Our story
Musa Firat, chef and owner, is originally from Kurdistan. He immigrated to the United States in 1982. Trained in New York, he opened his first restaurant in Manhattan on the corner of 46th and 8th, serving pizza. That grew into a larger restaurant and from there he has shared his wonderful Mesopotamian recipes with people from around the world in his restaurants in New York, Chapel Hill, NC, Atlanta, GA and now Seattle, WA.
Chef Musa and his wife, Jackie, proudly run and operate Marlaina’s Mediterranean Kitchen in Burien, WA.
The Naming of Marlaina’s
A longtime and loyal customer, Marlaina Leiberg, was a valued and active member of the Burien community. Marlaina was blind and during her life, she was a strong advocate for people with disabilities being instrumental in the passing of Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), and was responsible for the accessible cross walks and wheel chair friendly sidewalks you see today in Burien. One night at dinner, she pestered Musa about changing the name of the restaurant and he responded by saying, “How about Marlaina’s?”.
Marlaina’s Mediterranean Kitchen has been a part of the Burien community for close to ten years and a photo of Marlaina Leiberg can be seen inside the warm and welcoming restaurant that she lived and loved to enjoy.