Bye, Bye Cafe Rimon

For as long as I remember Jerusalem, going on forty-nine 49 years, there has always been a restaurant, or two, called "Rimon" just off of Zion Square on Lunz Street. And I've had some wonderful meals there. So when a friend and I were looking for a place to meet for lunch yesterday, The Rimon was an easy and popular decision.

I had been looking forward to ordering their "Business Lunch," and my friend expected to have their breakfast she loved, even though we were meeting after 1:30. We had ordered these things many times at that hour.

When I didn't see the business lunch on the menu, I just figured that the waiter had forgotten to give the extra sheet to us. And my friend was concerned that nothing was on the menu about breakfast being "served all day."

The waiter was friendly and charming, but that didn't help, since he had bad news for us. Both the attractive business lunch menu and breakfast all day are history in the Rimon. We had a very tough time finding something to order in the newly revamped menu. My friend ordered the "Crispy Salmon," and she told the waiter that they should leave out the spicy mayonnaise. One bite and she was in pain from the spices. They forgot, but at least the waiter offered to replace it and give her one without spicy mayonnaise. She liked the salmon and gave me a small piece. I found it awfully oily.

I wasn't happy with any of the salad options, and I didn't want to spend more for a fish meal. Many of the so-called salads were really sandwiches, or based on bread. And there were too many ingredients, which usually means too much oil and salt. Finally I chose the Asian Salad, even though it's based on pasta. At least it had some nice cooked vegetables. If you're wondering what that white stuff is on the right, you should be. I think they called it "rice sheets," or something like that. It looks a bit like thin Styrofoam, and it has less flavor than paper. Yes, it was that awful.

We were enjoying talking, but I needed to leave, and they hadn't given us our bill yet. I suggested we just walk out. They probably wouldn't have noticed. But instead we finally got the waiter's attention and asked for it. Then it took ages until they gave me my change.

Before leaving I went up to the WC, public toilet, and they were in awful shape. Luckily I noticed that there wasn't any toilet paper before closing the door, so I took paper towels. A woman came up right after me, and she complained too. Then we began discussing the new menu. We agreed that everything in the Rimon had gone downhill except the prices.

I won't be back.

Bye, Bye Cafe Rimon