Somebody Feed Phil (2018–…): Season 1, Episode 3 - Tel Aviv - full transcript
In vibrant Tel Aviv, Phil reconnects with old friends over shakshuka, visits a synagogue-themed hummus shop and meets "the princess of soup."
The first time I came to Israel
was about ten years ago.
And I have to say,
I found it to be a lot like Hebrew school.
And for me, it was also
a lot like being with family.
And we all know what that can be like.
I was given a special tour
by this one guy.
And it was kind of like being held hostage
as you were taken around...
and only being shown things
that he wanted to show me.
I don't recommend this for any country,
but here, especially,
everything was so fantastic
because it was Israel and there was
so much national pride, which is great.
But they're pointing out everything
that's phenomenal.
"Look at the tree.
Could you imagine living here
with such a tree?"
I said, "Listen, you know I come...
I actually come from Los Angeles.
We actually have a few trees there."
But there's a lot going on here.
It's one of the largest tech communities
in the world.
They invented Waze here.
They invented the USB, uh, thing.
They invented a pill that you swallow,
it has a camera in it.
I can also tell you,
if you're in an airplane,
we invented calling over
the flight attendant and saying,
"My seat doesn't go back far enough."
And, uh, also, if you're in a diner,
and the soup comes,
and you say that this is...
"I wanted it a little hotter.
Can you make it a little hotter,
but not too hot?"
We invented that.
We invented... uh... um...
"How come you're able
to be available for your friends,
but when I call, it goes to voicemail?
How come that is?"
By the way, we also, I think,
may have invented voicemail.
But we've perfected...
complaining.
♪ A happy, hungry man ♪
♪ Is traveling
All across the sea and the land ♪
♪ He's trying to understand ♪
♪ The art of pasta, pork
Chicken, and lamb ♪
♪ He will drive to you ♪
♪ He will fly to you ♪
♪ He will sing for you ♪
♪ And dance for you ♪
♪ He will laugh with you ♪
♪ And he'll cry for you ♪
♪ There's just one thing
He asks in return ♪
♪ Somebody feed, somebody feed ♪
♪ Can somebody ♪
♪ Somebody feed Phil? ♪
♪ Somebody feed him now ♪
Israel has a lot of amazing places.
Jerusalem is the spiritual center,
obviously, of the world,
and it's where all the politics
that we've read about in the news happen.
And that's what most of the news
focuses on.
Conflict.
What I want to focus on
is the part that maybe
the news doesn't cover.
How beautiful the rest of the country is.
Including Israel's capital, Tel Aviv.
Sit. Sit. Sit. It's a reunion!
I love seeing you guys.
The first people I want to see in Israel
are my friends from five years ago
when we did the Israeli version
of Raymond here.
And the guy who produced it
is Daniel Lapin,
and the guy who played
the Israeli Raymond
is named Yuval Yanai, fantastic actor,
and they met me for breakfast.
Let's get a little history here.
- Yeah.
- You're not born in this place.
In this restaurant?
- I was born actually in the corner there.
- In that pot.
I was born in Toronto, Canada.
I moved when I was 11.
- Moved back at 16.
- There you go.
Then moved back...
I've been trying to leave Israel
since I moved here.
I was born here, and then my parents
did the exact opposite.
- Went to Canada.
- Yeah.
- And then you wanted to move back?
- No.
- What happened?
- My parents did.
- We are victims of our parents.
- They decided to come back.
Hello.
You did a sitcom about that, didn't you?
He has a little bit more of an accent
than you.
Really? I have an accent?
You know what shakshuka is?
Shakshuka is a stew,
tomato stew with peppers
and other spices,
with eggs put on top
right before it's finished.
If you want it a little over medium,
you put them in a little earlier.
If you want them over easy,
you put them in at the last second
and they cook in the stew.
One of the best breakfasts you'll have.
So there's a guy who makes
all kinds of varieties of this stuff,
and his name is Dr. Shakshuka.
So we visited the doctor.
Oh!
This is with the spicy sausage.
By the way, there's eight eggs in here!
- Yeah, I know.
- Can't eat this thing. We'll die.
- He's gonna show you.
- Teach you how to eat it.
This is called dipping the bread
in the shakshuka.
- Gonna feed me?
- You're gonna be a king.
And don't worry if you burn your tongue.
There's a doctor here.
- What kind of doctor are you?
- Go. Take it.
- Really?
- Yeah.
- You're being fed by the doctor.
- Fed by the doctor.
I haven't had a grown man feed me
since I'm three years old
and my father was saying,
"Just eat already, eat something."
Mmm! That's good! That's really...
Oh, it's spicy too!
- Spicy, yes.
- I like it!
- Is it good?
- You're a king.
King cholesterol!
Can you tell me how old the building is?
Two hundred and fifty years.
This is his.
He's been collecting for 60 years.
- Wow. I love it.
- All this, uh...
I read that this is a Libyan dish,
originally. Did you know that?
Everybody believes they invented it.
It's like hummus, it's like tahini,
it's like everything.
But that's Israel, right?
It's this amalgam...
Yes, it's a melting pot.
There is no real "Israeli food."
That's true.
- Everybody came from everywhere.
- Everywhere.
This is very good.
But I heard we have to get
a mixed grill shawarma.
Juicy lamb
cooked on a rotating spit.
Shawarma is as common here
as a club sandwich is back home.
- There you go.
- Thank you!
You gotta get a mouthful.
Why are you in America?
You come here, in Israel.
Why am I in America? Of course!
Why, when you have this here with you,
why would I live in America?
Know how he became the doctor?
- No.
- How do you say...
He used to be a money changer.
He used to be like... he used to be huge.
He used to make millions.
And then he got caught
and he got sent to prison.
And in prison, he used to sneak in, like...
Shh. Everybody, be quiet!
And I love shawarma!
- What if I asked him?
- Don't.
Don't. I would be afraid.
How'd you get into this?
Started at age ten. They had a restaurant,
his father had a restaurant.
Everybody used to sell,
in the country, shakshuka on a plate.
- His father did it in a pan.
- And then what happened?
- He's getting emotional.
- Oh, no!
Yeah, it's fine.
Wow.
- It's not the food.
- I'm sorry. We hit a nerve.
No.
Sweetheart, I feel terrible.
- Why did you come here?
- I didn't want to...
What, are you a psychologist?
You're unearthing stuff that never was...
He's a sweetie pie.
He has some story, Dr. Shakshuka.
His father started the business,
and in addition to making eggs,
he was also making change,
and, uh, that turns out
not to be so legal.
You'd ask for dollars which you could only
change at a bank in an official place.
Oh, he would do it at the shawarma place.
He got a year in jail
for the money changing.
And five for the shawarma. No, I'm joking.
In jail, he was making shakshuka
for everybody.
For everybody, for the whole...
One guy yelled, from one of his cells,
"You're the doctor of shakshuka."
- That's how he got the name.
- This is the best story I ever heard.
- It's like a superhero origin story.
- Yeah, origin. Yeah, right.
It's fantastic.
When he got out, he decided,
"I'm not gonna..."
Enough with the dollar changing stuff
and the money stuff.
- Only...
- Shakshuka.
- I gotta say, thank God he got caught.
- Yeah.
- Otherwise, none of this.
- Yeah.
This is the best prison food
I've ever had.
Thank you.
Orange is the new shakshuka.
- L'chaim.
- L'chaim.
Established in 1948,
the state of Israel is a young country,
and Tel Aviv is known
as the party capital of the Middle East.
It's a city of diners, drinkers,
dog owners, surfers, and sunbathers.
One of the biggest draws are its beaches,
stretched along eight miles
of Mediterranean coastline.
I'm gonna spare you the sight
of me in a bathing suit,
and instead, get dressed
and hit the market.
So I meet Michael Solomonov,
my friend from Philadelphia,
who has probably the top
Israeli restaurant in America, Zahav.
Just this year,
he won the James Beard Award
for most outstanding chef in America.
And he agreed to come to Israel with us
and show me around.
So this is it,
synagogue-slash-hummusia.
- Was business not good at the synagogue?
- I guess so.
- How do you say excuse me?
- They don't say it, just go.
Elbows out. Such an Israeli moment,
you just gotta shove your way in there.
We go in...
Wow.
And sure enough, you're in a synagogue.
We're here for services.
And they're making hummus!
Wow. Look how he did that!
Like, I don't know,
how many countries are represented
just in this dish?
The hummus, which is
from all over the Middle East, right?
- There's the foul, that's from Egypt.
- Right.
The hard-boiled eggs,
that's like a Jewish-y thing.
Zhug, which is a hot sauce,
but it was brought to Israel
by the Yemenite Jews in the '50s.
- But that's Israeli cuisine, right?
- Totally.
- Something from everybody.
- A hundred percent.
This is the best breakfast ever.
- I'm going in.
- Gotta wipe. That's the deal.
Like this?
Yeah, like open it up,
you know, and then go...
Like you're sort of snowboarding
or skateboarding. That's...
When you say like, "Let's go get hummus,"
you say, like...
...which means you want
to go wipe some hummus.
This is already my favorite synagogue.
I'm just waiting for the rabbi
to come and ask me for a donation.
There's Torah scrolls on the wall,
and the books, the religious books,
are lining the shelves.
You know, I gotta get the story,
so I asked the guy to come over.
We have a question. Are you...
Do people still pray here?
No. No.
- No more?
- This is concept. Uh...
- This is the concept?
- This is the concept, yes.
And he says,
"Oh, no. It was never a synagogue."
"What?" "This is my theme restaurant."
You mean it was never a synagogue?
- No.
- Was it?
- No.
- Thought it was a synagogue.
- No.
- That's hilarious.
So this is the style of the restaurant.
Like a Disney-esque
kind of theme restaurant,
like Pirates of the Caribbean restaurant,
but it's a synagogue.
Hey, I got a great idea for a restaurant.
What if you thought
you were going to synagogue,
but instead of synagogue,
you got hummus?
Always fun, my people. Always fun.
It's such a funny concept, like,
what if they did the dentist's office?
This is not a dentist's office, but you...
we sell ice cream.
By the way, if you come to Israel,
you're gonna have the hummus of your life.
Now this is not a synagogue,
but it's still a holy place.
This is Abu Hassan.
Now you see this guy
is going around the table
and shouting, "Yalla, yalla, yalla,"
because there is a big line
and he wants people to finish and go out.
Like, "Hurry up!"
- Like, "Hurry up!" Yeah.
- You can't sit too long.
They'll kick you out.
I'm worried we won't finish.
Don't chew, swallow. We have no time.
They want you to have it,
enjoy it, get out, tell your friends,
have them come, enjoy it, and get out.
Yalla, yalla, yalla...
- What are we having now?
- We're gonna eat a little bit of sabich.
- Sabich.
- A fried eggplant sandwich.
Ah.
- Shalom!
- Shalom!
How are you guys? Good to see you.
- Sabich.
- Sabich.
- Sabich Tchernichovsky.
- Tchernichovsky.
In my opinion there's, like,
two great sabich places,
- and this is one of them.
- Wow.
My father is from Iraq.
This is Iraqian food.
Yeah. And the style here
is really different.
The eggplant, they fry it,
but it's really, really thin
and gets kind of crispy.
- Whoa, like potato chips almost.
- Yeah, yeah.
It's fried eggplant,
it's hard boiled eggs, tahina.
The way these guys layer it
is, like, amazing.
That is beautiful.
He's not just dumping it,
he's painting it. He's painting it.
What's great about this place is the way
they make their sandwich is perfect.
- It eats perfectly.
- Here we go.
Look at the color!
Come on! You're like a genius!
- No.
- Yeah.
It's so good.
Know why Israeli men
have back problems?
You get the sandwiches,
and you have to eat it like this,
like bent over, you know?
This is as good a sandwich
as I've ever had.
In just a couple blocks,
Michael's taken me on a culinary journey
across the Middle East,
from Egypt to Iraq.
Next stop, Yemen.
All right, here we go. So this is like...
This is "Simon, The King of Soup."
With a name like that...
- The King of Soup.
- Yeah, it's been around forever.
- How are ya?
- Shalom!
- I'm okay.
- Phil.
The King of Soup has passed on,
but I meet his daughter,
the Princess of Soup.
She makes Yemeni-style soups
out of all things I usually try to avoid.
- This is belly button.
- Did she say "belly button"?
Not belly button,
but it's belly button coq au vin.
It's not... It's gizzard, actually.
- This is off.
- Off?
This is meat from the head.
- From the cheek, right?
- It's very soft.
You know you don't add dairy
to these soups, right?
Obviously, because it wouldn't be kosher.
So this is fenugreek that they soak
and then they whip.
And the fenugreek holds air,
so this gives it texture.
Can be maple syrupy,
but it also can be like,
kind of like armpity a little bit too.
- So...
- You're really selling it.
Yeah.
People die for it.
- Really?
- It makes a little smell
in the body when they pee.
Two, three days, no sex.
- Two, three days, no sex?
- No sex, because the smell.
- Not a problem for me.
- Oh, no.
- No problem for me either.
- Married almost 30 years.
We wind up with cheek.
Put some spicy here.
- Okay.
- Okay?
- Come to my house and tell me what to do.
- I will. I will.
Gonna do it just 'cause
she's gonna yell at me otherwise, so...
Let's do that.
Wow.
- How is it?
- It's amazing.
That's nice, 'cause there's a lot of...
collagen, you know, in the cheeks.
Maybe I should inject some in my face.
- Mmm.
- Did you know that?
- No, but that might be a good...
- Taste something. This is oxtail.
- Oh!
- I didn't show you.
You're afraid to eat? I am...
- No, why didn't you put it in?
- No. He's not afraid.
Mmm!
- That might be the best thing.
- Yeah.
- And the problem is that the turmeric is...
- You don't eat the soup!
I'm eating the soup, but...
We're eating a lot today, that's all.
- We're tasting everything.
- Okay.
We can't finish everything. No, no more.
- But it's delicious.
- It's so good.
- We love it.
- Welcome.
- Thank you so much.
- Enjoy!
Wow, the demands and the guilt.
I wonder if we're related.
- I think you gotta do this.
- Yeah, just do it.
- Yeah!
- How's that? It wins, right? Boom!
Table flip over. Out!
Of course, if you flip this table over,
she'd come out with a butcher...
A knife. Yeah, kill you.
Here's one of the best things
about this city, Tel Aviv,
and I think a lot of the great cities
in the world have this in common,
bike lanes.
First of all, it's all along the ocean.
You can go all the way from Tel Aviv
to Yafo and probably beyond.
It's miles long,
one of the best bike paths in the world.
And then on the major streets,
there's a median between the traffic going
this way and the traffic going that way.
Tree-lined, beautiful.
Here's where the bikes go.
Here's where the people walk next to it.
And it's just so pleasant and so sweet.
Can you imagine living in a place
with such a bike lane?
Oh, sorry. Sorry.
I was told that this place
had great coffee, so I stopped,
and I met these two wonderful...
you know, I'm gonna call them kids
because I'm twice their age.
And they sat and talked with me.
Tel Aviv is amazing.
- It's a new city.
- Yeah.
- Comparatively. Like 70 years old.
- Yeah.
- And the beach is gorgeous, right?
- Yeah.
Everything on the beach.
I'm not crazy about, to be honest,
the architecture.
- I think the buildings could be a little...
- If you can call it that.
What would you call it?
A bunch of Jews were given a country,
and they threw something together
real quick before it was taken away.
That was as good an explanation
as I've gotten.
She came from Moscow,
and he came from Barcelona.
But there they were
in this transitionary time of life...
in kind of a happening city of the moment.
What are you drinking here?
- Carrot juice?
- That's... Yeah.
I'm getting ready for a cleanse.
- Oh, good. Okay.
- So...
Yeah, you look like you need a cleanse.
What's the worst thing about living here?
Have you heard of why Israelis
are called "Sabras"?
- Why?
- Know what a Sabra is?
Yes. Someone born here.
Yes, but do you know
what an actual Sabra is?
- No.
- Sabra is a cactus fruit.
It has thorns on the outside,
- but it's sweet on the inside.
- Sweet on the inside.
They are warm people, you know?
For the good and for the bad.
- You get to know them really fast.
- Right.
Because they assume...
They feel like they're family.
You know what? I don't know.
This is something that American Jews think
when they come here.
"Oh, we're all family."
I'm not sure that Israelis
think of it that way.
When there's a crisis in the country,
we all think of it that way.
When everything is calm...
- No, it's "Get out of my way, me first."
- Yeah, exactly.
It's funny. I say all this
and I still haven't moved back
to the States, so I'm still here.
- Something's keeping you.
- Yeah.
- I loved meeting you. Thank you.
- Yeah. Nice to meet you.
Great to meet you. Good luck.
- Good luck with your cleanse.
- Yes.
There's parts of Tel Aviv
where the architecture is kind of,
you know, 1970s-ish,
but then when you come
to the old city of Jaffa,
you have these buildings,
some of which are a thousand,
sometimes 2,000 years old.
The older I get, the more I like old.
The ancient port of Jaffa
is a predominately Arab neighborhood
in the oldest part of Tel Aviv: Yafo.
This is where the biblical stories
of Jonah, Solomon,
and Saint Peter were set.
And this is from the book of Saint Nathan.
I passed your bakery before and it
looked so good, I want to buy something.
I happen to walk by a bakery,
and I noticed that the Arab gentleman
behind the counter had a shirt:
"Arabs and Jews refuse to be enemies."
The bakery has been here since 1879.
- What?!
- Yeah.
My great-grandfather started this bakery,
and we've always coexisted with Arabs
and Jews before 1948, after 1948,
so we decided to make this shirt
as a tribute.
- That's a good story.
- Our long history, yeah.
- Hold this one second.
- Okay.
- I'm going in.
- Yeah.
This is right out of the oven, right?
- Ow. It's hot. I have to wait a minute.
- Yeah.
- Okay, take your time.
- Okay.
Now?
Mmm!
Wow! No wonder we get along!
Yeah. That's what keeps us together
and always has, 140 years.
All right, this is pretty damn delicious.
You made me so happy!
Shalom!
So I want to recommend this bakery
to everybody:
Abouelafia.
Wonder if this shot is wide enough
that you'll believe this is me.
So my friend Nancy Silverton has
a friend who writes all about Israel,
loves Israel, loves Tel Aviv, especially.
His name is Steven Rothfeld.
Wrote a book called Israel Eats
with Nancy.
- I'm a vegetarian.
- Yeah.
This is a place that I found
and walked into,
and saw the vegetables lined up,
so it completely appealed to me.
I should tell you now.
I don't eat vegetables.
Now, I can't say
that I seek out vegetarian restaurants.
I like vegetarian food.
I'm not against vegetarian food.
Please don't send me letters.
But it's just, you know... uh...
It's not something I get all excited for.
But this is not just some pile
of boring vegetables.
These are serious plates
of delicious food, beautifully presented.
Zakaim is a Persian-style restaurant.
It's owned by Harel and his two sisters.
We wanted to know
what was in your ricotta.
- Basically, uh, soy milk.
- Oh.
And some salt.
So, is this vegan?
- Vegan.
- Yeah.
Not just vegetarian.
There's no animal products of any kind.
Totally vegan.
There are over 400
vegan-friendly restaurants in Israel,
and that number is only gonna go up
as soon as people taste this.
- Cauliflower gondi?
- Yeah.
Basically it's a very traditional
Persian dish.
There is chickpeas in the gondi, okay?
Mmm! You don't miss meat at all.
This is like the best chips and dip
you ever had.
What Harel told me
when I first met him was
becoming vegan gave them
something to talk about
other than the political situation
in Israel, and they loved that.
We should all become vegan
in the United States.
Yes.
The flavors were so unique,
where you don't miss the meat at all,
where you don't even think about it.
I spent most of my time
- working in France and Italy.
- Yeah.
Never was interested in visiting Israel.
That's interesting,
because I felt the same way.
There's a misperception,
I think, of Israel in our media.
- News likes conflict, right?
- Absolutely.
So that's what they focus on.
People can find pleasure and happiness
in a land of conflict
where they're forced to live their lives
against this backdrop of things
that are completely out of their control.
- Hello.
- You talk too much.
- French fries. Yeah.
- Yeah!
Hand-torn French fries
with a soy-based mayo
that's not only as good as the real thing,
it's better.
Wow.
And here's a grilled mushroom skewer.
We put it on a charcoal barbecue.
Yeah.
And then all the flavors
are exactly like meat.
That is like meat off the grill,
you're right.
- Yeah.
- Wow, that's good.
I didn't think about meat once.
I mean,
I just thought about meat just now.
But that whole meal,
I didn't think of anything
but how delicious this food is.
I just thought about meat again.
I think you should be a vegan
if you like it so much.
Don't pressure me, okay? I just got here.
One, two, three, four.
One of the deadliest,
most effective self-defenses,
even offenses, in the world
is something called Krav Maga.
It started in the Israeli army, right?
- Right.
- And you were in the army?
Because in Israel, everyone
have to be soldiers, you know that?
Yes, every man and woman, every...
- When you're how old?
- While you're 18.
- Eighteen.
- Yes.
I've never taken a self-defense class
in any discipline at all.
- Okay?
- Don't be afraid.
- All right. Yes.
- I promise I won't hurt you.
This is my motto in life,
"Please don't hurt me."
Give me your hands. Very good.
I want you to put them here, like...
Yeah, to defend yourself.
So if I came from here...
Easier, yeah.
- Look how your reflexes start to work.
- Yeah.
- Can you see that? Ha!
- If only the person...
- Oh!
- Oh, my God!
Did you see that?
It took you how much time?
If that was real life
and the knife came at me,
I would be so busy screaming and running,
or dying, that I wouldn't have a...
If you were dying,
it wouldn't matter, right?
Put that on your... "Krav Maga.
If you're dying, it doesn't matter."
I can just, you know, like this.
Yes.
- A few, like, times here, in the groin.
- Yes.
- Wow. This is, uh...
- Yes.
Need to call your wife?
I think I know where this is going.
Push the neck here. Get out of here!
Are you alive, Phil?
Maybe if I just lay here,
she'll leave me alone.
And go away from here!
I got that down. All right, that I can do.
One kick...
one punch, and go away.
- Yeah, I like this idea.
- Okay.
- Are you ready?
- Yes.
Ha!
- Oh, wait.
- Very good!
- Yes! And go! See...
- No, I want more!
Who else wants a piece?
Very good, who else?
At the cutting edge
of the Tel Aviv culinary scene is Mashya.
Chef Yossi Shitrit draws upon
his Moroccan heritage
to reinvent traditional Israeli cuisine.
Joining me are my friends, Daniel,
and food writer, chef,
and TV host Ruthie Russo.
L'chaim.
All this guy does is eat
and I'm the fat guy. Why does that happen?
This is a mini pita
with shakshuka, egg yolk cream,
with hot chili above it
and micro coriander.
Someone told me that the new,
like, taking pictures before you eat,
is, like, the new
"thank you for the food."
I have something better than Instagram.
- Yes, what is that?
- I have three 4K cameras focused on this.
Which is what you need to pick up
that delicious drop of shakshuka in there.
- Cheers!
- I don't do hot stuff.
It's not that spicy. I tried it.
Yeah, "not that spicy"
is still in the realm of spicy.
- I'm telling you.
- Not spicy.
Okay, can we have a drumroll here?
Not spicy.
Boop!
- Wait, hold on.
- Psh.
It's not spicy.
- So...
- Wow! That's beautiful!
This is our carpaccio.
- That's dairy?
- Yeah.
I don't do dairy and meat together.
- You are so much fun.
- Such a pain in the ass.
Know what's great? He's not gonna
eat anything, and we get everything.
I'm fine with that.
We went to his house for dinner
and he made in his apartment
delicious chicken,
and he forgot that he put a whole
cauliflower in the bottom of the oven,
and he pulls this out
and it's black on top,
and his wife comes home to find smoke
- coming out of the cauliflower.
- Flames.
This is a version of the story.
I've been to your place,
by the way, very nice house,
chicken, and then the next day
we had chicken,
- and after, we had chicken.
- Because you don't eat anything!
- No.
- Maybe it's you!
- There you go.
- It has to be burned. I was going to say...
- This is our famous cauliflower mafrum.
- Perfect.
- Cauliflower!
- Yeah.
And look, it's burned.
It comes with lamb kebab inside of it.
- And above it, you have yogurt.
- You're not gonna try it?
- You enjoy this. I don't...
- You only eat your cauliflower?
- Yes, I'm very particular about that.
- Wait.
- How is it?
- It's good, very different from yours.
- Because it's good.
- It's not on fire.
But... Oh, wow!
It's coming fast and furious!
This is a raw red sashimi tuna
with a wheat salad.
Do you like any of this?
Um, I love to watch you guys eat it.
- So just be careful.
- Whoa! Hey! Your cauliflower!
Almost.
This is the gratitude I get.
Okay, so this is
a grapefruit marshmallow
- that you can burn in smoke and fire.
- Yes! Come on! This is fun!
By the way, how evocative
is that smell of a camp fire?
Let's make a bigger fire.
I like that.
Here, break up your chair.
So we just happen to be here
for Purim here in Israel.
Big celebration, big parties.
It's like Israeli Halloween.
It was like a rave times the West Village
times West Hollywood.
All of this is making me feel
slightly underdressed.
I need to find something
a bit more my speed.
There's a magical place
where ladies meet in Israel.
It's called the mall.
My mother's always had wonderful friends,
and I've always been
brought into the conversation.
So it's very natural for me
if I'm out grabbing coffee
and I see women of a certain age,
I feel like... Is this weird?
...that I fit in very well.
I feel like these are my people.
Shalom!
- Shalom!
- Hi! How are you?
- May I join you?
- Yeah.
It's okay?
They told me Tel Aviv was filled
with beautiful women,
and now I've found them.
I'm Phil.
Beautiful lady.
- Dora.
- Dora, you're also beautiful.
This is the parliament, right?
- Yeah.
- Yeah. Parliament.
When the ladies get together,
you make a parliament,
you make all the decisions
for the country.
- How is the country doing?
- Fantastic.
Fantastic, that's what I think.
Have a cookie.
No? It's good.
It's all right, you can skip lunch.
We meet once a week.
Yes. So, oh, this is tradition?
- Ten to twelve.
- Ten to twelve.
What do you like most
about living in Israel?
It's good to bring up children here.
- Did you all bring up children here?
- Yes.
Come to live in Israel.
- Come to live here?
- You will be happy.
- We just met!
- Yeah. Why not?
Nice. Well, you're very sweet.
By the way, I said hi to that table,
they didn't want to talk to me.
Do you know those ladies over there?
Don't know them?
Don't want to know them?
We don't.
Every week, they meet.
Every Tuesday, for years.
They've never spoken to each other.
How can there be peace in the Middle East
if we can't get two tables
of old Jewish ladies to even say hello?
This is my mission.
What if they came and said hello?
Come and say hello!
Please, sit.
You don't want to stay?
No? You want a cookie for the road?
- No, thank you.
- Okay.
Nice talking to you.
It's not easy wrangling ladies.
And then, look at this.
A miracle.
Hello! You came all the way
from the next table.
- Yeah, a long way.
- A long way.
Everybody that comes to the table,
they get a cookie.
Thank you. I ate just now.
You're the first Jews I've seen
that don't want to eat anything,
I can't believe it.
Have you been to America?
- Yes.
- You like it?
Eh...
- What's your name?
- Ariella.
Ariella, this is Dora.
If Dora and Ariella can make friends,
- isn't there hope for the world?
- Yeah.
I'm gonna need subtitles.
My work is done here.
Thank you, Ariella. You're very nice.
- Thank you.
- Nice to meet you, Dora.
Dora, you're hanging on. Let me go, Dora!
- You're lovely, too.
- No.
- "Don't kiss me"?
- Don't kiss me.
"Don't you touch me"? I get it.
I still... you know, I don't need you,
but you know why?
Because I have Dora.
Dora, give me another one.
Ah-ha.
This is not a tiny thing,
this a big...
- This is a big thing we have here.
- A big little market!
We have 71 producers, farmers,
cheese makers.
There's a woman here
named Michal Ansky,
and she's very famous in Israel.
She started the kind of
slow food movement,
farmers' market in Tel Aviv.
The miracle of Israel
is that there was nothing here,
and not only did you get it to grow,
you got it to grow incredible stuff.
We're very good in, uh,
copying and understanding traditions
and building things from scratch.
We take a little bit of this
and a little bit of that.
We learned a lot
from the Palestinian agriculture.
And it's amazing to see because now Israel
is one of the most interesting places
in the world to eat.
Look at the carrots!
I like how excited you are.
Look at the radish!
I'm divorced,
but if I'll get married again,
I want to hold like, this, as my...
- That's sweet.
- Isn't it?
- Imagine with a white dress.
- Somebody please...
This poor, unfortunate-looking girl
needs a husband.
Please, someone, won't you help?
Michal opened
Tel Aviv's Port Market in 2010,
and her enthusiasm for the project
has not diminished.
This is like one of my favorite stalls
- in the market.
- Too bad it's not colorful.
It's produce grown on a salty desert soil.
The sweetest variety of peppers.
- In salty desert soil...
- Salty desert soil.
Little bit of olive oil, za'atar, salt...
Who needs a man? Who needs a husband?
I am fine with my tomato.
Don't let my wife hear you,
she'll leave me for a tomato.
I chased Michal around the stalls.
This is a savory hamantaschen.
This I never had.
We stop at one of Michal's favorites,
and I gotta tell you,
this is worth stopping for.
You are standing next to Sherry Herring.
Sherry's my mother.
Really?
So the Jewish people have
a deep, deep history with herring.
Very, very strong emotional history
with herring.
- Yeah.
- It's what you eat on Kiddush,
it's what you eat on shul,
on the synagogue.
It's what you eat on holidays.
It's what you eat before Shabbat,
it's what you eat after Shabbat.
And you always have it
with a shot of vodka.
And it's like the most amazing
herring sandwich on planet Earth.
This is the most excited I've ever seen
- a human being get about herring.
- Yeah.
I want that herring.
It's one of those things
where you see it being made,
and you know how good it's going to be,
and then it's better.
So good.
Sherry Herring, one of the best sandwiches
I've ever had in my stupid life.
- L'chaim.
- L'chaim, everybody.
Come to Tel Aviv, go to Sherry Herring,
get the sandwich, tell her I said to come.
Why? Because next time she sees me,
I want a free sandwich.
I want to just stay and eat everything
in Tel Aviv,
but I'm told there's so many
other places in Israel we can't miss.
So we're heading north.
Up the coast is
the ancient Roman city of Caesarea,
or, in Hebrew, Kaesarea.
It was discovered by people
making a kibbutz in the '50s,
and they were digging,
and they hit ancient Roman ruins.
This was built for the city's inauguration
in the year 10 B.C.
And this seated... 12,000 people
would come and watch chariot races here.
These are real steps.
Still good.
It's amazing how just
a little bit of design,
and suddenly you can see
how grand the thing must have been
and how beautiful.
All right, I'm good.
When I think of Israel,
I think of cities and deserts,
but that's not the whole story.
The further north you go,
just like California,
the more beautiful it gets.
This is the biblical region of Galilee,
or as I call it, the Israeli Catskills.
It's a little like fairy land up here.
Michael Solomonov
has brought me to a resort here
that's also a stunning organic farm.
So this whole idea that all of Israel
was desert, it's not really true.
Israel has everything.
You have snow at the north of the country,
- desert at the south...
- Yeah.
...and everything in between.
This is very unexpected
and beautiful.
This is like
where the Israelis kind of hang out.
You know, it's kind of quiet,
it overlooks the Sea of Galilee,
and the air is sweet. You can smell,
especially this time of year,
you can smell the blossoms in the air,
you know. It's floral.
The hotel's chef, Guy Lasnitzky,
tells us that every single bite of food
they serve here
is grown right here on their farm.
Hello, ladies!
Cows! What's happening?
Some of the biggest cows
I ever saw in my life.
In California, they're more
self-conscious about their figure.
- so they stay slim.
- Yeah.
Listen, when a James Beard
award-winning chef
offers to improvise lunch for you,
I suggest you say okay.
I'm going, like, super rustic
with a lot of the things.
The stuff we took out of the ground,
I just dressed with olive oil
- and cooked over charcoal, right? Um...
- Yeah.
We took some of that Svatit,
this goat's milk cheese,
and I wrapped it in Swiss chard.
We've also got some crushed almonds,
flowers, which we haven't determined
whether they're poisonous or okay to eat.
I just wish you were someone
who knew what they were doing.
You've come
to the wrong place, my friend.
- Mmm. The onion!
- Yeah.
That's like Israel in a bite,
and super fresh because we literally
just picked this out of the ground.
Exactly.
By the way, the flowers?
They are poisonous.
More? Really? More?
Yeah, more.
So, we got a little duck that, uh...
- That's the one that woke me.
- This is it.
The ducks woke me up this morning.
That was the way I woke up.
Where ducks were quacking
in the morning, he goes,
"You know we can eat them."
You asked for this.
Philip's revenge.
Some pistachios.
Oh.
It looks amazing.
Hee, hee.
All the onions, everything that
made the stew was from here, so, enjoy!
Oh, my God! Michael!
It was kind of miraculous to see him work.
Especially miraculous
because every single bite of that lunch
was fantastic.
None of it he had ever made before.
Hug it out.
Come live with me.
So we traveled up
to the port city of Akko.
I'm sleeping in a beautiful hotel,
and at 4:30 in the morning...
There are loud speakers on the mosque,
pointing at my head.
And at 4:30 in the morning,
you bolt out of bed
and think there's a man
next to you in bed, yelling in your ear.
It's actually quite beautiful once
you're fully conscious and look around.
Akko was established
four to five thousand years ago.
It's one of the oldest continually
inhabited places on the Earth.
Akko is one of the most
integrated cities in Israel.
It's populated by both Arabs and Jews.
Everyone going about their lives,
working, shopping, eating,
and celebrating alongside one another.
- You're Uri Buri.
- Yes.
This gentleman's name is Uri Jeremias.
He's a larger-than-life character
with a larger-than-life beard.
And he has a famous restaurant in Akko
called Uri Buri.
Did anyone ever tell you
you look like David Letterman?
- I don't know David Letterman.
- No?
You look just like him.
- I never met him.
- Very handsome.
He has a beautiful beard like you now.
Yeah, but it's impossible.
Nobody has a beard like me.
That's true, too.
This is just a market
that works for the people.
- Not a tourist market.
- No.
Oh, it smells so good.
Here you have all these spice shops
and all vegetables and fruits
you can imagine.
And culinary? It is a paradise.
Hummus places and real small
manufacturers of sweets.
Wow, this is the real deal.
This is Mr. Shakshia.
You have the most beautiful color
of any falafel stand.
Thank you. It's not falafel.
This is golden ball.
- Golden ball.
- Yes. Why?
Because I put the lemon here inside.
Taste that.
Mmm! Mmm...
- Mmm!
- It's so good.
If you eat falafel,
you take this preserved lemon,
put it in there with the other stuff,
it totally makes it.
I love this. This is great.
It changed my life.
I haven't seen that before.
If that changed my life,
what does that say about my life?
Uh, you know... Have you tried this?
Boker Tov! Hello!
- Hi, good morning.
- Good morning.
You walk down the street with Uri Buri.
He's like Bruce Springsteen.
Ah, Uri Buri!
Uri, Uri Buri!
- Hey, Uri Buri!
- Do I have to introduce you?
Uri Buri.
- I'm Phil. Nice to meet you.
- Everybody loves Uri in this city.
Everyone knows and loves him.
- It's because...
- Uri!
Uri's here!
Wow.
- Nice to meet you.
- He's the mayor. He's the mayor of Akko.
- He is the mayor.
- Yeah.
He's the town historian. He built a hotel.
He built a restaurant,
and he has an ice cream parlor. He has a...
He's... He is Akko.
He is the embodiment of this city,
and he's the keeper of the flame.
And a great chef, by the way.
This is smoked aubergines
and raw Spanish mackerel with nigella.
- It's very simple, very basic.
- Simple is good.
- There are two secrets in cooking.
- Yeah.
- One is to buy the best materials.
- Yes.
And the second is not to spoil them.
I am trying to cook with eight ingredients
maximum in one dish.
Oh! Beautiful!
So here comes a dish, and it's
sliced salmon in a little soy sauce.
And there's a green ball on top.
This looks like wasabi.
- Yeah, but...
- Oh, look, it's frozen.
- It's sorbet of wasabi.
- Oh, come on!
Yeah.
Uri! How old is this recipe?
Uh, 20 years.
- Can't get it off the menu.
- That long ago?
He invented that when sushi
was just kind of catching on.
So the fact that he took wasabi
and turned it into sorbet then,
I told him, I said,
"You're ahead of your time, Uri Buri."
Wow.
- This is the OMG.
- OMG. Oh, my God.
No.
What's OMG?
OMG is Orange, Mandarin, and Grapefruit.
That's my, uh, OMG.
- If you eat my OMG...
- You say, "Oh, my God."
You say, "Oh, my God." So it's OMG.
Now I will show you something.
I'll put some olive oil on top.
Oh!
- Try it with olive oil.
- That's brilliant.
Huh? Opens your eyes.
Wow.
Oh, my God.
- You see? You said it.
- I said it.
- I didn't mean to say it.
- I know.
It was really, really delicious.
It would be a great restaurant anywhere,
and it's in this little ancient city
of Akko.
Throughout history,
Akko was a very important city
as it was the safest natural harbor
in the Eastern part of the Mediterranean.
Every ruler wanted to control Akko,
so it changed hands very frequent,
and it was really a city to fight for.
So you see the influence of all
these bits of history in present day.
These rocks are from the Crusades,
these rocks are from the Byzantine era,
on top of them are
from the Ottoman Empire,
and on and on until present day.
Civilizations just built
one on top of the other.
I was born as a Palestinian.
I have a Palestinian birth certificate.
Wow.
- We were very poor.
- Yeah.
But we didn't have...
we never had the feeling of being poor
because everybody around was poor.
- If someone...
- You didn't feel...
You didn't feel the politics of the time,
you didn't feel the violence of the time?
Yes, sure we felt it.
I mean, if there were bombings,
we went to the shelter, you know?
And this is throughout the years.
But there is no aggressivity
in the street, in the market.
Eh, all around, you see very calm place.
Uri Buri said to me, "What don't you see?"
You know what the answer is? Policemen.
No need for them.
So many people
can tell you about coexistence,
but they never practiced it.
And I can tell you
that there is one main ingredient
that makes it possible to live together,
and this is respect.
The question, "Can we all get along?"
seems to be answered in Akko, at least.
L'chaim!
- Amen to this!
- Yeah.
I like your message.
I don't want to make it
too much of a tourist destination,
but you should all go.
- Hello!
- Hello!
How are you enjoying Israel this time?
I have to say I love it this time.
- I'm having a fantastic time.
- Good.
I'm in this ancient city of Akko.
- Okay.
- Okay.
Can you hear what's happening here?
Listen.
Birds? Birds?
Birds?
What kind of birds do you have there?
Oh, they're being called to pray, yeah.
This woke me up at 4:30 in the morning,
I didn't know what was going on.
- Oh, you're getting a call.
- Who is it?
I don't know.
- Who is it?
- Bella.
Forget it. Let it go.
- Okay.
- Someone you love?
Tell her...
just tell her I'll call her back.
- Here. Give it to me.
- Call from Bella.
Bella? Good morning.
Can I call you back?
We're just Skyping with Philip.
Hi, Bella!
She's saying hello to you.
- Say... Okay.
- Hello.
- I don't... I think she hung up.
- Of course.
Did I tell you the story
about the Wailing Wall?
- Go ahead.
- It's the Western Wall.
The Western Wall.
This guard was seeing this man,
he comes every day to pray,
and he walks over to him and he said,
"Mister, I see you here every day,
what are you praying for?"
"Uh...
I pray for, uh... health,
I pray for karnosa,
that means I want to make a lot of money,
and I pray for peace."
He said, "That's great. Does it help?"
He said, "You're talking to a wall."
I think maybe it meant
"It's like talking to a wall."
I don't want to rewrite your jokes,
but do the joke again.
Ma, I want you to try to pretend
that you like this joke.
The 50th time?
Sorry, you married him.
This is what you get.
He said, "I pray for health,
making the money, and I pray for peace."
He said, "That's great."
He said, "Does it help?"
"I think you're talking to a wall."
Again, you said it wrong.
"It's like talking to a wall."
- You know what it...
- "It's like talking to a wall."
- No.
- By the way, this is a very apt joke
to work on with you because telling you
to do it the right way is like...
Do you want one more shot at it?
It was good until the end.
I think if you're talking to a wall,
honestly, it's just as good.
No, it's not just as good.
You messed it up.
And with that...
Bye. Take care.
You too.
It's my last night in Israel
and Michael's invited me to come join
his family for a barbecue.
Being the family of a great chef,
this was no ordinary barbecue.
It was an Israeli feast,
which brought together the family's
wide variety of cultural heritage.
From his father's Bulgarian kebabs...
to his brother-in-law's Persian rice...
it was like a microcosm of Israel
at one table.
- Sit, let's eat.
- I'm going in!
- Thank you so much.
- This is great!
- Ah! Cheers. Good job.
- Are you available for parties?
Yeah.
Guys, let's do a little toast.
He said, "Thanks."
He said there is a saying in Persian,
"May your home
be always full with guests."
Clink me, man!
The world today
so often focuses on the fault lines,
highlighting differences and amplifying
only the most extreme voices.
In such a climate, it becomes all too easy
to develop pre-conceived notions
about a people or a place.
If you want to know what Israel's
really like, you gotta come here.
Walk the streets.
Meet the people.
Eat the food.
I've been welcomed here with warmth
and openness from everybody.
I've witnessed how shared experiences
are helping forge a bond
based on mutual respect,
and discovered a sense of joy
and communion at the Israeli table.
Ah-ha!
It's a table that celebrates
the tastes and values of everyone,
and there's no question that delicious
food has the power to bring us together.
- L'chaim.
- L'chaim!
This is a very nice family you have.
Thank you so much.
- Thank you for having me.
- Welcome to Israel!
It's very nice here, I'm going to stay.
I'll be back tomorrow, okay?
Can you imagine visiting such a place?
♪ So come sit at his table ♪
♪ If you're happy, hungry
Willing, and able ♪
♪ To see how breaking bread ♪
♪ Can turn a stranger
Right into a friend ♪
♪ He will drive to you ♪
♪ He will fly to you ♪
♪ He will sing for you ♪
♪ And he'll dance for you ♪
♪ He will laugh with you ♪
♪ And he'll cry for you ♪
♪ There's just one thing
He asks in return ♪
♪ Somebody feed, somebody feed ♪
♪ Can somebody ♪
♪ Somebody feed Phil? ♪
♪ Oh, please, somebody ♪
♪ Somebody feed Phil ♪
♪ Somebody feed him now ♪
was about ten years ago.
And I have to say,
I found it to be a lot like Hebrew school.
And for me, it was also
a lot like being with family.
And we all know what that can be like.
I was given a special tour
by this one guy.
And it was kind of like being held hostage
as you were taken around...
and only being shown things
that he wanted to show me.
I don't recommend this for any country,
but here, especially,
everything was so fantastic
because it was Israel and there was
so much national pride, which is great.
But they're pointing out everything
that's phenomenal.
"Look at the tree.
Could you imagine living here
with such a tree?"
I said, "Listen, you know I come...
I actually come from Los Angeles.
We actually have a few trees there."
But there's a lot going on here.
It's one of the largest tech communities
in the world.
They invented Waze here.
They invented the USB, uh, thing.
They invented a pill that you swallow,
it has a camera in it.
I can also tell you,
if you're in an airplane,
we invented calling over
the flight attendant and saying,
"My seat doesn't go back far enough."
And, uh, also, if you're in a diner,
and the soup comes,
and you say that this is...
"I wanted it a little hotter.
Can you make it a little hotter,
but not too hot?"
We invented that.
We invented... uh... um...
"How come you're able
to be available for your friends,
but when I call, it goes to voicemail?
How come that is?"
By the way, we also, I think,
may have invented voicemail.
But we've perfected...
complaining.
♪ A happy, hungry man ♪
♪ Is traveling
All across the sea and the land ♪
♪ He's trying to understand ♪
♪ The art of pasta, pork
Chicken, and lamb ♪
♪ He will drive to you ♪
♪ He will fly to you ♪
♪ He will sing for you ♪
♪ And dance for you ♪
♪ He will laugh with you ♪
♪ And he'll cry for you ♪
♪ There's just one thing
He asks in return ♪
♪ Somebody feed, somebody feed ♪
♪ Can somebody ♪
♪ Somebody feed Phil? ♪
♪ Somebody feed him now ♪
Israel has a lot of amazing places.
Jerusalem is the spiritual center,
obviously, of the world,
and it's where all the politics
that we've read about in the news happen.
And that's what most of the news
focuses on.
Conflict.
What I want to focus on
is the part that maybe
the news doesn't cover.
How beautiful the rest of the country is.
Including Israel's capital, Tel Aviv.
Sit. Sit. Sit. It's a reunion!
I love seeing you guys.
The first people I want to see in Israel
are my friends from five years ago
when we did the Israeli version
of Raymond here.
And the guy who produced it
is Daniel Lapin,
and the guy who played
the Israeli Raymond
is named Yuval Yanai, fantastic actor,
and they met me for breakfast.
Let's get a little history here.
- Yeah.
- You're not born in this place.
In this restaurant?
- I was born actually in the corner there.
- In that pot.
I was born in Toronto, Canada.
I moved when I was 11.
- Moved back at 16.
- There you go.
Then moved back...
I've been trying to leave Israel
since I moved here.
I was born here, and then my parents
did the exact opposite.
- Went to Canada.
- Yeah.
- And then you wanted to move back?
- No.
- What happened?
- My parents did.
- We are victims of our parents.
- They decided to come back.
Hello.
You did a sitcom about that, didn't you?
He has a little bit more of an accent
than you.
Really? I have an accent?
You know what shakshuka is?
Shakshuka is a stew,
tomato stew with peppers
and other spices,
with eggs put on top
right before it's finished.
If you want it a little over medium,
you put them in a little earlier.
If you want them over easy,
you put them in at the last second
and they cook in the stew.
One of the best breakfasts you'll have.
So there's a guy who makes
all kinds of varieties of this stuff,
and his name is Dr. Shakshuka.
So we visited the doctor.
Oh!
This is with the spicy sausage.
By the way, there's eight eggs in here!
- Yeah, I know.
- Can't eat this thing. We'll die.
- He's gonna show you.
- Teach you how to eat it.
This is called dipping the bread
in the shakshuka.
- Gonna feed me?
- You're gonna be a king.
And don't worry if you burn your tongue.
There's a doctor here.
- What kind of doctor are you?
- Go. Take it.
- Really?
- Yeah.
- You're being fed by the doctor.
- Fed by the doctor.
I haven't had a grown man feed me
since I'm three years old
and my father was saying,
"Just eat already, eat something."
Mmm! That's good! That's really...
Oh, it's spicy too!
- Spicy, yes.
- I like it!
- Is it good?
- You're a king.
King cholesterol!
Can you tell me how old the building is?
Two hundred and fifty years.
This is his.
He's been collecting for 60 years.
- Wow. I love it.
- All this, uh...
I read that this is a Libyan dish,
originally. Did you know that?
Everybody believes they invented it.
It's like hummus, it's like tahini,
it's like everything.
But that's Israel, right?
It's this amalgam...
Yes, it's a melting pot.
There is no real "Israeli food."
That's true.
- Everybody came from everywhere.
- Everywhere.
This is very good.
But I heard we have to get
a mixed grill shawarma.
Juicy lamb
cooked on a rotating spit.
Shawarma is as common here
as a club sandwich is back home.
- There you go.
- Thank you!
You gotta get a mouthful.
Why are you in America?
You come here, in Israel.
Why am I in America? Of course!
Why, when you have this here with you,
why would I live in America?
Know how he became the doctor?
- No.
- How do you say...
He used to be a money changer.
He used to be like... he used to be huge.
He used to make millions.
And then he got caught
and he got sent to prison.
And in prison, he used to sneak in, like...
Shh. Everybody, be quiet!
And I love shawarma!
- What if I asked him?
- Don't.
Don't. I would be afraid.
How'd you get into this?
Started at age ten. They had a restaurant,
his father had a restaurant.
Everybody used to sell,
in the country, shakshuka on a plate.
- His father did it in a pan.
- And then what happened?
- He's getting emotional.
- Oh, no!
Yeah, it's fine.
Wow.
- It's not the food.
- I'm sorry. We hit a nerve.
No.
Sweetheart, I feel terrible.
- Why did you come here?
- I didn't want to...
What, are you a psychologist?
You're unearthing stuff that never was...
He's a sweetie pie.
He has some story, Dr. Shakshuka.
His father started the business,
and in addition to making eggs,
he was also making change,
and, uh, that turns out
not to be so legal.
You'd ask for dollars which you could only
change at a bank in an official place.
Oh, he would do it at the shawarma place.
He got a year in jail
for the money changing.
And five for the shawarma. No, I'm joking.
In jail, he was making shakshuka
for everybody.
For everybody, for the whole...
One guy yelled, from one of his cells,
"You're the doctor of shakshuka."
- That's how he got the name.
- This is the best story I ever heard.
- It's like a superhero origin story.
- Yeah, origin. Yeah, right.
It's fantastic.
When he got out, he decided,
"I'm not gonna..."
Enough with the dollar changing stuff
and the money stuff.
- Only...
- Shakshuka.
- I gotta say, thank God he got caught.
- Yeah.
- Otherwise, none of this.
- Yeah.
This is the best prison food
I've ever had.
Thank you.
Orange is the new shakshuka.
- L'chaim.
- L'chaim.
Established in 1948,
the state of Israel is a young country,
and Tel Aviv is known
as the party capital of the Middle East.
It's a city of diners, drinkers,
dog owners, surfers, and sunbathers.
One of the biggest draws are its beaches,
stretched along eight miles
of Mediterranean coastline.
I'm gonna spare you the sight
of me in a bathing suit,
and instead, get dressed
and hit the market.
So I meet Michael Solomonov,
my friend from Philadelphia,
who has probably the top
Israeli restaurant in America, Zahav.
Just this year,
he won the James Beard Award
for most outstanding chef in America.
And he agreed to come to Israel with us
and show me around.
So this is it,
synagogue-slash-hummusia.
- Was business not good at the synagogue?
- I guess so.
- How do you say excuse me?
- They don't say it, just go.
Elbows out. Such an Israeli moment,
you just gotta shove your way in there.
We go in...
Wow.
And sure enough, you're in a synagogue.
We're here for services.
And they're making hummus!
Wow. Look how he did that!
Like, I don't know,
how many countries are represented
just in this dish?
The hummus, which is
from all over the Middle East, right?
- There's the foul, that's from Egypt.
- Right.
The hard-boiled eggs,
that's like a Jewish-y thing.
Zhug, which is a hot sauce,
but it was brought to Israel
by the Yemenite Jews in the '50s.
- But that's Israeli cuisine, right?
- Totally.
- Something from everybody.
- A hundred percent.
This is the best breakfast ever.
- I'm going in.
- Gotta wipe. That's the deal.
Like this?
Yeah, like open it up,
you know, and then go...
Like you're sort of snowboarding
or skateboarding. That's...
When you say like, "Let's go get hummus,"
you say, like...
...which means you want
to go wipe some hummus.
This is already my favorite synagogue.
I'm just waiting for the rabbi
to come and ask me for a donation.
There's Torah scrolls on the wall,
and the books, the religious books,
are lining the shelves.
You know, I gotta get the story,
so I asked the guy to come over.
We have a question. Are you...
Do people still pray here?
No. No.
- No more?
- This is concept. Uh...
- This is the concept?
- This is the concept, yes.
And he says,
"Oh, no. It was never a synagogue."
"What?" "This is my theme restaurant."
You mean it was never a synagogue?
- No.
- Was it?
- No.
- Thought it was a synagogue.
- No.
- That's hilarious.
So this is the style of the restaurant.
Like a Disney-esque
kind of theme restaurant,
like Pirates of the Caribbean restaurant,
but it's a synagogue.
Hey, I got a great idea for a restaurant.
What if you thought
you were going to synagogue,
but instead of synagogue,
you got hummus?
Always fun, my people. Always fun.
It's such a funny concept, like,
what if they did the dentist's office?
This is not a dentist's office, but you...
we sell ice cream.
By the way, if you come to Israel,
you're gonna have the hummus of your life.
Now this is not a synagogue,
but it's still a holy place.
This is Abu Hassan.
Now you see this guy
is going around the table
and shouting, "Yalla, yalla, yalla,"
because there is a big line
and he wants people to finish and go out.
Like, "Hurry up!"
- Like, "Hurry up!" Yeah.
- You can't sit too long.
They'll kick you out.
I'm worried we won't finish.
Don't chew, swallow. We have no time.
They want you to have it,
enjoy it, get out, tell your friends,
have them come, enjoy it, and get out.
Yalla, yalla, yalla...
- What are we having now?
- We're gonna eat a little bit of sabich.
- Sabich.
- A fried eggplant sandwich.
Ah.
- Shalom!
- Shalom!
How are you guys? Good to see you.
- Sabich.
- Sabich.
- Sabich Tchernichovsky.
- Tchernichovsky.
In my opinion there's, like,
two great sabich places,
- and this is one of them.
- Wow.
My father is from Iraq.
This is Iraqian food.
Yeah. And the style here
is really different.
The eggplant, they fry it,
but it's really, really thin
and gets kind of crispy.
- Whoa, like potato chips almost.
- Yeah, yeah.
It's fried eggplant,
it's hard boiled eggs, tahina.
The way these guys layer it
is, like, amazing.
That is beautiful.
He's not just dumping it,
he's painting it. He's painting it.
What's great about this place is the way
they make their sandwich is perfect.
- It eats perfectly.
- Here we go.
Look at the color!
Come on! You're like a genius!
- No.
- Yeah.
It's so good.
Know why Israeli men
have back problems?
You get the sandwiches,
and you have to eat it like this,
like bent over, you know?
This is as good a sandwich
as I've ever had.
In just a couple blocks,
Michael's taken me on a culinary journey
across the Middle East,
from Egypt to Iraq.
Next stop, Yemen.
All right, here we go. So this is like...
This is "Simon, The King of Soup."
With a name like that...
- The King of Soup.
- Yeah, it's been around forever.
- How are ya?
- Shalom!
- I'm okay.
- Phil.
The King of Soup has passed on,
but I meet his daughter,
the Princess of Soup.
She makes Yemeni-style soups
out of all things I usually try to avoid.
- This is belly button.
- Did she say "belly button"?
Not belly button,
but it's belly button coq au vin.
It's not... It's gizzard, actually.
- This is off.
- Off?
This is meat from the head.
- From the cheek, right?
- It's very soft.
You know you don't add dairy
to these soups, right?
Obviously, because it wouldn't be kosher.
So this is fenugreek that they soak
and then they whip.
And the fenugreek holds air,
so this gives it texture.
Can be maple syrupy,
but it also can be like,
kind of like armpity a little bit too.
- So...
- You're really selling it.
Yeah.
People die for it.
- Really?
- It makes a little smell
in the body when they pee.
Two, three days, no sex.
- Two, three days, no sex?
- No sex, because the smell.
- Not a problem for me.
- Oh, no.
- No problem for me either.
- Married almost 30 years.
We wind up with cheek.
Put some spicy here.
- Okay.
- Okay?
- Come to my house and tell me what to do.
- I will. I will.
Gonna do it just 'cause
she's gonna yell at me otherwise, so...
Let's do that.
Wow.
- How is it?
- It's amazing.
That's nice, 'cause there's a lot of...
collagen, you know, in the cheeks.
Maybe I should inject some in my face.
- Mmm.
- Did you know that?
- No, but that might be a good...
- Taste something. This is oxtail.
- Oh!
- I didn't show you.
You're afraid to eat? I am...
- No, why didn't you put it in?
- No. He's not afraid.
Mmm!
- That might be the best thing.
- Yeah.
- And the problem is that the turmeric is...
- You don't eat the soup!
I'm eating the soup, but...
We're eating a lot today, that's all.
- We're tasting everything.
- Okay.
We can't finish everything. No, no more.
- But it's delicious.
- It's so good.
- We love it.
- Welcome.
- Thank you so much.
- Enjoy!
Wow, the demands and the guilt.
I wonder if we're related.
- I think you gotta do this.
- Yeah, just do it.
- Yeah!
- How's that? It wins, right? Boom!
Table flip over. Out!
Of course, if you flip this table over,
she'd come out with a butcher...
A knife. Yeah, kill you.
Here's one of the best things
about this city, Tel Aviv,
and I think a lot of the great cities
in the world have this in common,
bike lanes.
First of all, it's all along the ocean.
You can go all the way from Tel Aviv
to Yafo and probably beyond.
It's miles long,
one of the best bike paths in the world.
And then on the major streets,
there's a median between the traffic going
this way and the traffic going that way.
Tree-lined, beautiful.
Here's where the bikes go.
Here's where the people walk next to it.
And it's just so pleasant and so sweet.
Can you imagine living in a place
with such a bike lane?
Oh, sorry. Sorry.
I was told that this place
had great coffee, so I stopped,
and I met these two wonderful...
you know, I'm gonna call them kids
because I'm twice their age.
And they sat and talked with me.
Tel Aviv is amazing.
- It's a new city.
- Yeah.
- Comparatively. Like 70 years old.
- Yeah.
- And the beach is gorgeous, right?
- Yeah.
Everything on the beach.
I'm not crazy about, to be honest,
the architecture.
- I think the buildings could be a little...
- If you can call it that.
What would you call it?
A bunch of Jews were given a country,
and they threw something together
real quick before it was taken away.
That was as good an explanation
as I've gotten.
She came from Moscow,
and he came from Barcelona.
But there they were
in this transitionary time of life...
in kind of a happening city of the moment.
What are you drinking here?
- Carrot juice?
- That's... Yeah.
I'm getting ready for a cleanse.
- Oh, good. Okay.
- So...
Yeah, you look like you need a cleanse.
What's the worst thing about living here?
Have you heard of why Israelis
are called "Sabras"?
- Why?
- Know what a Sabra is?
Yes. Someone born here.
Yes, but do you know
what an actual Sabra is?
- No.
- Sabra is a cactus fruit.
It has thorns on the outside,
- but it's sweet on the inside.
- Sweet on the inside.
They are warm people, you know?
For the good and for the bad.
- You get to know them really fast.
- Right.
Because they assume...
They feel like they're family.
You know what? I don't know.
This is something that American Jews think
when they come here.
"Oh, we're all family."
I'm not sure that Israelis
think of it that way.
When there's a crisis in the country,
we all think of it that way.
When everything is calm...
- No, it's "Get out of my way, me first."
- Yeah, exactly.
It's funny. I say all this
and I still haven't moved back
to the States, so I'm still here.
- Something's keeping you.
- Yeah.
- I loved meeting you. Thank you.
- Yeah. Nice to meet you.
Great to meet you. Good luck.
- Good luck with your cleanse.
- Yes.
There's parts of Tel Aviv
where the architecture is kind of,
you know, 1970s-ish,
but then when you come
to the old city of Jaffa,
you have these buildings,
some of which are a thousand,
sometimes 2,000 years old.
The older I get, the more I like old.
The ancient port of Jaffa
is a predominately Arab neighborhood
in the oldest part of Tel Aviv: Yafo.
This is where the biblical stories
of Jonah, Solomon,
and Saint Peter were set.
And this is from the book of Saint Nathan.
I passed your bakery before and it
looked so good, I want to buy something.
I happen to walk by a bakery,
and I noticed that the Arab gentleman
behind the counter had a shirt:
"Arabs and Jews refuse to be enemies."
The bakery has been here since 1879.
- What?!
- Yeah.
My great-grandfather started this bakery,
and we've always coexisted with Arabs
and Jews before 1948, after 1948,
so we decided to make this shirt
as a tribute.
- That's a good story.
- Our long history, yeah.
- Hold this one second.
- Okay.
- I'm going in.
- Yeah.
This is right out of the oven, right?
- Ow. It's hot. I have to wait a minute.
- Yeah.
- Okay, take your time.
- Okay.
Now?
Mmm!
Wow! No wonder we get along!
Yeah. That's what keeps us together
and always has, 140 years.
All right, this is pretty damn delicious.
You made me so happy!
Shalom!
So I want to recommend this bakery
to everybody:
Abouelafia.
Wonder if this shot is wide enough
that you'll believe this is me.
So my friend Nancy Silverton has
a friend who writes all about Israel,
loves Israel, loves Tel Aviv, especially.
His name is Steven Rothfeld.
Wrote a book called Israel Eats
with Nancy.
- I'm a vegetarian.
- Yeah.
This is a place that I found
and walked into,
and saw the vegetables lined up,
so it completely appealed to me.
I should tell you now.
I don't eat vegetables.
Now, I can't say
that I seek out vegetarian restaurants.
I like vegetarian food.
I'm not against vegetarian food.
Please don't send me letters.
But it's just, you know... uh...
It's not something I get all excited for.
But this is not just some pile
of boring vegetables.
These are serious plates
of delicious food, beautifully presented.
Zakaim is a Persian-style restaurant.
It's owned by Harel and his two sisters.
We wanted to know
what was in your ricotta.
- Basically, uh, soy milk.
- Oh.
And some salt.
So, is this vegan?
- Vegan.
- Yeah.
Not just vegetarian.
There's no animal products of any kind.
Totally vegan.
There are over 400
vegan-friendly restaurants in Israel,
and that number is only gonna go up
as soon as people taste this.
- Cauliflower gondi?
- Yeah.
Basically it's a very traditional
Persian dish.
There is chickpeas in the gondi, okay?
Mmm! You don't miss meat at all.
This is like the best chips and dip
you ever had.
What Harel told me
when I first met him was
becoming vegan gave them
something to talk about
other than the political situation
in Israel, and they loved that.
We should all become vegan
in the United States.
Yes.
The flavors were so unique,
where you don't miss the meat at all,
where you don't even think about it.
I spent most of my time
- working in France and Italy.
- Yeah.
Never was interested in visiting Israel.
That's interesting,
because I felt the same way.
There's a misperception,
I think, of Israel in our media.
- News likes conflict, right?
- Absolutely.
So that's what they focus on.
People can find pleasure and happiness
in a land of conflict
where they're forced to live their lives
against this backdrop of things
that are completely out of their control.
- Hello.
- You talk too much.
- French fries. Yeah.
- Yeah!
Hand-torn French fries
with a soy-based mayo
that's not only as good as the real thing,
it's better.
Wow.
And here's a grilled mushroom skewer.
We put it on a charcoal barbecue.
Yeah.
And then all the flavors
are exactly like meat.
That is like meat off the grill,
you're right.
- Yeah.
- Wow, that's good.
I didn't think about meat once.
I mean,
I just thought about meat just now.
But that whole meal,
I didn't think of anything
but how delicious this food is.
I just thought about meat again.
I think you should be a vegan
if you like it so much.
Don't pressure me, okay? I just got here.
One, two, three, four.
One of the deadliest,
most effective self-defenses,
even offenses, in the world
is something called Krav Maga.
It started in the Israeli army, right?
- Right.
- And you were in the army?
Because in Israel, everyone
have to be soldiers, you know that?
Yes, every man and woman, every...
- When you're how old?
- While you're 18.
- Eighteen.
- Yes.
I've never taken a self-defense class
in any discipline at all.
- Okay?
- Don't be afraid.
- All right. Yes.
- I promise I won't hurt you.
This is my motto in life,
"Please don't hurt me."
Give me your hands. Very good.
I want you to put them here, like...
Yeah, to defend yourself.
So if I came from here...
Easier, yeah.
- Look how your reflexes start to work.
- Yeah.
- Can you see that? Ha!
- If only the person...
- Oh!
- Oh, my God!
Did you see that?
It took you how much time?
If that was real life
and the knife came at me,
I would be so busy screaming and running,
or dying, that I wouldn't have a...
If you were dying,
it wouldn't matter, right?
Put that on your... "Krav Maga.
If you're dying, it doesn't matter."
I can just, you know, like this.
Yes.
- A few, like, times here, in the groin.
- Yes.
- Wow. This is, uh...
- Yes.
Need to call your wife?
I think I know where this is going.
Push the neck here. Get out of here!
Are you alive, Phil?
Maybe if I just lay here,
she'll leave me alone.
And go away from here!
I got that down. All right, that I can do.
One kick...
one punch, and go away.
- Yeah, I like this idea.
- Okay.
- Are you ready?
- Yes.
Ha!
- Oh, wait.
- Very good!
- Yes! And go! See...
- No, I want more!
Who else wants a piece?
Very good, who else?
At the cutting edge
of the Tel Aviv culinary scene is Mashya.
Chef Yossi Shitrit draws upon
his Moroccan heritage
to reinvent traditional Israeli cuisine.
Joining me are my friends, Daniel,
and food writer, chef,
and TV host Ruthie Russo.
L'chaim.
All this guy does is eat
and I'm the fat guy. Why does that happen?
This is a mini pita
with shakshuka, egg yolk cream,
with hot chili above it
and micro coriander.
Someone told me that the new,
like, taking pictures before you eat,
is, like, the new
"thank you for the food."
I have something better than Instagram.
- Yes, what is that?
- I have three 4K cameras focused on this.
Which is what you need to pick up
that delicious drop of shakshuka in there.
- Cheers!
- I don't do hot stuff.
It's not that spicy. I tried it.
Yeah, "not that spicy"
is still in the realm of spicy.
- I'm telling you.
- Not spicy.
Okay, can we have a drumroll here?
Not spicy.
Boop!
- Wait, hold on.
- Psh.
It's not spicy.
- So...
- Wow! That's beautiful!
This is our carpaccio.
- That's dairy?
- Yeah.
I don't do dairy and meat together.
- You are so much fun.
- Such a pain in the ass.
Know what's great? He's not gonna
eat anything, and we get everything.
I'm fine with that.
We went to his house for dinner
and he made in his apartment
delicious chicken,
and he forgot that he put a whole
cauliflower in the bottom of the oven,
and he pulls this out
and it's black on top,
and his wife comes home to find smoke
- coming out of the cauliflower.
- Flames.
This is a version of the story.
I've been to your place,
by the way, very nice house,
chicken, and then the next day
we had chicken,
- and after, we had chicken.
- Because you don't eat anything!
- No.
- Maybe it's you!
- There you go.
- It has to be burned. I was going to say...
- This is our famous cauliflower mafrum.
- Perfect.
- Cauliflower!
- Yeah.
And look, it's burned.
It comes with lamb kebab inside of it.
- And above it, you have yogurt.
- You're not gonna try it?
- You enjoy this. I don't...
- You only eat your cauliflower?
- Yes, I'm very particular about that.
- Wait.
- How is it?
- It's good, very different from yours.
- Because it's good.
- It's not on fire.
But... Oh, wow!
It's coming fast and furious!
This is a raw red sashimi tuna
with a wheat salad.
Do you like any of this?
Um, I love to watch you guys eat it.
- So just be careful.
- Whoa! Hey! Your cauliflower!
Almost.
This is the gratitude I get.
Okay, so this is
a grapefruit marshmallow
- that you can burn in smoke and fire.
- Yes! Come on! This is fun!
By the way, how evocative
is that smell of a camp fire?
Let's make a bigger fire.
I like that.
Here, break up your chair.
So we just happen to be here
for Purim here in Israel.
Big celebration, big parties.
It's like Israeli Halloween.
It was like a rave times the West Village
times West Hollywood.
All of this is making me feel
slightly underdressed.
I need to find something
a bit more my speed.
There's a magical place
where ladies meet in Israel.
It's called the mall.
My mother's always had wonderful friends,
and I've always been
brought into the conversation.
So it's very natural for me
if I'm out grabbing coffee
and I see women of a certain age,
I feel like... Is this weird?
...that I fit in very well.
I feel like these are my people.
Shalom!
- Shalom!
- Hi! How are you?
- May I join you?
- Yeah.
It's okay?
They told me Tel Aviv was filled
with beautiful women,
and now I've found them.
I'm Phil.
Beautiful lady.
- Dora.
- Dora, you're also beautiful.
This is the parliament, right?
- Yeah.
- Yeah. Parliament.
When the ladies get together,
you make a parliament,
you make all the decisions
for the country.
- How is the country doing?
- Fantastic.
Fantastic, that's what I think.
Have a cookie.
No? It's good.
It's all right, you can skip lunch.
We meet once a week.
Yes. So, oh, this is tradition?
- Ten to twelve.
- Ten to twelve.
What do you like most
about living in Israel?
It's good to bring up children here.
- Did you all bring up children here?
- Yes.
Come to live in Israel.
- Come to live here?
- You will be happy.
- We just met!
- Yeah. Why not?
Nice. Well, you're very sweet.
By the way, I said hi to that table,
they didn't want to talk to me.
Do you know those ladies over there?
Don't know them?
Don't want to know them?
We don't.
Every week, they meet.
Every Tuesday, for years.
They've never spoken to each other.
How can there be peace in the Middle East
if we can't get two tables
of old Jewish ladies to even say hello?
This is my mission.
What if they came and said hello?
Come and say hello!
Please, sit.
You don't want to stay?
No? You want a cookie for the road?
- No, thank you.
- Okay.
Nice talking to you.
It's not easy wrangling ladies.
And then, look at this.
A miracle.
Hello! You came all the way
from the next table.
- Yeah, a long way.
- A long way.
Everybody that comes to the table,
they get a cookie.
Thank you. I ate just now.
You're the first Jews I've seen
that don't want to eat anything,
I can't believe it.
Have you been to America?
- Yes.
- You like it?
Eh...
- What's your name?
- Ariella.
Ariella, this is Dora.
If Dora and Ariella can make friends,
- isn't there hope for the world?
- Yeah.
I'm gonna need subtitles.
My work is done here.
Thank you, Ariella. You're very nice.
- Thank you.
- Nice to meet you, Dora.
Dora, you're hanging on. Let me go, Dora!
- You're lovely, too.
- No.
- "Don't kiss me"?
- Don't kiss me.
"Don't you touch me"? I get it.
I still... you know, I don't need you,
but you know why?
Because I have Dora.
Dora, give me another one.
Ah-ha.
This is not a tiny thing,
this a big...
- This is a big thing we have here.
- A big little market!
We have 71 producers, farmers,
cheese makers.
There's a woman here
named Michal Ansky,
and she's very famous in Israel.
She started the kind of
slow food movement,
farmers' market in Tel Aviv.
The miracle of Israel
is that there was nothing here,
and not only did you get it to grow,
you got it to grow incredible stuff.
We're very good in, uh,
copying and understanding traditions
and building things from scratch.
We take a little bit of this
and a little bit of that.
We learned a lot
from the Palestinian agriculture.
And it's amazing to see because now Israel
is one of the most interesting places
in the world to eat.
Look at the carrots!
I like how excited you are.
Look at the radish!
I'm divorced,
but if I'll get married again,
I want to hold like, this, as my...
- That's sweet.
- Isn't it?
- Imagine with a white dress.
- Somebody please...
This poor, unfortunate-looking girl
needs a husband.
Please, someone, won't you help?
Michal opened
Tel Aviv's Port Market in 2010,
and her enthusiasm for the project
has not diminished.
This is like one of my favorite stalls
- in the market.
- Too bad it's not colorful.
It's produce grown on a salty desert soil.
The sweetest variety of peppers.
- In salty desert soil...
- Salty desert soil.
Little bit of olive oil, za'atar, salt...
Who needs a man? Who needs a husband?
I am fine with my tomato.
Don't let my wife hear you,
she'll leave me for a tomato.
I chased Michal around the stalls.
This is a savory hamantaschen.
This I never had.
We stop at one of Michal's favorites,
and I gotta tell you,
this is worth stopping for.
You are standing next to Sherry Herring.
Sherry's my mother.
Really?
So the Jewish people have
a deep, deep history with herring.
Very, very strong emotional history
with herring.
- Yeah.
- It's what you eat on Kiddush,
it's what you eat on shul,
on the synagogue.
It's what you eat on holidays.
It's what you eat before Shabbat,
it's what you eat after Shabbat.
And you always have it
with a shot of vodka.
And it's like the most amazing
herring sandwich on planet Earth.
This is the most excited I've ever seen
- a human being get about herring.
- Yeah.
I want that herring.
It's one of those things
where you see it being made,
and you know how good it's going to be,
and then it's better.
So good.
Sherry Herring, one of the best sandwiches
I've ever had in my stupid life.
- L'chaim.
- L'chaim, everybody.
Come to Tel Aviv, go to Sherry Herring,
get the sandwich, tell her I said to come.
Why? Because next time she sees me,
I want a free sandwich.
I want to just stay and eat everything
in Tel Aviv,
but I'm told there's so many
other places in Israel we can't miss.
So we're heading north.
Up the coast is
the ancient Roman city of Caesarea,
or, in Hebrew, Kaesarea.
It was discovered by people
making a kibbutz in the '50s,
and they were digging,
and they hit ancient Roman ruins.
This was built for the city's inauguration
in the year 10 B.C.
And this seated... 12,000 people
would come and watch chariot races here.
These are real steps.
Still good.
It's amazing how just
a little bit of design,
and suddenly you can see
how grand the thing must have been
and how beautiful.
All right, I'm good.
When I think of Israel,
I think of cities and deserts,
but that's not the whole story.
The further north you go,
just like California,
the more beautiful it gets.
This is the biblical region of Galilee,
or as I call it, the Israeli Catskills.
It's a little like fairy land up here.
Michael Solomonov
has brought me to a resort here
that's also a stunning organic farm.
So this whole idea that all of Israel
was desert, it's not really true.
Israel has everything.
You have snow at the north of the country,
- desert at the south...
- Yeah.
...and everything in between.
This is very unexpected
and beautiful.
This is like
where the Israelis kind of hang out.
You know, it's kind of quiet,
it overlooks the Sea of Galilee,
and the air is sweet. You can smell,
especially this time of year,
you can smell the blossoms in the air,
you know. It's floral.
The hotel's chef, Guy Lasnitzky,
tells us that every single bite of food
they serve here
is grown right here on their farm.
Hello, ladies!
Cows! What's happening?
Some of the biggest cows
I ever saw in my life.
In California, they're more
self-conscious about their figure.
- so they stay slim.
- Yeah.
Listen, when a James Beard
award-winning chef
offers to improvise lunch for you,
I suggest you say okay.
I'm going, like, super rustic
with a lot of the things.
The stuff we took out of the ground,
I just dressed with olive oil
- and cooked over charcoal, right? Um...
- Yeah.
We took some of that Svatit,
this goat's milk cheese,
and I wrapped it in Swiss chard.
We've also got some crushed almonds,
flowers, which we haven't determined
whether they're poisonous or okay to eat.
I just wish you were someone
who knew what they were doing.
You've come
to the wrong place, my friend.
- Mmm. The onion!
- Yeah.
That's like Israel in a bite,
and super fresh because we literally
just picked this out of the ground.
Exactly.
By the way, the flowers?
They are poisonous.
More? Really? More?
Yeah, more.
So, we got a little duck that, uh...
- That's the one that woke me.
- This is it.
The ducks woke me up this morning.
That was the way I woke up.
Where ducks were quacking
in the morning, he goes,
"You know we can eat them."
You asked for this.
Philip's revenge.
Some pistachios.
Oh.
It looks amazing.
Hee, hee.
All the onions, everything that
made the stew was from here, so, enjoy!
Oh, my God! Michael!
It was kind of miraculous to see him work.
Especially miraculous
because every single bite of that lunch
was fantastic.
None of it he had ever made before.
Hug it out.
Come live with me.
So we traveled up
to the port city of Akko.
I'm sleeping in a beautiful hotel,
and at 4:30 in the morning...
There are loud speakers on the mosque,
pointing at my head.
And at 4:30 in the morning,
you bolt out of bed
and think there's a man
next to you in bed, yelling in your ear.
It's actually quite beautiful once
you're fully conscious and look around.
Akko was established
four to five thousand years ago.
It's one of the oldest continually
inhabited places on the Earth.
Akko is one of the most
integrated cities in Israel.
It's populated by both Arabs and Jews.
Everyone going about their lives,
working, shopping, eating,
and celebrating alongside one another.
- You're Uri Buri.
- Yes.
This gentleman's name is Uri Jeremias.
He's a larger-than-life character
with a larger-than-life beard.
And he has a famous restaurant in Akko
called Uri Buri.
Did anyone ever tell you
you look like David Letterman?
- I don't know David Letterman.
- No?
You look just like him.
- I never met him.
- Very handsome.
He has a beautiful beard like you now.
Yeah, but it's impossible.
Nobody has a beard like me.
That's true, too.
This is just a market
that works for the people.
- Not a tourist market.
- No.
Oh, it smells so good.
Here you have all these spice shops
and all vegetables and fruits
you can imagine.
And culinary? It is a paradise.
Hummus places and real small
manufacturers of sweets.
Wow, this is the real deal.
This is Mr. Shakshia.
You have the most beautiful color
of any falafel stand.
Thank you. It's not falafel.
This is golden ball.
- Golden ball.
- Yes. Why?
Because I put the lemon here inside.
Taste that.
Mmm! Mmm...
- Mmm!
- It's so good.
If you eat falafel,
you take this preserved lemon,
put it in there with the other stuff,
it totally makes it.
I love this. This is great.
It changed my life.
I haven't seen that before.
If that changed my life,
what does that say about my life?
Uh, you know... Have you tried this?
Boker Tov! Hello!
- Hi, good morning.
- Good morning.
You walk down the street with Uri Buri.
He's like Bruce Springsteen.
Ah, Uri Buri!
Uri, Uri Buri!
- Hey, Uri Buri!
- Do I have to introduce you?
Uri Buri.
- I'm Phil. Nice to meet you.
- Everybody loves Uri in this city.
Everyone knows and loves him.
- It's because...
- Uri!
Uri's here!
Wow.
- Nice to meet you.
- He's the mayor. He's the mayor of Akko.
- He is the mayor.
- Yeah.
He's the town historian. He built a hotel.
He built a restaurant,
and he has an ice cream parlor. He has a...
He's... He is Akko.
He is the embodiment of this city,
and he's the keeper of the flame.
And a great chef, by the way.
This is smoked aubergines
and raw Spanish mackerel with nigella.
- It's very simple, very basic.
- Simple is good.
- There are two secrets in cooking.
- Yeah.
- One is to buy the best materials.
- Yes.
And the second is not to spoil them.
I am trying to cook with eight ingredients
maximum in one dish.
Oh! Beautiful!
So here comes a dish, and it's
sliced salmon in a little soy sauce.
And there's a green ball on top.
This looks like wasabi.
- Yeah, but...
- Oh, look, it's frozen.
- It's sorbet of wasabi.
- Oh, come on!
Yeah.
Uri! How old is this recipe?
Uh, 20 years.
- Can't get it off the menu.
- That long ago?
He invented that when sushi
was just kind of catching on.
So the fact that he took wasabi
and turned it into sorbet then,
I told him, I said,
"You're ahead of your time, Uri Buri."
Wow.
- This is the OMG.
- OMG. Oh, my God.
No.
What's OMG?
OMG is Orange, Mandarin, and Grapefruit.
That's my, uh, OMG.
- If you eat my OMG...
- You say, "Oh, my God."
You say, "Oh, my God." So it's OMG.
Now I will show you something.
I'll put some olive oil on top.
Oh!
- Try it with olive oil.
- That's brilliant.
Huh? Opens your eyes.
Wow.
Oh, my God.
- You see? You said it.
- I said it.
- I didn't mean to say it.
- I know.
It was really, really delicious.
It would be a great restaurant anywhere,
and it's in this little ancient city
of Akko.
Throughout history,
Akko was a very important city
as it was the safest natural harbor
in the Eastern part of the Mediterranean.
Every ruler wanted to control Akko,
so it changed hands very frequent,
and it was really a city to fight for.
So you see the influence of all
these bits of history in present day.
These rocks are from the Crusades,
these rocks are from the Byzantine era,
on top of them are
from the Ottoman Empire,
and on and on until present day.
Civilizations just built
one on top of the other.
I was born as a Palestinian.
I have a Palestinian birth certificate.
Wow.
- We were very poor.
- Yeah.
But we didn't have...
we never had the feeling of being poor
because everybody around was poor.
- If someone...
- You didn't feel...
You didn't feel the politics of the time,
you didn't feel the violence of the time?
Yes, sure we felt it.
I mean, if there were bombings,
we went to the shelter, you know?
And this is throughout the years.
But there is no aggressivity
in the street, in the market.
Eh, all around, you see very calm place.
Uri Buri said to me, "What don't you see?"
You know what the answer is? Policemen.
No need for them.
So many people
can tell you about coexistence,
but they never practiced it.
And I can tell you
that there is one main ingredient
that makes it possible to live together,
and this is respect.
The question, "Can we all get along?"
seems to be answered in Akko, at least.
L'chaim!
- Amen to this!
- Yeah.
I like your message.
I don't want to make it
too much of a tourist destination,
but you should all go.
- Hello!
- Hello!
How are you enjoying Israel this time?
I have to say I love it this time.
- I'm having a fantastic time.
- Good.
I'm in this ancient city of Akko.
- Okay.
- Okay.
Can you hear what's happening here?
Listen.
Birds? Birds?
Birds?
What kind of birds do you have there?
Oh, they're being called to pray, yeah.
This woke me up at 4:30 in the morning,
I didn't know what was going on.
- Oh, you're getting a call.
- Who is it?
I don't know.
- Who is it?
- Bella.
Forget it. Let it go.
- Okay.
- Someone you love?
Tell her...
just tell her I'll call her back.
- Here. Give it to me.
- Call from Bella.
Bella? Good morning.
Can I call you back?
We're just Skyping with Philip.
Hi, Bella!
She's saying hello to you.
- Say... Okay.
- Hello.
- I don't... I think she hung up.
- Of course.
Did I tell you the story
about the Wailing Wall?
- Go ahead.
- It's the Western Wall.
The Western Wall.
This guard was seeing this man,
he comes every day to pray,
and he walks over to him and he said,
"Mister, I see you here every day,
what are you praying for?"
"Uh...
I pray for, uh... health,
I pray for karnosa,
that means I want to make a lot of money,
and I pray for peace."
He said, "That's great. Does it help?"
He said, "You're talking to a wall."
I think maybe it meant
"It's like talking to a wall."
I don't want to rewrite your jokes,
but do the joke again.
Ma, I want you to try to pretend
that you like this joke.
The 50th time?
Sorry, you married him.
This is what you get.
He said, "I pray for health,
making the money, and I pray for peace."
He said, "That's great."
He said, "Does it help?"
"I think you're talking to a wall."
Again, you said it wrong.
"It's like talking to a wall."
- You know what it...
- "It's like talking to a wall."
- No.
- By the way, this is a very apt joke
to work on with you because telling you
to do it the right way is like...
Do you want one more shot at it?
It was good until the end.
I think if you're talking to a wall,
honestly, it's just as good.
No, it's not just as good.
You messed it up.
And with that...
Bye. Take care.
You too.
It's my last night in Israel
and Michael's invited me to come join
his family for a barbecue.
Being the family of a great chef,
this was no ordinary barbecue.
It was an Israeli feast,
which brought together the family's
wide variety of cultural heritage.
From his father's Bulgarian kebabs...
to his brother-in-law's Persian rice...
it was like a microcosm of Israel
at one table.
- Sit, let's eat.
- I'm going in!
- Thank you so much.
- This is great!
- Ah! Cheers. Good job.
- Are you available for parties?
Yeah.
Guys, let's do a little toast.
He said, "Thanks."
He said there is a saying in Persian,
"May your home
be always full with guests."
Clink me, man!
The world today
so often focuses on the fault lines,
highlighting differences and amplifying
only the most extreme voices.
In such a climate, it becomes all too easy
to develop pre-conceived notions
about a people or a place.
If you want to know what Israel's
really like, you gotta come here.
Walk the streets.
Meet the people.
Eat the food.
I've been welcomed here with warmth
and openness from everybody.
I've witnessed how shared experiences
are helping forge a bond
based on mutual respect,
and discovered a sense of joy
and communion at the Israeli table.
Ah-ha!
It's a table that celebrates
the tastes and values of everyone,
and there's no question that delicious
food has the power to bring us together.
- L'chaim.
- L'chaim!
This is a very nice family you have.
Thank you so much.
- Thank you for having me.
- Welcome to Israel!
It's very nice here, I'm going to stay.
I'll be back tomorrow, okay?
Can you imagine visiting such a place?
♪ So come sit at his table ♪
♪ If you're happy, hungry
Willing, and able ♪
♪ To see how breaking bread ♪
♪ Can turn a stranger
Right into a friend ♪
♪ He will drive to you ♪
♪ He will fly to you ♪
♪ He will sing for you ♪
♪ And he'll dance for you ♪
♪ He will laugh with you ♪
♪ And he'll cry for you ♪
♪ There's just one thing
He asks in return ♪
♪ Somebody feed, somebody feed ♪
♪ Can somebody ♪
♪ Somebody feed Phil? ♪
♪ Oh, please, somebody ♪
♪ Somebody feed Phil ♪
♪ Somebody feed him now ♪