Miriam Upper West Side

Miriam Restaurant – the flagship restaurant that launched Chef Rafael Hasid’s NY venture – has been one of Park Slope’s most cherished and celebrated restaurants for almost two decades (est 2005)

At Miriam Restaurant the cuisine is uniquely, distinctly Israeli. Our menu is seasonal, and many of our ingredients come straight from Israel. Yet what exactly is Israeli cuisine? Truthfully, to enter the subject is not unlike entering a sea by foot and feeling a sudden deepening. Unlike French, Chinese, Italian food, etc., one does not unfold the menu at Miriam with a set of associations firmly in the mind. In truth, there exists no single dish, no single style of preparation that one might call uniquely Israeli. And yet this lack of identity is its identity, its beauty. 

A by-product of the cross-pollination that accompanied the gathering together of Jewish people from around the globe, one might say that, in itself, Israeli cuisine is as close to a true world cuisine as exists. When citizens arrived after World War II, each group brought a tradition of culture and cuisine as set in its ways and one of a kind as a river. And yet suddenly something different was happening around these peoples. They were breathing different air. There was a new climate and a new terrain. Things like figs, thyme, marjoram, and pomegranates were growing in their outlying fields.