I take the bus into the south end of the city and walk the last five minutes into the industrial park on Hubbard, the kind of spot where garages and shipping depots cluster in long rows, quiet in the cooling light of a Friday evening. Maissa sits tucked between them, unassuming from the outside, but the second I step through the door I’m met by a wave of warmth. Abdenour greets me with a smile big enough to feel like sunlight, and to the right the counter is lined with trays of kalb el louz and baklava behind glass, bright and sticky under the lights. On the left, half a dozen tables sit beneath green walls dotted with images of stone streets and houses from a casbah—worn stairways, old masonry, corners that feel lived-in. When I mention I’ve actually visited his region, Kabylie, the whole staff lights up. They laugh, shake my hand, shake it again. There’s a kind of joy in the room that doesn’t need explaining.

My friend Marc arrives a few minutes later by car, and we settle into a table near a massive TV showing a soccer match, the green of the pitch blending with the green of the walls. The effect is strange and transportive: for a moment, I’m not in an industrial park in Fredericton at all, but back in the cafés of Algiers or Tizi Ouzou, where the noise is friendly and the service is generous in ways that make you sit a little easier.

Abdenour tells us he opened Maissa in the first week of November this year, naming it after his 10-month-old daughter. He says it’s the first Algerian restaurant in New Brunswick. Before this, he ran a shipping company in Edmundston—something he still does. Before that, he arrived in Canada in 2021, lived in Montréal, worked in restaurants, studied, cooked, learned, kept moving. And before all of that, back in Algeria, he was a lawyer—something he mentions almost casually, like it’s a detail from someone else’s life. His mum cooked, he says. Algerians are proud people. He tells me he wanted to present his culture, and that everything here is made at home.

The coffee arrives before the meal—dark, strong, the kind that hits the palate with intention. Marc orders the Algerian shawarma and I go for the couscous, and while we wait we talk about Fredericton. He chose this city because it’s the capital and because, unlike Moncton, there’s no real competition for North African cuisine. There are plenty of people who look for those flavours, he says, and he can serve that community here. The first 10 days were tough—quiet, slow—but then people started coming. Now he talks about the future with a hopeful kind of practicality, wondering aloud if one day the place could grow, maybe even become a franchise.

The food arrives in generous plates. Marc bites into his shawarma and raises his eyebrows immediately. I try a piece, and he’s right: it’s different. Creamier, crispier, unmistakably not the Levantine style you see everywhere else. There’s cheese in it, heat in the sauce—sauce algérienne, that ubiquitous blend you find all over France and North Africa—and fries that are golden, crisp, and far too easy to keep picking at. Marc calls it the best shawarma he’s had in Fredericton, and I agree without hesitation. At just over eleven dollars, it’s a steal.

My couscous is the kind of homey and warming dish that feels like it was made by someone cooking for family. The chicken is flavourful, the spices are subtle, the steam rising from the plate smells like comfort rather than showmanship. Eighteen dollars feels like a fair price for something this grounding. Still, I keep glancing back at that shawarma, thinking about what I’ll order next time, already plotting my return.

When we finish eating, full and happy and still nibbling at the fries we swore we were done with, Abdenour brings over complimentary mint tea and offers us baklava and kalb el louz, each piece rich and syrupy enough to stand up to the coffee. Everything is homemade, everything feels tied to family and place.

We pay less than 40 dollars total and leave with leftovers, stepping back into the industrial park with mint still lingering on our tongues. Maissa may be tucked into a quiet corner of the city, but it’s the kind of spot that stays with you long after you leave—warm, generous, and shaped by someone proudly sharing a piece of home.