Tishbi Winery: Revisiting the creative and excellent food near Binyamina - review

It’s always a pleasure to visit Tishbi, the winery near Binyamina established well over a hundred years ago now and still run by the same family – or rather their descendants.

It was a breezy June day when we arrived for lunch and chose our places next to the garden wall decorated with a frieze of – what else? – grapes and vines.

A fan next to our table made sitting outside very bearable, while many guests sat in the central area shaded from the heat by the tendrils of an old vine covering the wooden structure.

What's on the menu at the Tishbi Winery?

We left the choice of food to our hosts and several starters arrived very quickly. There was the classic Israeli dish of sliced watermelon with feta cheese, very aesthetically presented with garnishes of cherry tomatoes and greenery (NIS 62). A second starter was coleslaw (served in a cabbage leaf) with a chopstick, and this was pleasantly sweet and not too oily (NIS 56). 

And yet another starter arrived, very thinly sliced paté, made from salmon and beetroot, which accounted for the gorgeous purple shade of this dish, with added dots of feta cheese. Maybe we were extra hungry after the long drive, but everything tasted like ambrosia and the crispy fresh whole meal bread added to the pleasure.

Of course, as this was a winery, we broke our no-booze-before-6 p.m. rule to taste a brand new product of the company – a semi-dry rose, dubbed Cabernet Muscat, served ice cold. The mixed fruity overtones were perfect for a summer day lunch. (NIS 80 a bottle).

The next dish to arrive was Aubergine Parmigiano, nicely hot fried eggplant topped with a piquant tomato sauce and melted cheese. For me, this was a real delicacy as melted cheese is probably my favorite food (NIS 62).

While we waited for the main course, we had the pleasure of a visit from head chef Gunther Biederman, who arrived from Austria years ago to oversee the kitchen and now speaks perfect Hebrew to add to his other qualities as a top of the line creative chef.

We told him we could only manage a main course if we shared one and he obliged with a dish of fresh salmon, smoked in situ in the restaurant’s smoker. It came on a bed of buttered, diced carrots, peas, and an unidentified herb, with small potato croquettes on the side and a good Hollandaise sauce (NIS 135). We both loved the distinctive smoky flavor of the fish.

There was no way we could escape dessert, so we picked a cheese cake which we shared over excellent cappuccinos (NIS 35).

We left to drive home, certain in the knowledge that Tishbi Winery is still a great place to dine, thanks to its very creative approach, good service, beautiful surroundings, and excellent food.

• Tishbi Winery Restaurant
• Road 652, between Zichron Ya’akov and Binyamina
• (04) 638-0434
• Open: Sun.-Thurs.: 8.30 a.m. – 3.30 p.m. Friday: 8 – 3
• Kashrut: local rabbinate
• Wheelchair accessible

The writer was a guest of the restaurant.