Dayem and I made our introductions. He agreed to initiate me into the world of hookah. I hadn't smoked anything in 15 or 20 years, other than a few cigars during the Clinton years, and I was afraid of looking the fool when the pipe really got burning. J.J. seemed to know that, which I appreciated.

J.J. is a gentle, bearlike 28-year-old man of Palestinian descent born in Cleveland and raised in the Bay Area. He and an older cousin, Zeaad Handoush, are partners in Stogies and the Hookah Hut.

They started the lounge in 1997 because their retail customers were looking for a place to get away and smoke, and business has grown since. They claim theirs is the original and premiere hookah den in the East Bay, although, as I learned the next day, a young Egyptian entrepreneur in Oakland aims to give them a run for their money.

J.J. reached high on a shelf and pulled down a top-line model hookah pipe in the Lebanese style. With a cloisonne-decorated brass pipe fixed to a crystal vase, it retails for $350. I pinged a finger on the crystal, and it sounded real enough. People buy these pipes to use at home. The least expensive goes for $50.

"Sometimes we get couples coming in," J.J. said. "They want a piece for the house and something that looks nice. Then we get college students from Berkeley."

It was time to go upstairs.

We ascended to the sitting room. Hookah hoses hung on a rail over the bar. Low, deep-cushioned rattan stools awaited customers later in the evening. A card announced the menu: more than 50 flavors to choose from.

J.J. got busy behind the hookah-only bar. He popped open Ziploc containers of dark, wet tobacco, explaining that it's made in the Middle East, Dubai to be exact, and infused with molasses.

J.J. had me take a good whiff of one called Jell-O and another of a tropical-fruit blend called Sex on the Beach. They're the most popular flavors these days, although Blueberry Burst, Exotic Mango, Pina Colada and Oreo Ecstasy aren't far behind.

Customers pay a $5 cover and a $10 minimum pipe rental for one or two smokers, and $5 for each additional smoker. The lounge is open Sunday through Thursday from 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. and on Friday and Saturday from 10 a.m. til 1 a.m. You must be at least 18 to enter.

Working real slow, J.J. set a pipe on a table and grabbed a good pinch of Sex on the Beach with a forceps. He loaded the pipe and proceeded to fire up a couple of special briquettes the size of checkers pieces.

J.J. explained that the burning charcoal gently heats the tobacco, releasing the aromatic flavors and burning only the top part of the contents. It's nothing like smoking a cigarette or a cigar. Mellow to begin with, hookah smoke bubbles through the water in the vase and coils through the long hose. It's still smoke, but tolerably light and cool smoke when it hits the lungs.

J.J. took a draw and passed the hose to me, offering a plastic sanitary tip to stick on the end. I took a couple of weak pulls of Sex on the Beach, non-inhaling and giving my taste buds a chance to put the flavor into some kind of context. I detected smoldering, ripe fruit.

The next selection was the Jell-O. Inhaling lamely, I visualized sugar and cherries.

I noticed the walls were covered with snapshots of customers having an extremely good time. Judging by the photos, the Hookah Hut draws lots of young adults and is popular with women.

J.J. said groups often rent the lounge for private parties. The Hookah Hut is big with fraternities and sororities. "They're very good -- very respectful," he said. "They clean up after themselves."

I had to ask J.J. what's with the tiki decor. The Hookah Hut's look includes coconut palms and lots of bamboo. But hookah is a creation of the Arabic Mideast and has nothing to do with the South Seas.

J.J.'s answer was unexpected. It's all about relaxation, about making the customer feel at ease, he said. He pointed with pride at the tropical lagoon scenes that he had an artist paint behind fake windows on a wall in the Hookah Hut's pool room.

J.J.'s system also extends to the music. Sometimes he plays jazz, other times hip hop. It all depends on who's listening and on what it takes to make different customers feel at home.

"We just do our thing," said J.J., who explained that the lounge is about to undergo remodeling to expand the seating. "We provide the best tobacco for our customers. It's a good place to kick back. Like I told the customers, when you're here, you're family. You need anything, just ask me."

Competition? J.J. said there isn't any. He said the Hookah Hut with its base as a tobacco shop -- it's also a top-selling California Lottery store - - is the trendsetter and draws customers from Sacramento to San Jose, from lawyers to retired athletes.

The next day, I spoke with Elsayed Elhamaki, 25, co-owner of Oakland's El- Omda Cafe near Lake Merritt. He opened El-Omda a year-and-half ago and modeled it on shisha cafes he knew growing up in Egypt. Shisha is the Arabic term for what Americans call hookah.

Elhamaki, who studied business in college in Egypt, started an airport shuttle company, Super Porter, when he moved to the Bay Area. His brother, Emir, El-Omda's co-owner, also created a shuttle business, called Oakland Ride.

"I decided to open up something on the side to show people how we're living back home, how we stay up till 2 in the morning smoking shisha and playing dominos," Elhamaki said.

At El-Omda, the smoking (you must be 18 or older) takes place on an outdoor patio. The cafe also serves Arabic coffee and tea, desserts and a traditional sweet milk drink with almonds. Regular tobacco costs $7, and the longer-lasting golden tobacco costs $9. The cafe is open from 5 p.m. to 2 a.m. every day, but will open at 6 p.m. starting next month.

J.J. Dayem and Elsayed Elhamaki have different approaches to hookah but share an attitude.

"The good thing is, when you smoke hookah, it's just to smell the flavor, " Elhamaki said. "It doesn't make you dizzy, it doesn't make you get high or anything. It's just to relax."

I admit, after an evening with J.J. I felt relaxed, and that's not easy to do. I don't know if it was the smoke or J.J's calming hand.

J.J. and I went downstairs to a Vietnamese restaurant for a late supper of large bowls of the No. 3 pho and talked about things. I forgot about the smoke and, just as J.J. said it would, the flavor of the experience lingered if not the flavor of the tobacco.