French toast, fish fingers and the kind of shwarma you might pick up as a late night takeaway hardly sound the staple fare of five star hotels. Yet these are the very dishes Israel's smartest hostelries are currently dishing up. Fully-booked dining areas suggest guests are loving what used to be considered guilty pleasures.
Call it a move to comfort food, or perhaps a backlash against the exciting but pretty out-there food being served by celebrity chefs in the headline-grabbing restaurants of Jerusalem and Tel Aviv.
Jerusalem is a particular case in point. The success of offal- and truffle-filled Machneyuda has not only made the city a dining destination but propagated innovative Israeli food around the world. Yet the city's King David Hotel continues to serve the traditional chopped liver and chicken soup for Friday night dinner. On top of that, the chef's idea of the perfect complement to an Israeli sauvignon blanc in the hotel's new wine bar is - fish fingers.
Admittedly these are not any old crumbed or battered goujon, but instead the most fabulous fish fingers you've ever tasted. Super-fresh cod in a tempura batter, they are inspired by chef David "Dudu" Bitton's love of Japanese cuisine. "I felt they were a must to accompany our selection of Mediterranean white wines," says Bitton, who was running a fine dining restaurant at the age of 21 but feels that after three years at the King David Hotel, he has come to understand the different tastes of hotel diners.
"While I'm free to play with ingredients, cooking techniques and the way I present dishes, it's hard to do this on a Friday night," he admits. "Most of our guests are not expecting innovation. They come to keep traditions and feel at home, even more so on Shabbat than the rest of the week."
Across the Green Line at the historic East Jerusalem Hotel, favoured by diplomats and well-heeled travellers, it's Middle Eastern home cooking which is drawing the crowds. Star of the Saturday night buffet at the American Colony is chicken shwarma - a refined version of a doner kebab.
David Dide, who presides over the kitchen of this five-star hostelry, is unashamed about taking the inspiration for his star dish from street food. "What's eaten on the streets reflects the culinary heritage of a nation," he says, "and shwarma can be a real delicacy. I believe the secret of its appeal is the release of all the aromas of cooked meat and spices as the vertical spit spins around. We make it with veal or lamb as well as chicken."
Uri Steinberg,head chef of Tel Aviv's Hotel Montefiore, which takes a multi-national approach to the home cooking ethos, also draws inspiration from tradition. "Israelis hold sacred dishes which remind them of their grandmother's cooking," he says.
Another chef attracting massive attention with dishes classic and imaginatively prepared is Barak Aharoni of The Norman Hotel in Tel Aviv. He has won awards for his French toast and has made a signature of a dish beloved by Israelis but usually only served at home - goose leg confit.
"Honest food, beautifully cooked, is what I'm after," says the chef who went through his own 'out-there' phase at a raft of high-profile Tel Aviv restaurants before being recruited by The Norman Hotel to get bums on seats. No easy task for a hotel brasserie competing with a town of bells and whistles restaurants.
Aharoni felt the only way to go was back to the familiar. "You won't get fireworks on the plate in my restaurant but you will get tastes you'll remember and hopefully want to come back for."
His original brief was to create the French food Israeli hoteliers used to consider de rigeur for their fine dining restaurants, but although he can do all the classics - making a perfect confit being a case in point - he eventually dug his heels in.
"I decided I didn't want to do entirely European food. My dishes have to connect with the place where I'm from. So I embrace dishes Israelis love to eat, like goose, which you can find in portions all year round in our butcher's shops. It's not just a once a year seasonal treat like it is in England."
But cooking Israeli doesn't mean cliches, he says: "There's no tahini in my kitchen, and never will be.
"Just give me good olive oil, fresh Israeli asparagus we can grow for twice as long as in Europe, some chillies and the
kind of hearty melting pot food I grew up with - including Lebanese-style kreplach - and I'm a happy man."
