Del Mar: Potentially, this could be one of the best restaurants in Israel

We will give her a few more months to become like this, but we have already returned with good news from Haifa

My father Efrati

27/10/2022

Thursday, October 27, 2022, 08:20 Updated: 08:32

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Del Mar, a landscape whose beauty cannot be overstated (photo: Anatoli Michaelou)

No city in Israel is able to compete with the crazy rate at which new restaurants are opening in the local culinary capital, Tel Aviv.

And yet, things are not only happening in Tel Aviv.

The new Del Mar restaurant has been operating for the past two months on Yaffe Nof Street in Haifa, the one that was once called "Panorama Street", overlooking the city and the harbor.

This is not a standard location choice at all.

The areas that are considered live and kicking in Haifa, hereinafter "complexes", are Talpiot market and the port.

Yaffe Nof Street is in a decent, classic, relaxed and certainly not "cool" residential neighborhood;

But instead of promoting coolness, Del Mar's space has a view whose beauty cannot be overstated.

The restaurant, led by Idan Malkin, does not try to be cool in any way.

It doesn't look "up-to-date" and even though it was opened and designed very recently, it even has a kind of old-time, nineties vibe.

Not that I have anything against the current atmosphere design in restaurants.

On the contrary, I'm all for him, but he also seems to be entering a sort of predictable trance.

A restaurant with a decent atmosphere and white tables, this thing that local restaurant designers have been trying to distance themselves from for years as a sign of anachronism, suddenly feels, from being fed up with restaurants designed in a self-conscious nonchalance, like something completely refreshing.

The classic design approach continues to the menu, which is mainly sea food but also has enough options for meat eaters and vegetarians.

Malkin previously worked at "Hamanal 24" in Haifa, in Kitit and at Moshik Roth in Amsterdam and advised restaurants.

Ledel Mar has built a menu that clearly carries to the elite, with a clear French base and here and there additional refined touches.

Despite the classics, the menu is not built from starters and mains, like in fine dining restaurants.

After the starters there is an extensive category of appetizers.

Unlike most restaurants since the corona virus, which reduce the number of main dishes, due to pricing constraints, among other things, here there is quite a section of main dishes.

Bruschetta Boyavez (photo: Anatoli Michaelou)

There were four of us and a glance at the menu showed that most of the interesting parts are in the starters and the intermediate dishes.

We went for four starters, bread, three appetizers and one main.

The first ones included

(NIS 66),

(NIS 72),

(NIS 72) and

(NIS 68).

Quinoa, cucumber gazpacho, shallot, crème fraîche and another twist, nori seaweed and kefir lime were mixed in the tartare.

This was a dish that was deliberately carried over to refine flavors.

She did not leave the fish in the center but expanded the range of flavors around it while maintaining a restraint factor, as opposed to an iceberg of flavors.

Undoubtedly a good fine dining dish.

The tuna ceviche dish had radish, avocado and Brazil nut and it also had a little twist, this time from Thai basil and wasabi.

Unlike the sea bar tartar that opened with restraint from a relatively wide range of flavors, here it was more basic but precise, measured and sharp, with a nice and not excessive note of spiciness.

Another good dish.

The shrimp salad had shallots, padron pepper, radishes, lime, olive oil and herbs.

There was no flaw in the dish's performance and the shrimp themselves were of high quality and well cared for;

But unlike the previous dishes, in which a clear uniqueness and an unmistakable chef's signature were evident, this was a dish that could easily be found in other restaurants as well.

Clearly the first is more generic and less interesting.

The bouillabaisse bruschetta, on the other hand, was an elaborate fine dining dish for all intents and purposes.

On the bruschetta was fish sitting on an excellent aioli with a reduced bouillabaisse sauce with touches of pastis.

Everything here was the most classic French there is, with sauces, whipped creams and everything else - and extremely delicious.

Here a really excellent control of techniques and the ability to put them together into a truly coherent and delicious whole was demonstrated.

We have several chefs who have a good command of the techniques but find it difficult to combine them into a tasty and cohesive statement.

It was a dish that revealed Malkin's talent, experience, maturity and good taste.

However, she also revealed a recurring feature in the entrées: a penchant for slightly heavy sauces.

Last week

Everyone is flying over this place, are you serious?!

To the full article

Octopus, meaty, juicy if seared well and correctly (photo: Anatoli Michaelou)

We went on to

(72 NIS),

(72 NIS),

(88 NIS), all three of the entrees, and

(88 NIS) from the main course.

First came the octopus dish, seared in a plancha with potato, demi-glace sauce, chili coulis and crème fraîche on the side.

The octopus itself was excellent and it is clear that they did not look for shortcuts in its preliminary treatment, which requires continuous softening.

It was meaty, juicy to the extent and charred well and correctly.

All the flavor components, including mini sauces from the worlds of French cuisine and a nice touch of spiciness, were made to executive perfection.

The combination of flavors was coherent and appropriate.

The heaviness factor, derived from the abundance of sauces, was not excessive here but joined the particular heaviness that began to create the bouillabaisse bruschetta.

The Gambri dish had really high-quality seared shrimp with a white wine sauce and a delicious garlic butter, in which broccoli, chili and kefir lime were also combined for an Asian hint.

It was impossible to mistake the qualities of this dish, as well as the meticulousness of the execution, but the sauce already belonged to the worlds of heavy and burdensome content.

If until now we felt the classics but we didn't feel that it was too burdensome and produced a feeling of old-fashionedness, this dish - good for its own sake as mentioned - already created that feeling.

A stuffed calamari dish is kind of retro.

Creating such a dish with a sense of freshness is challenging.

I was a little worried when we ordered it, but we are here on duty, to learn about all aspects of the menu, even those that seem suspicious in advance.

I was not wrong.

It is a bit unnecessary to fill calamari with goat cheese and banana;

Even if they have leeks and garlic cream on the side.

Unlike some of the previous dishes, whose lack of contemporaneity was of the refreshing and joyful kind, this one felt like something old-fashioned and quite a casting mistake by someone who was exposed before our eyes during the meal as a serious professional.

The fourth dish in this round, the burrata pasta, was ordered for the diner with a semi-chic bent, from the main course section.

It was a large dish, with a ball of burrata in the center and an olive oil, tomato, basil and pine nut sauce.

It turned out to be the least successful dish so far in the meal, without any mark, with really faded flavors and a feeling that it found its place on the menu mainly to fulfill its duty.

The desserts at Del Mar, there is more work (Photo: Anatoli Michaelou)

Despite the certain reservations, the vintage so far looks absolutely positive and we moved on to the desserts:

(NIS 56) and

(NIS 48).

The forest dessert was insanely expensive and looked like a dish from a luxury restaurant.

Visually, it did look like a forest, including two mushroom-shaped constructions, plenty of textures and colors.

There were chocolate creme, pistachio cocoa crumble, coffee ganache, puffs, honeycomb and pistachio ice cream.

Lots of components, each of which was well made on its own, but together it was too busy, too heavy, too creamy.

It was impossible not to appreciate the effort;

It was hard not to be upset by the load and the lack of balance and focus.

The Basque cheesecake was good.

The crème anglaise and the fig confit added to it loaded sweetness and again, one layer of cream too many.

So there is a new restaurant in Haifa and it is endowed with many qualities.

Ido Malkin, the chef, does not seek to align with trends and makes serious and elaborate food.

There is no compromise in the raw materials, his culinary knowledge is extensive and his mastery of techniques is unequivocal.

The level of execution is also high, no fakes at all.

However, right now, Del Mar is not where it could be.

First of all, it lacks a degree of focus.

Along with very good dishes (the tartar and ceviche) to really excellent (the boyavez bruschetta) there are somewhat unnecessary dishes (the stuffed calamari and the forest dessert, for example).

This is the first fine-tuning element that is highly requested in the kitchen.

Additionally, although overall it was a definitely good meal, I finished it feeling congested and overwhelmed due to too many heavy sauces.

This is how haute cuisine was once made;

Today less.

It's not that the sauces should be eliminated from the menu, but they should and should be dosed completely differently.

At the moment Del Mar is a good restaurant, at certain moments very good, but not focused enough.

You have to know how to choose it correctly, and there is a chance to come across dishes that feel outdated.

With proper tuning it can be a much better restaurant.

What is needed here is not a revolution but giving up certain dishes and making some others lighter and more balanced.

After a fairly extensive sampling of the food, one can say with a fair degree of confidence that Malkin has everything it takes to make Del Mar an excellent restaurant.

It will be really fascinating to eat here again in about six months.

Potentially, and given the requested changes, this could be one of the best restaurants in Israel.

Account (for four):

Ehrlich bread - 28

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