located at Ben Yehuda 202, in the north of Tel Aviv, not far from the tel aviv port, and nearby the somewhat famous "Ashkara" hummus.

since Ashkara is a kosher place and closed on saturday, we've decided to give it a try.

we were a bit suspicious of the clean design (a sketch of a misterious figure), because hummus mustn't be manipulated into a semi sophisticated product. also the name "Zahlawi" comes from the lebanese city "Zahle", well known here for it's excellent Arak. is this really a Zahlawi style hummus? or is it an attempt to give a new place better respectability?

however, owr concerns quickly disappeared as the food arrived.

I'll leave the more analytic report to hummus101, and just say that the pickles were excellent, the salads were fresh and well orchestrated, and the "Zahlawi dish" (which wasn't a Mashawsha but who can tell the exact differences?) was good. we also probed their trinity-dish - the hummus, the full and the holy tahin, which was satisfactory. while I won't go into deep analysis, I also can't poisition it all in a multi dimensional taste-space relative to other places, so I'll just let some images speak, and conclude by saying I enjoyed it and if in the vicinity will come back again.

* non disclosure: while doing the reasearch for this post, I've discovered that a few years ago I lived over a restaurant run by the two owners of "hummus Zahlawi" (called "Allora"). I remember them as very nice neighbours, and wish them all the best!

and on another topic, you may know I'm an eggplantophile, and as such I would like to present to you these eggplant-erotic photos. just eggplant, tahin, pommegrenate and corriander: