Yulia, in Rasi to Lam (Photo: Yonatan Ben Haim)
Yulia has been operating in the Tel Aviv port for many years as a restaurant for customers;
A kind of beach brasserie that appeals to young people as well as adults and like most entertainment places in the port is largely based on a casual crowd.
A place of this type is evident, obviously, in culinary genericity.
Yulia has never functioned as a restaurant chef and at her best she was expected to serve the daily menu flawlessly.
Genericity is the last concept that can be associated with the name of chef Einav Azgori, even if in all the stations he has been in, Azgori has never cooked anything innovative or creative.
He is a chef who represents the classics at their best - and when he's good, it's excellent.
This was the case, for example, at the culinary food bar Bar A Vin, peace be upon him, and the same was the case at Cafe Nordoi, also the same.
For the past two months, Azgori has been in Yulia's kitchen.
This is not an obvious match.
The classic and strict chef, with deep roots in France, who almost always worked for a foodie crowd;
A cook at a respectable but conservative establishment, generic by choice, committed for years to pasta rosa and burgers for the masses.
Did two go together?
We went to Iulia to wonder about the first jug of Azgouri's work in it.
Azgouri's Locus head cigar in the renewed Yulia (photo: screenshot, Einav Azgouri's Instagram)
It is impossible to exaggerate the description of the absolute advantage of the outdoor sitting space, in front of the harbor, of Yulia.
Cool there, without having to do much.
All beach restaurants in Israel have great natural data.
Most of them, almost all of them, have avoided significant culinary experiments over the years, relying on the natural resource that ensures constant customer traffic, wary of experiments.
The interior space is smaller and a bit cramped.
The seniority is evident in him.
Look at the menu.
Most of it looks generic, Julia's familiar menu.
Next to him came a not short page of specials where the presence of the new chef in the kitchen was clearly evident and mainly from it was our order.
We started with a
marinated palameda
(NIS 42),
a locust head cigar
(NIS 52) and
cocktail shrimp
(NIS 64) alongside
spelled bread
(NIS 22) and
pickles
(NIS 18).
The pickle plate had only cucumbers, refined and good.
The sesame bread could have been more impressive.
The palmade - white, with hot pepper, purple onion and fennel leaves - clearly illustrated who was behind it.
The raw material was really good and the pressing was delicate, very precise.
The additives did not take over but provided an additional flavor dimension: a small pinch of spiciness, the right touch of onion, freshness and the right olive oil coating.
The beauty of a dish that is based on the right connection between a proper, refined fish, near Medikat.
The cigar section no longer spoke silence and restraint.
Two long, fried cigars, topped with large Arabic lettuce leaves, stuffed with meat from the head of the locus, with tahini and suhug for dipping and two lemon quarters on the side.
A fried dish with tahini and sahug is almost 180 degrees from the understatement of the delicately marinated palameda.
It was a dish full of power, in which all the components were treated optimally.
The fish head meat stuffing was excellent, the frying was perfect, without excess oil and the combination of the fresh (lettuce), spicy (shoug) and sour (lemon) created a powerful synergy, without being dragged into excessive flavor intensity.
Delicious to God, and beyond that.
The shrimp cocktail dish did not come from the specials and had braised, cold shrimp with a spicy cold sauce based on tomatoes, celery and onions, alongside horseradish leaves and fried tortillas.
It was, how to put it delicately and stay true to the duty of reporting, clearly inappropriate.
Everything about her felt off.
From the shrimp infusion, which failed to retain its juiciness, through the sauce, which evoked an association with Bloody Mary in a bad way, to the tortillas, which added a somewhat junkist dimension.
I have no idea if this is an old dish or a new one, but it stood in stark contrast to its two predecessors.
Straightforward: she shouldn't have a place on Yulia's emerging menu.
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Cool here, without much effort (Photo: Yonatan Ben Haim)
Yulia has real mains, as opposed to side dishes.
We ordered
fish and seafood couscous
(NIS 122) and
grilled whole lobster in marinara sauce
(NIS 132).
At the base of the sea couscous dish was a sea eel fillet in a shrimp head sauce with crystal shrimp and mussels.
The fish was very high quality, the stock excellent and the shrimp juicy.
The couscous itself, which came in a separate bowl, was moist and less good.
I doubt if it was necessary.
The fish dish with the sauce and seafood on the side held its own well.
The halibut portion was compressed into an oval plate that turned out to be too small, which created a compression effect in the plate.
The fish is impeccably grilled whole.
The sauce was based on a stock of fish heads and shrimp with tomatoes and in it there were also potatoes and pieces of fennel.
It wasn't bad at all but without a doubt its flavors can be refined, intensified a little and also add a little spiciness.
A fundamentally good dish that needs further refinement and focus.
We ate, of course, b
Basque cheese cake
(NIS 52).
Everyone is serving this cheesecake today, with a measure of almost liquid softness in the center.
Azgouri was the first to bake it at Cafe Nordoi, and he is given the right of firsts over it;
Just like Yonatan Borovitch has the right of first refusal on the crack pie.
There is no doubt that Azgouri's Basque is also the best of them all.
The original Basque, yes, here too (photo: screenshot, Julia's Instagram)
There was no mistaking the abilities demonstrated at this meal.
The pickled palmade and the locus head cigar were outstanding.
The fish and seafood couscous did it and the Basque was Azgouri Basque.
There was also the unnecessary shrimp cocktail and the whole halibut, good in itself but in need of a lesson in focus.
So Azgouri arrived.
Everyone knows what he knows how to do and how excellent it is when he's at his best.
It is important to say that the dishes described in this list are a very selective sample from the Yulia menu, and that there are many dishes on the menu that clearly originate from the period before Azgori's arrival.
Yulia, as of now, is therefore a restaurant in the midst of a transformation process.
It is clear that it will not be able to become what it was at the time Bar a Vin - a bastion of almost puritanical Francophilia, or Cafe Nordoi, which preserved a distinct European classic.
Something of the DNA of the Israeli beach brasseries will have to be preserved in it.
On the other hand, one of the better professionals who work here is in the kitchen now and as of right now the volume of his presence on the menu is relatively modest.
This will have to be an evolution, as opposed to a revolution, but it is good and true that the change will go on and gain volume.
Iulia can be a place where some people come to eat trivial but well-made basic seafood pasta, and some come to branch out a little Azagori.
In the conservative and fixed spirit of this place, you can definitely breathe some life into it.
The result will be a hybrid that will serve everyone.
The pricing reflects a very good value for money factor.
The raw materials from the sea, which rely on the owner's partnership in a fishing vessel, are very good to excellent.
You could clearly feel it during the meal.
The foodie who comes to Julia should check which of the menu dishes are new and which are old and probably prefer the first ones.
I would love to visit here in a few months and find a transfer of additional weights on the menu alongside the new dishes.
We will keep our fingers crossed for the success of the match.
Yulia, Yordi Al-Shi'at 1, Tel Aviv Port, 03-5469777
invoice:
Spelled bread - 22
pickles - 18
Pickled palameda - 42 Locust
head cigar - 52
Cocktail shrimp - 64
Whole lebarek - 132
Fish and seafood couscous - 122
Basque cake - 52
Total: 504
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