Amid Israel-Hamas war, Jerusalem food truck becomes a therapeutic oasis

There were plenty of kosher-keeping Jews at Boston University when Zissie Erlanger was an undergraduate there 20 years ago. But she was the only kosher-keeping Jew in her class at the university’s culinary school.

“I couldn’t taste anything in class, so I would go home and recreate what I learned,” says Erlanger, a professional chef and proprietor of Brunch, The Boutique Food Truck by Chef Zissie, in Jerusalem’s Ramot Bet neighborhood.

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“The school focused on French cuisine, and there were so many other flavors I wanted to taste. I would pick a country and study the cuisine, make a whole dinner, and invite people who came from that country to make sure I really understood it. Now my style is a fusion of inspiration from many different countries’ cuisines.”

Erlanger grew up in Boston “in a home where our motto was ‘Israel is our home, America is the place we live.’ We came to Israel every summer from the time I was four. The first time we were here, I remember sitting on the suitcases thinking that if I sat on them, my parents couldn’t take us back to America. Even at four, I felt I belonged here. So it wasn’t a question of if, just how and when, I would one day live here.”

The opportune time didn’t present itself until she’d finished her schooling and worked as a private chef in New York and New Jersey. When she arrived in Jerusalem in 2014, she knew she wanted to remain in the food industry. 

“Within a few weeks, I was fully booked as a private chef. I was so shocked and beyond grateful. God gave me this talent as a flavor artist. Once you cook for one person and they’re happy, they spread the word.”

For nine years, she ran her own business as a private chef, health coach, food photographer, and recipe developer, cooking for events such as parties, corona weddings, and cooking demonstrations.

Because flavor and ambiance are, she says, “a package deal,” she longed to provide and create both elements in one location.

“Often I’d cook beautiful and colorful meals for holidays and then have to package the food in disposable tins – which took away so much for me,” she says.

With seven children, she had never wanted to open a restaurant that would keep her away from home for long hours. “It’s really important for me to be home and available when my kids are home, so I tried to think of some way that people could come to me but I’d still be home with my family. That is how the food truck café was born,” she explains.

She asked her husband, Nafti, who is from Switzerland and runs a construction and prefab house company, to build her food truck in the form of a little Swiss chalet, tucked away in an outdoor garden shaded by fruit trees. The seating area contains eight tables, with space for up to 20 diners. 

Her Brunch truck opened at the end of August and soon was attracting patrons from near and far, not just from the Jerusalem area. 

Becoming a therapeutic oasis after the October 7 massacre

When the war started on October 7, she shuttered her food truck and wasn’t sure when it would be appropriate to reopen. But within a few weeks, she was overwhelmed with messages and phone calls from people saying they needed it to reopen.

“Brunch became a spot where army wives come when their husbands have a few hours off, where people come and have an escape for a moment, eating fresh food, listening to good music, feeling like the whole world is on pause, to get that moment of rejuvenation,” she says.

Much more than an upscale food truck, she has come to see Brunch as a therapeutic oasis. “Everyone living in Israel now needs a moment to decompress in order to keep going forward,” she says.

OPEN FROM 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., Monday through Friday, Brunch offers a menu based on what is fresh and seasonal: salads and sandwiches, specialty iced and hot beverages, and desserts. The food is served on china dishes with real cutlery.

“These little details can make such a difference to people,” she observes.

One of the aspects of Israeli life that is at once challenging and thrilling to her is that produce vendors “won’t provide anything that’s not in season. You can’t get strawberries in the summer, and that’s good because when you get them at the right time, they taste amazing – you could fall off your chair from how beautifully sweet they are. In Israel, I don’t worry that something won’t taste as it should.”

Her food philosophy, she says, is that “flavor and health are the two secrets behind good food. Everything that goes into my food happens to be healthy and nourishing because fresh ingredients are what taste best – God’s ingredients are the most colorful and most flavorful.”

Chef Zissie is a one-woman show, aside from cleaning help. “I want to be the face of it, to oversee the production so that people get the experience they deserve.”

She admits that starting and running a small business in Israel can be a complex and expensive endeavor. Nevertheless, “I didn’t listen to people who said not to be your own boss in Israel. I feel that people with specific talents and business knowledge have the potential to have professional and profitable success in Israel.” 

She never took formal business courses. “I studied hospitality and restaurant management at Boston University, and a lot of business savvy is intuitive to me,” she says.

“I’ve had such success in this country, and I feel it was purely God. He gave me this talent, and I ran with it and believed in myself. I’ve always felt that because Israel is such a small country, you have the stage to make a difference.” ■

Zissie Erlanger, 38 From New York to Jerusalem, 2014

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