We have visited Doha Burger in the past and always enjoyed the food and the atmosphere. It is situated in the Carmel market – which is now over 100 years old, having been established in 1920. To reach Doha you traverse the narrow cobble-stoned streets of the shuk, past the fish and meat stalls.
The restaurant is a cheerful open space and when we visited for lunch recently we were greeted by Maor, the manager, who could not have been more helpful.
The brain behind the restaurant and the person in charge of overall planning is famed chef Shaked Pahima, known for his culinary creativity. As the name suggests, it’s a burger joint but with quite a variety of different burgers to choose from. The meat comes from a nearby butcher and is freshly ground every day.
Eating burgers at Doha
There are six starters, including salads, cigars, and our choice, chicken wings (NIS 44) which we shared. They arrived after the main course but that did not detract from their excellence: sweet and sticky as wings should be, deep fried, and served with sweet and sour sauce and grated tomatoes, the kind you get with melaweh.
Doha offers endless variations of the burger and I chose the one that included merguez in its ingredients. This is a very spicy sausage and was agreeably hot in every sense. (NIS 48/63.) Other burger choices are The Classic (NIS 48), The Premium Lamb (NIS 52), and Entrecote (NIS 62).
My companion naturally chose the one purporting to contain lamb. Last time we ate here the distinctive lamb flavor had been entirely absent; this time there might have been a smidgeon. He enjoyed it anyway.
The French fries were dubbed “with chef’s seasoning” and were very good and hot with a dusting of salt and pepper: Nothing needed to be added.
There were three very good dips with the burgers – chili, aioli, and my favorite, truffle mayonnaise.
We inquired if there was dessert. Maor responded by saying there wasn’t any, but would we like another burger? We declined, and said our farewells, having enjoyed an excellent lunch in pleasant surroundings.
The whole episode underlined how resilient we are as a people – in spite of the war, Israelis seem to be making a point of carrying on life as usual.
- Doha Burger
- Rehov Tarmav, Carmel Market
- Tel Aviv
- Tel: 052 686-8399.
- Open: Sun.-Thu., 12 p.m.-12 a.m.
- Kashrut: Tel-Aviv Rabbinate
The writer was a guest of the restaurant.