As Israel began opening up after months of COVID corona closures I had dinner out with a special person in שפשוואן - Chefchaouen. It's a relatively new restaurant that although opened during the difficult COVID corona restrictions has managed to survive.
Many of the health restrictions here in Israel seriously affected restaurants, because although the cooks and serving staff can easily mask themselves to keep customers and themselves safe, there's no way that customers can do the same. Therefore only Takeaway was permitted, and quite a few restaurants just stayed closed. That's how my eating partner and I ended up experimenting, trying a new and different restaurant.
I knew nothing about שפשוואן - Chefchaouen when I called it up to make our reservations, and to be honest, I still can't pronounce its name.
The person who answered the phone was charming with a French accent. I'm sure he was amused that we made reservations, because when we arrived we were the only customers. שפשוואן - Chefchaouen began filling as we ate. It's on Hillel Street #19 where the sidewalk is very wide, and they have an outdoor eating area in a flexible structure. There were just enough walls to keep us warm and comfortable and few enough to make sure we felt safe from unwanted viruses. In today's world, clean, safe fresh air is a priority.
שפשוואן - Chefchaouen is a kosher meat restaurant that serves North-African French style food. As it was a cold night, plus we were in a celebratory mood we ordered our favorite drinks, whiskey and beer. When I questioned the beer list on the menu, which was nothing special, I discovered that they had many more including my favorite,
Shapiro's IPA.
Maybe it was the chill in the air, because I went against my general practice and ordered a carbohydrate based main course, the couscous. Of course it also comes with vegetables, chicken breast and chickpeas. They were very generous with the chicken, so I was able to fill up easily without having to eat all of the couscous. It was totally delicious.
The
menu they have online is slightly different from what we ordered from, but it doesn't really matter. Everything they served us was first class, 100% scrumptious. We've added שפשוואן - Chefchaouen to our list of favorite restaurants and look forward to eating there again.
To contact them for reservations, questions and takeout call 074-769-1307.
