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The Real Chinatown

“Is there such a thing as Israeli cuisine?” Ruthie Rousso asked in the inaugural issue of the Televivian Journal three years ago. “The international response settles the issues for us all: Israeli food is quickly becoming among the most popular in the world. Israeli restaurants bloom and boom in London and New York, Israeli cookbooks win international prizes, and Israel in general has become a place of pilgrimage due to its restaurants and not only because of the Old City and the Dead Sea.”

The Chef continues to muse, “Food is a reflection. Plates have narratives. They tell different stories. These stories have a very personal connection to the traditions and habits that pass from generation to generation. But there is also a much broader dimension related to issues of culture, history, conflicts, wars, international relations, and even GDP. The complex Israeli identity is contained on every plate. In every tiny heirloom Palestinian bamya with preserved lemon and brown butter served in haBasta, and in every steaming pitta stuffed with roasted cauliflower, crème fraîche and local hot pepper … Israeli cuisine, like Israeli identity, is a fragile and frail tissue of crossings and stitching, fraught with youth on the one hand, and with hindering history on the other, full of adventurous urges, creativity and courage. Yes, and some chutzpah as well.”

Shabbat shalom! Kapara is chutzpah in a pistachio nutshell. But first, it’s oh so quiet (to channel Björk). Seems like a no show. Then, predicting a riot (channelling Kaiser Chiefs) it’s suddenly oh so Soho. Sababa! Soon the Galilee Dry White Givon Chardonnay is flowing as the lights get dimmer, the music booms louder, and the imaginary patterns appear in the wall tiles. Or are they imaginary? Everything seems rather naughty but terribly nice. Mezze is: Roasted Plums and Feta (soft herbs). Brunch Plate is: Baby Aubergine Shakshuka (spicy tomato sauce, stewed aubergine, eggs, tahini, pickled chillies, chive). Sweet Ending is: Gramp’s Cigar (brick pastry, pistachio, rose, coco, passionfruit curd, chocolate soil, smoked tuile). From smoky to smoking to smoking hot. And in an even sweeter ending, the cocktails are: The Glory Mole (El Rayo Tequila, hibiscus, cardamom, ginger, lime, soda) and Space Cowboy (Konik’s Tail Vodka, port, pimento, caraway, strawberry, hop, soda).

Kapara is tucked away in a redrawn block stretching from the retained 17th century Portland House (stuccoed up in the mid 19th century) on Greek Street to the replacement Foyles bookshop on Charing Cross Road. Architectural practices Matt and Soda combined their pizzazz to bring the best piece of urban design to hit London this decade. Nine storeys above ground (some occupying the air space where the Wedgwood china factory once stood) and four underground. A glazed sliced cone nose diving into the earth lights the subterranean office floors. If this is Soho Estates cleaning up their act what’s not to like? One sixth of the site is dedicated to new public realm. The restaurant spills onto part of this realm: an elusive and exclusive courtyard. Terracotta stained GRC (Glass Reinforced Concrete), glazed bricks and scoop and scallop patterned tiles all add to the Mediterranean ambience. A four metre high stainless steel head sculpture by Cuban artist Rafael Miranda San Juan gazes across the courtyard.

Owner Chef Eran Tibi’s earliest memories involved food. “I helped my father, a Tunisian born baker, in our family bakery and I spent time with my mother trimming okra tips. Family and food became intertwined, inseparable, from a young age. Food was a means to an end for my family – it meant more, it was a way of life. My grandfather was a great lover of life and all its indulgences. He owned a bar, a restaurant and a club. He instilled in me the importance of living for the moment, of being present in the now.” Aged 30, Eran decided to formally train at Le Cordon Blue School in London. His first restaurant in the English capital is the wildly successful Bala Baya in London Bridge. Eran’s mission to bring localised Middle Eastern food to southeastern England proves there really is such a thing as Israeli cuisine.

Bubala Spitalfields London + Televivian Journal

Shake the Shakshuka

“Vegans make better lovers,” tweeted Californian Baywatch babe Pamela Anderson who has just celebrated tying the knot for the fifth time. “The cholesterol in meat, eggs and dairy causes hardening of the arteries (and not much else). It slows blood flow to all the body’s organs, not just the heart. You can improve your overall health and increase stamina in the bedroom by going vegan.” As an active vegan, the animal rights star has been researching her hypothesis for the last 30 years.

“I’m fairly confident in this statement,” she later tweets. “Although I think I’ve always had a lot of fun in that department. It’s a romantic way of caring about the world, about life and the environment. It’s another little perk to being vegan!” Not to be taken with a pinch of salt, while red meat eaters clearly don’t make for red hot lovers, vegetarians must surely pass the mustard in the sack, knowing their quixotic onions so to speak. Certainly food for thought.

Which brings us nicely onto Bubala, the little Middle Eastern restaurant with the big international agenda in East London’s Spitalfields. As we await Tel Aviv, Tel Aviv comes to us. Best served on wheat straw plates, hardcore meze has never tasted this good. ‘Bubala’ is roughly the Yiddish for sweetheart or darling. Yiddish is the language of the Ashkenazi Jews of Central and Eastern Europe.

Founder Marc Summers explains, “We’ve been inspired by our backgrounds and heritage. There are a couple of Jewish things on the menu which reflects the area we’re in – a century ago Spitalfields was very Jewish. My grandfather was born here, as was Helen’s grandmother, so the location means a lot to us. It took a long time to find the right location for Bubala, but when we found this place we knew we had to go for it.” The restaurant is a falafel’s throw from Christ Church Spitalfields.

“We’d had enough of dealing with meat on a daily basis,” Marc continues. “Sticking to vegetarian dishes means everything feels a lot more hygienic in the kitchen and it’s a nicer environment to work in. Our Head Chef Helen Graham was also getting a bit tired of seeing the amount of waste that can come from cooking meat in a restaurant so it was something we were both keen to focus on.”

“Meze has many iterations across the Mediterranean, Middle East and North Africa,” explains Helen. “Spanning such a broad region, it’s no surprise that the word brings conflict. ‘Meze’ is of Turkish origin, borrowed from the Persian ‘mazze’ meaning ‘snack’ or ‘taste’. Indeed, many cultures enjoy meze as an appetiser. Where the concept of opening your appetite is foreign, meze refers to the entire thing from the first scoop of hummus to the final button undoing bite.”

Televivian Journal is the magazine of choice for every cosmopolitan citizen of Israel’s party capital and a few savvy London subscribers too. Shalom! Lehitraot? What does Ruthie Rousso, food critic and contributor to the latest hard hitting hard copy edition of Televivian Journal, think of Tel Aviv cuisine and its emergence on the world stage? Or should that be world table?

“The complex Israeli identity is contained on every plate: in every tiny heirloom Palestinian bamya served with preserved lemon and brown butter served in ‘haBasta’, and in every steaming pita stuffed with roasted cauliflower, crème fraîche and local hot pepper at Eyal Shani’s Miznon… The Israeli chefs and restaurateurs continue to dare, insist on trying, are driven to create. If I had to put a finger on one characteristic of Israeli identity and cuisine, it would be this: it is a turbine, refusing to stop, pushing forward against all odds.”

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