Haifa’s Hummus in Vancouver Brought me Back To Tel Aviv

Haifa is a new Middle Eastern restaurant located in Vancouver. Haifa is a city in Israel, which I have visited, known for the beautiful Bahai Gardens and delicious shawarma. The restaurant was founded by two chefs, one of Palestinian, and the other Jewish, background. The dining room is in the lobby of an office building on West Georgia, which is an interesting use of space. I liked it, and think that Vancouver needs more of this type of venue which is common in many other cities. The kitchen is open. Service was a bit slow to start, then speeded up, then slowed down again. More on that later. We started with the hummus which was delicious and brought back memories of some of my meals in Tel Aviv.

Next, the lamb tartar which was fresh and without gamey lamb taste. The mint came through nicely.

The next two dishes were the Nazareth Hot Chicken and charred cabbage. Both were good. Presentation of the dishes at Haifa was nice, without trying too hard.

It was at this point that there was a LONG pause in the meal. They told me it was due to the thickness of the meat in the next dish needed more time to cook, but I think it was more of them needing to run a more efficient kitchen. I noticed there were only two people cooking. The next dish was the Sishkabab “Skewer”. It was the only dish I was disappointed in, and would skip. Flavor was OK, but it was essentially just a steak. First, it was not presented on a skewer, even though that is what the menu stated. I am ok with chefs doing “deconstructed” dishes, but this also did not have the flavors of a properly grilled shishkebab. My standard for Middle Eastern meat is M25 in Tel Aviv. This was not even close.

For dessert, we had a knafeh and tahini ice cream. The ice cream was just ok, not a creamy texture but more dense, and the knafeh was not as sweet as a traditional one, but still pretty good.

Service was ok except for the long waits. The restaurant did comp the ice cream, without me asking, to compensate for the slow service which was a nice surprise. Overall, the food is good, except for the shishkebab, and I would return to try other items.