In central Tel Aviv, not far from one of my favorite areas here, Rothschild Boulevard, there’s a elegant boutique hotel – The Norman Tel Aviv – oozing with luxury and European style, that won the title as the best boutique hotel in the world last year from the known American travelling magazine, Jetsetter.

This hotel found its way to my bucket list even before I set foot in it outside the virtual world, but since it’s a very exclusive hotel {also in terms of pricing, of course} staying there is reserved only for special occasions.

Since my birthday already passed {not that I’m complaining, god forbid, since I celebrated it at one of the most beautiful boutique hotels in the country}, and our honeymoon in Thailand is closer than ever {a little over a month!! #Staytuned}, it was obvious that the only way to enjoy a bit of the famous “The Norman” hotel’s atmosphere was to enjoy a good meal at one of the hotel’s restaurants.

The hotel has 2 restaurants – The Norman restaurant which is the hotel’s main restaurant {defined as “the prestigious restaurant bringing together Nice and Tel Aviv”} and the restaurant Dinings, an Israeli branch of a Japanese tapas restaurant from London.

We decided to go to The Norman restaurant, mainly since we wanted to enjoy a midweek business-lunch and as of now, Dinings is only open during the evening and on weekends.

As usual, I examined their business-lunch menu carefully online, and it seemed like a small menu, without anything innovative or interesting.

Honestly, it’s not the first time we considered trying the restaurant’s business-lunch menu and then changed our minds and went to a restaurant which seemed a bit more interesting or diverse.

This is exactly what happened to us a week before, when we decided after debating for awhile between two restaurants to try Mashya's business-lunch, which looked much more interesting and special online {and even got a lot of praises from a lot of food critics} – but it really didn’t meet our expectations {the opposite…}.

So we decided to give it a chance, especially since the last time we really enjoyed a restaurant, it was the kind with a classic menu, without complicating anything too much {in case you missed it – the review is here}.

We hoped that “The Norman” would be the same type – not too artistic or innovative, but manages to compensate for it with classic and precise dishes.

“The Norman” hotel is actually a classic European bubble in the Tel Aviv bubble, and that’s what the hotel’s restaurant is like, too.

A space that’s not too big, the kind that gives you an intimate feeling with the classic European colors, tables set with white starched and ironed tablecloths and napkins, with heavy silverware – the kind you can only find in Grandma's closet.

Nothing grandiose, just classic elegance at its best.

The second we sat down, for some reason the waitress gave us two regular menus instead of the business-lunch menus. When we asked the waitress about it, turned out that they still serve the business-lunch but the menu changed so she told us about the dishes offered.

It seemed a bit odd to me, especially when I found out that the menu changed a couple months before.

If there’s something I really don’t like doing, it’s choosing a dish this way. I like reading the menu, understanding the ingredients of each dish and of course seeing the price written down, instead of having a long conversation full of dilemmas with the waitress.

Oh well.

Turns out that the business-lunch menu on the restaurant’s website is completely different than what they serve these days. Right now, the business-lunch doesn’t include an appetizer and a main dish at a fixed price, but instead they offer main dishes {a wider variety than those written in the business-lunch menu, and most are more expensive} which are prices individually and appetizers in the “table with the chef” style – meaning, a variety of the chef’s salad which change on a daily basis.

We ordered the two dishes that stuck in our heads after the waitress’s quick explanation – Daniel ordered “The Norman” burger {72 NIS} and I ordered the Beef Ragu {78 NIS} along with a glass of chilled Italian red wine {32 NIS}, which was great.

After a short wait, the whole table filled up with a mosaic of white plates full with goodies – Calamari on tartar sauce, a small Caesar salad, olives, masbacha, Labane with eggplant, pumpkin cream, lentil salad and my two favorites – white beans cream and small meat dumplings which were a bit spicy and I would’ve loved to order it as a main dish if it was possible.

All of the salads were fresh and precise {besides the masbacha which was a bit tasteless} and along with them, they served in a big silver dish {of course…} 4 big slices of an amazing focaccia – yes please!

2 things I really liked about the chef’s table at “The Norman”:

1. They serve bread {and not just any bread – a real focaccia} without an additional charge, as opposed to most other restaurants in Israel {usually priced between 10-25 NIS}.
2. The second we emptied one plate, the waitress walked over and asked if we wanted a refill.

The main dishes came out in perfect timing, just when we finished devouring the last piece of the focaccia.

The burger was served on a super soft brioche bun, which you can tell was baked there, and the meat itself was made perfectly – medium, soft and juicy, just like Daniel ordered.

Along with that he got a nice side dish of fries fried twice – crispy on the outside and soft on the inside.

I think it really was one of the better burgers I ever had – it was all so soft and full of butter…

My Ragu dish was especially good – the pappardelle was made perfectly and the beef ragu was reduced well with rich flavors, along with a small hill of parmesan cheese which just added to the pleasure. The only thing that kept me from eating the whole dish { I asked for a “doggy bag”, of course} was the dessert that we knew we couldn’t skip right from the first courses.

We ordered our latest favorite dessert, Cheesecake {44 NIS}, and we got a nice slice of very rich cheesecake {and heavy as well!}, with vanilla dots and a crisp and buttery base, placed on a line of wild berries. Alongside they served us 3 ice cream scoops {OTH} – vanilla, mache and a refreshing lemon sorbet, which were all excellent – but with the amount of butter and carbs in this meal, we really couldn’t finish the ice cream 😉

“The Norman” is one of the better restaurants I’ve been to lately – the dreamy atmosphere, the excellent and professional service {I don’t know many places where the waiter fill up your glass the second it’s empty and cleans up the table between courses – and that’s too bad}, the excellent food and the value for money {VFM}, at least with the dishes we chose, was very worth it.

We’ll definitely go back there 😉

Bottom line – next time you visit Israel make sure to book a table at “The Norman” !