The Middle East has long been fertile ground for extraordinary flavours and, in recent years, attention has focused on the wave of creative gastronomy surging through Israel. Tel Aviv, in particular – is experiencing a groundswell that, thanks to the likes of Yotam Ottolenghi and Claudia Roden and restaurants like London’s Palomar, has extended far beyond the country.
The latest new Tel Aviv-inspired outpost to tickle our tastebuds is Bar Shuka in Frankfurt’s Bahnhofsviertel district. Designed by Morgen Interiors and Michael Dreher, the restaurant in the ground floor of the newly minted 25hours The Trip hotel, is a lively mashup of industrial-lite textures and materials such as exposed raw brick walls and concrete columns paired with Spanish ornamental tiles, a 400-year-old oak chef’s table, lampshades made of Tunisian straw baskets, and honey-combed tiles glazed in marine hues.
In the kitchen, chefs Yossi Elad and Stephan Kaiser serves up a menu of sharing plates that’s based on local meats and vegetables, warmed with house-made harissa, za’atar and sumac sourced from Israel – think, stewed lamb, raw tahini, grilled octopus, beluga lentils and smoky kebabs – all washed down with a drinks list sourced from Lebanon, Israel and Syria. For a post-prandial saké cocktail, the speakeasy Shuka Bar is hidden behind a wall in the restaurant’s courtyard.§
