Miznon Beverly Grove. Exciting Israeli Cuisine Tailored For Gourmets In West Hollywood.

Anthea Gerrie Enjoys Exciting Dishes Created Especially For LA By Israeli Celeb Chef Eyal Shani At Miznon Beverly Grove.

It’s an unexpected nicety for a casual restaurant devoid of tablecloths, but at Miznon’s West Hollywood outpost every unadorned table gets a centrepiece. Not a cauliflower, as you might expect from Eyal Shani, the Israeli superstar chef who sold the world on the now-ubiquitous roast brassica in Tel Aviv before founding an international chain around it, but in LA, at least, a big beautiful tomato.

“People do pick them up to eat – we rush over and wash them before bringing them back,” says Ben Abrahams, the manager whose warm welcome has already made this new addition to WeHo’s 3rd Street dining strip (a street scene not to be confused with the nearby Grove shopping and dining complex) a local favourite. Miznon worldwide offers Middle Eastern favourites including the best hummus in town, but in LA adds some real treats for carnivores as well as the plant-based delights which have made Miznon so popular with vegans worldwide.

I had to come back within a week to this lively restaurant whose colourful blackboard mural provides all the decoration you could ever want to taste the brisket, sumptuously billed as a “bag of golden meat, $24) because I just didn’t get to it first time around. I had been stopped in my tracks by the description of “broken chicken” ($18.50): “Imagine a chicken, straight from the rotisserie, torn into chunks along with its skin,” said Ben, who had me at “along with its skin”.

Instead of the seared and slow-cooked brisket or the delicious roast chicken in a pitta I ended up with, I could have had a chicken schnitzel plate garnished with tahini and coleslaw ($26) or my son’s favourite, the Amburger ($21), in which a kosher beef burger meets a fried egg, grilled tomato, pickles and aioli, one of the many “in a pitta” options available.

These are mains, among which there is plenty of choice for vegetarians, at whom the starters are firmly aimed. A mezze plate features the Mediterranean aubergine dip baba ghanoush and an excellent hard-boiled egg along with many kinds of crudite ($17), and almost everyone seems to order a whole baby cauliflower, charred till golden, on the side ($11). There are also, slightly puzzlingly to this Brit, charred green beans served in a brown paper bag with a lemony vinaigrette on the side ($7).

Of course there are falafels, mushrooms and dishes of succulently caramelised sweet potato as well as regular mashed spud – and whatever you choose, a profusion of paper rather than plates to eat the sizzlingly hot food off. The hummus plate – billed as “the best you will ever eat” ($19) lives up to the brag but really needs more than one fluffy pitta served with it to scoop it all up.

Given that the restaurant closes at 9pm, it seems curious that it has created cocktails (all $14) specifically for its Angeleno diners. Perhaps that’s the influence of one partner, Giancarlo Pagani, who has made a party house out of his Hollywood Italian complete with speakeasy bar, Mother Wolf. Coming to the LA partnership with closer ties to Israel is Steve Anavim, for whom a local Miznon has been a dream since encountering the original in Tel Aviv.

The school-friends first opened a branch in Grand Central Market, now a fabulous food hall in downtown LA, and within a year had committed to bricks and mortar in West Hollywood, home to the city’s liveliest dining scene.

You can have a beer from one of several countries including Israel ($8) as an alternative to cocktails or a $10 mocktail and would be welcome to linger with a drink and incredibly good value plate of falafel balls – five for $8.

Come early to avoid parking hassle; while there are meters on the street, there’s no parking in the residential side roads behind after 6pm, so the only alternative after then if meters are full is the $10 parking lot across the road. But worth it to experience the subtly changing vibe as dusk falls and the night people come out to sip a Miznon margarita or Smoke and Ginger (think mezcal and ginger beer) at outdoor tables while listening to the good sounds coming from within.

With a cauliflower on the side, of course.

Food images (C) Shelby Moore.