Miriam Restaurant & Wine Bar

At Miriam Restaurant the cuisine is uniquely, distinctly Israeli.
And yet what is Israeli cuisine? Truthfully, to enter the subject is not unlike entering a sea by foot and feeling a sudden deepening. Unlike French food, Chinese food, Italian food, one does not unfold the menu at Miriam with a set of associations firmly in the mind. In truth, there exists no single dish, no single style of preparation that one might call uniquely Israeli. And yet this lack of identity is its identity, its beauty. A bi-product of the cross-pollination that accompanied the gathering together of Jewish people from around the globe, one might say that, in itself, Israeli cuisine is as close to a true world cuisine as exists. When citizens arrived after World War II, each group brought a tradition of culture and cuisine as set in its ways and one of a kind as a river. And yet suddenly something different was happening around these peoples. They were breathing different air. There was a new climate and a new terrain. Things like figs, thyme, marjoram, and pomegranates were growing in their outlying fields. Bound by a new common ground and also by a tradition of kosher, foods from Eastern Europe and North Africa began rubbing shoulders, mingling, conversing. Interactions occurred with traditional Middle Eastern dishes. As might be expected, friction was produced. We might say that there were two competing impulses: the new Israeli people felt a desire to preserve their particular identities and also a desire to forge an entirely new one. It is from this dual parentage that evolved and continues to evolve what we must call contemporary Israeli cuisine. It is from this heritage that Miriam Restaurant springs.