Emily Grill Bar is a Rishon Letzion must for any meat lover

This is an Israeli story. How many times have you heard it? Hang on, because this story ends with a place where you are going to want to eat.

In the 1970s, the Mizrachi family opened a shipudiya (restaurant that features meat skewers) in the Kerem Hatemanim section of Tel Aviv. The father had been a butcher before he opened the restaurant, so this was the natural next step. Son Dror learned about meat from his father, and learned the restaurant business from experience. But the hospitality business was in his blood. 

Fast forward 40 years, and the family patriarch has stepped aside, allowing Dror to take over the Tel Aviv restaurant. While it continued to attract customers for its renown shipudim and other excellent cuts of meat, ambitious Dror had his eyes on something bigger. And this is where Emily Grill Bar in Rishon Lezion comes in.

Emily is a classic Israeli Middle Eastern grill restaurant upgraded to 21st-century Israel. This is a large restaurant with a spacious indoor and outdoor dining area, with plenty of room for private groups and parties. We visited the establishment for lunch, which is a quiet time at Emily’s. The restaurant starts hopping in the evening. 

We started our meal with an array of salads, so characteristic of a classic shipudiya. And then came the large round fresh hot Iraqi laffa bread, which just cannot be beat. There is a full menu of meats but my carnivore companion cannot pass up shipudim (meat skewers). He chose one lamb skewer and a second butcher’s cut beef skewer. Both were flavorful and tender. 

He couldn’t help comparing the meat skewers to other shipudiyot that we have visited in our eLuna travels. Both meats were excellent, some of the best he has eaten. In his ranking, Emily took top place. 

“Have you had our hummus? We make it here from scratch, along with all the salads, but the humus is a highlight of the menu and one of the specialties. A dessert is also a must,” we were told. A professional baker prepares outstanding parve desserts just for this restaurant. Out came a plate with two crunchy flat cookies, crumb topping, and a scoop of ice cream. They were correct, dessert is a must.

The best part of Emily Grill Bar

The best part of the Emily Grill Bar is the part you will never see. Dror took me on a tour of the kitchen, which I am pleased to report is wonderfully organized and immaculately clean. He showed me the huge walk-in refrigerator where the meat is stored till it is prepared. Meat that is removed from refrigeration is never returned. That way they can guarantee the flavor, quality, and sanitation. The kitchen is air-conditioned to freezing. The grill man doesn’t even break a sweat. 

This kitchen meets the highest standard of cleanliness. Every section is labeled. The vegetable section is separate from the meat section. The salads are prepared fresh twice daily, and sometimes three times. At the end of each day, Dror tells me, the kitchen gets a deep clean.

Laffa expert Moshe showed me how Iraqi laffa is made. Balls of dough are flattened and placed against the wall of the taboun oven while an open flame licks the bread from below. The laffa is scorched for 40 seconds, and then peeled off the wall, brown and bubbly and ready to serve. 

Are the chips parve? Indeed so, as they are cooked separately from the meat. They are thin, crispy, and as the menu says, imported from Amsterdam.

Dror, together with his son, give back for the many blessings that have been bestowed on them. Every week they host special needs children and their counselors from the Lehosheet Yad organization at the restaurant. 

I have known many restaurant owners in my career as a restaurant writer. Some restaurant owners behave like accountants, checking every penny. Others are in the hospitality business, making sure that they provide the best food service to please their customers even if it costs them another dime. Dror is most definitely in the second category.

Though we offered to pay for our meals, Dror generously insisted on hosting us. The salads for two, two meat skewers, chips, and one dessert came to NIS 230.

Getting there: Yaniv Linker Street is an alley way off the main street of Derech Hamaccabim. There is some street parking on Linker and plenty of parking on the surrounding streets. 

Emily Grill Bar

12 Yaniv Linker St., Rishon Lezion

Tel: 03-6763344 

Kashrut: Rabbanut Rishon Lezion 

Open: Sunday-Thursday 12 p.m.-11 p.m. After Shabbat until midnight. Closed Friday and Shabbat.

The writer was a guest of the restaurant.