[Jerusalem] — Shabi Shreffler arrives at Azura restaurant every morning at 3:30 a.m. The famed Jerusalem landmark Machane Yehuda market is quiet then, as Sheffler starts the day’s dishes. The food is cooked slowly in pots with kerosene lighters under them, called “ptiliyot” in Hebrew. By 6, Shreffler has been to the nearby Machane Yehuda vegetable market, and comes back to open the restaurant. By 8, the customers start coming and the steady stream, which becomes more like a tidal wave during lunchtime, continues until closing time at 6 pm.
“The idea is that the food cooks very slowly and the flavors meld together,” the affable Shreffler told The Media Line. “We do not try to innovate, or serve modern food. We serve traditional food, like it’s been served for decades.”
Shreffler’s father Ezra, came to Israel from Dyarkabir in Turkey, near the Kurdish and Syrian borders, in 1947. Azura, a diminutive of Ezra, opened in 1952, although even before that Ezra had a cart in the market selling humus and rice and beans. He opened the restaurant in 1952 and things haven’t changed much since then.
Like his father, Shreffler never went to cooking school. Ezra, who started as a dishwasher, learned to cook while watching other chefs. Shreffler says all nine of Ezra’s children are somehow involved in the business, whether as chefs, servers, or on the business side. The restaurant has about 40 employees.
The menu offers five kinds of kubbeh, semolina dumplings filled with meat, in different soups, some sweet and some sour. There is also the signature dish Azura, an eggplant stuffed with ground beef, pine nuts and hints of cinnamon. There are several vegetarian dishes, including grape leaves stuffed with rice, and lentil soup, as well as rice and beans.
In Israel, the main meal is at lunchtime, and the restaurant gets very crowded by noon. On Fridays, the first day of the Israeli weekend, wait times extend to an hour. While you’re waiting, you can check out the old men playing backgammon, as well as the produce stalls offering a wide selection of fruits and vegetables.
Azura attracts a local clientele as well as tourists and Israelis from outside Jerusalem. They have just opened a new branch in Tel Aviv. On a recent afternoon, Simon Tal had come from Kochav Yair, near Tel Aviv with a few friends. They were on their way to a jeep tour in the desert and said the detour to eat at Azura was worth it.
“The food is fantastic – it tastes like my mother’s cooking,” Tal told The Media Line. “The slow cooking on a low flame gets fantastic results. It’s really something special.”
At another table Dina Shefet, an 8th generation Jerusalemite, says that she comes frequently to the restaurant.
“It reminds me of the flavors of my childhood,” she told The Media Line. “I feel like I am going back to my grandmother’s house. It is food with a lot of tradition, a lot of flavors, and a lot of spices, and it makes me feel good.”
Azura has also attracted celebrity interest. Chicago mayor Rahm Emmanuel held his son’s bar mitzvah reception there, and President Obama considered visiting in 2013. Ultimately his secret service decided that the restaurant, which is part of an open plaza, could not be secured.
Shreffler is not fazed by the celebrity interest.
“For me, Obama and John from Kansas are the same,” he said. “I serve good food to everyone, and it makes me happy when they enjoy it.”