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“When people ask me my dream, I say I want to overhear a discussion on where to have dinner tonight and hearing — among their choices of Chinese, Indian, or Italian — Palestinian.’ It’s making Palestinian food what it is, which is a beautiful cuisine, like any other.”
Such was chef Fadi Kattan’s motivation for opening Louf, a new restaurant near Casa Loma which combines Palestinian and local ingredients to serve a modern interpretation of Palestinian traditions. Having been a podcast host, a star of a travel documentary and a published author, Kattan has worked at cities around the globe and opened restaurants in his hometown of Bethlehem and London.
Kattan had never been to Canada when Nicole Mankinen, a Torontonian from a Canadian-Palestinian family, reached out to him via social media to enquire about various recipes. Eventually, she asked if he had ever considered opening a restaurant in Toronto.
“Being raised here in North America, you don’t have the same exposure to your culture and background,” she says. “It was a natural thing to want to create something that was a legacy for my own children.”
Upon arrival in Toronto and meeting with various purveyors, Katton saw the potential to open Louf.
“A bit of the reason for wanting to open Louf was seeing our cuisine was not represented in a restaurant that’s accessible to everyone,” he says. “The beauty of our cuisine is under-represented in general — the flavours, the recipes, the stories, the wine.”
Together, the duo has taken over a converted two-story former residential house at 501 Davenport Road. Upon walking into Louf, customers are surrounded by stories of Palestine from the tones and colours of the land to the miss-matched chairs and the artworks and colourful ceramic dishes crafted by Palestinian artists. There is even a bar room of a metallic blue colour, the same colour found on the doors of Bethlehem.
“The idea that it used to be a house is exactly what we wanted — creating that homely feeling,” says Kattan. “It’s the idea of going into a home where we welcome guests and it’s a home that’s open to everybody.”
Floor-to-ceiling windows craft a warm and bright space, even in the middle of winter, while the second floor offers a community dining table for more intimate dinning and special occasions. In the springtime, Louf will offer a patio which will offer views of a vibrant herb garden.
“Every space has something different,” say Mankinen. “We really want to welcome everybody in as they come to Louf and there’s a lot of different areas to provide that.”
The menu boasts a decadent arrangement of share plate, representing how families dine in Palestine.
“You’ll never get invited to a Palestinian home and have a single dish on the table,” says Kattan. “You’ll have a few small dishes — sometimes too many!”
From sumac sourced in Ontario to Maftool from Palestine, the restaurant blends the best of flavours and traditions for a GTA-inspired twist on the cuisine.
“Our intention is to tell the story of Palestinian food that also celebrate local Canadian producers,” Kattan says. “It’s not a restaurant where we’re flying everything in from Palestine.”
With its half-warm, half-chilled presentation, a mushroom salad with pickled cremini mushrooms and sauteed black oysters with coriander is one dish that is intended to “push your perceptions.” Another dish, the sushbarak, is a roasted dumpling, filled with potatoes, mushrooms and a laban jameed cream — a dry preserved yogurt which is a Palestinian classic — that is sourced from a Palestinian family in Ontario.
Representing all of Palestine, coastal dishes are also represented on the menu, including the sayyadieh samak, a dry-aged pickerel and white fish. The fish is typically deep-fried, but at Louf, it’s cooked in olive oil and served with chili tahinia.
While he believes in modernizing, Kattan says he doesn’t “believe in molecular cuisine.”
“I don’t believe in ultra-modernizing for the sake of modernizing, because I think there are certain cuisines that require a lot of respect to the product,” he says.
To pair with the share plates, including those found on the Saturday and Sunday brunch menu, Fattan and Mankinen have enlisted the help of sommelier Anna Patrowicz who has come from London to develop the specialty cocktail menu. Like the food, the cocktails combine the stories of Palestine with flavours sourced in Ontario. The ruz bil yansoun is a play on a traditional rice pudding with the Arak, the national spirit of Palestine and what is believed to be the oldest distilled spirit in the world.
In supporting Louf as a place that is open and inviting to everyone, Louf has gratuity included in menu prices as tips are not accepted.
“We’re paying people a fair wage,” Fattan says. “It’s the idea of going into a home where we welcome guests, we’re at a home that’s open and welcome to everybody.”
Louf is located at 501 Davenport Rd.
