Beirut
ChI Eats 
Restaurants – where to lunch, where to dine

ChI Eats At….

Beirut is a seriously foodie city. Not for nothing do the Lebs pride themselves on both their own cuisine, and their appreciation of others’. People love to eat, to cook, to share food with friends.

Lunch

Hamra & Ras Beirut
A low key, but delightful joint for gossip and sandwiches is Lina’s Place on Hamra St.

But top of the list in the Ras Beirut area, is Gruen. Booking is a must, it’s always full. Retro sixties décor on the ground floor of the famous Gefinor twin towers, Gruen caters for ladies who lunch, business men in suits and doctors and professors from the nearby American University and Hospital. This is definitely a place to see and be seen - but it is also a place to eat innovative salads, wraps and classic dishes, made with top ingredients.

Especially on a Friday (but do reserve), drive to Felucca restaurant, in the old Sporting Club. Felucca – the best, best, best. Simple, unpretentious, with the freshest fish (Sultan Ibrahim) in town, fabulous mezze, and divine “batata harra” (fried potatoes with garlic, lemon and chopped coriander, all fried together and used more as a sauce on top, than as a garnish). ChI’s absolutely favourite place. Half a bottle of delicious, light, chilled Lebanese white wine…..

And the Sporting – a relic of pre-civil war days, with the slightly run down winter look to the sunbathing terraces, peopled only by the odd fisherman and the rays of the dying pale winter sun’s rays on the rough sea. Not for nothing is the Mediterranean known as the Bahr al Abiyadh, the Ak Deniz, the White Sea…. Whatever the season, it glows white where the sunlight hits it, strong or weak, winter or summer.

So too the nearby Riviera Club (also known as Silicone Beach because so many of its female visitors are addicted to the magic that famous gel can achieve!) the Riviera does brisk lunchtime business throughout the summer, offering diners a view - of the sea and of the ladies!

Goroud, Gemmayzeh & Monnot

Or, at the top of Gouroud, nestling behind a discreet bamboo façade boasting a modern water feature is Chez Paul, one of the most popular spots on the eastern side of the city. A restaurant-patisserie in the ubiquitous Paul format, this busy location complete with garden, bustles from morning till late night. Like most establishments in Gemmayze, it has an army of valet parking attendants who whisk the cars away to hidden locations nearby, for one thing this narrow, one way street does not have is a plethora of parking bays.

Photo: Bethune Carmichael, Lonely Planet Images

In the Monnot district, are excellent bars and restaurants ranging from the extraordinarily elegant Al Dente, on the ground floor of the trendy Albergo Hotel, to Crystal, one of Beirut’s most famous nightclubs where legendary sums of money are dispensed on the world-famous champagne. From the exquisite food and fine wines of Picasso to the solid Italian fare of Pinocchio, from Armenian delicacies at Mayass, to the much loved formula of the Paris/Geneva stakehouse chain, L’Entrecote, the Monnot has it all.

Saifi & Solidere

For fish-lovers, after trying Felucca, compare and check out a different but equally delicious fish experience at the Mandaloon Fish (located near Le Biel). And carnivores, indulge yourselves in its sister-restaurant, the Mandaloon Grill, just off Gouroud.

Or dine at Ramzi Halabi’s classy Italian restaurant Don Giovanni, in Saifi/Gemmayze (near Central).

Out of Town

In summer, if you feel like moving out of town, head up the coast to the small town of Byblos, for fish lunches, beautiful ruins, and take in the celebrity photo gallery at PÉPÉ'S Fishing Club, in the port, located inside a 12th century building, open since 1962, with its grilled fish and Lebanese mezze. Phone: 961-9/ 54 02 13; 961-3/ 63 58 50; fax: 961-9/ 21 72 76
 

Byblos: photo by leiralim

Dinner

The choices are myriad….and these are some of ChI’s favourite places to eat at night. The Lebanese (not to mention the stream of Arab visitors particularly in summer) like to eat out – so reservations are a must! Directory enquiries can usually provide a current number (call 1515 from within Beirut).

European/Fusion

Back in town, go for dinner at Kitchen, on Damascus Road. Tel 01 218 176/03 020 040. Minimalist concrete slab of futuristic building with a sloped grass entry strewn with little white lights. Nouvelle cuisine. And sometimes, complementary desserts, courtesy of the management, a la Libanaise.

Or if you’re feeling French, which one often does in Beirut, Le Gouroud, a high quality brasserie in Gemmayze, offers the best of French cooking.

For Italian, Corleone, and Olio are two excellent restaurants which vie for ChI’s “best pizza” accolade.

Other CI faves in a class of their own are Yaban and Centrale, between Monnot and downtown. Both are architectural innovations by Beirut’s foremost designer Bernard Khoury. Apart from its excellent food, Yaban’s design is an absolute must-see – being accessed below ground by a circular lift the size of a small room! It is ingeniously built in the round, with above ground access to natural light.

Centrale has taken a traditional house and garden and transformed it into a popular restaurant and roof terrace, complete with fully retractable glass domed roof for summer and winter use.

Baltus nestled in the nearby Starco Centre is generally recommended as one of the best for European cuisine. Close by in the Nahar building named after Lebanon’s leading and most respected Arabic newspaper, the restaurant popularly known as DT (Downtown) continues to do brisk business.

Bardo restaurant, located in place of the once famous Myrtom House restaurant, is another dinner nightspot. Quietly chilled in early evening, with artists and designers locked in concentration on lap tops, while a classic movie plays silently with subtitles on the wall, by 10pm the music pumps up and the Zen-type seating fills up. Offering an interesting ‘fusion’ menu, Bardo is a truly welcome new addition to the West Beirut restaurant scene.

Oriental

There is Chinese, Japanese, and traditional Lebanese on offer in the historic ‘Glass Café, a fixture as old as Gouroud street itself. whose décor and furnishings have remained the same for decades and where old and young gather to play backgammon, smoke nargheileh and eat traditional Lebanese mezze.

Try the amazing Lebanese food at Karam, in the Solidere district, regarded by many as Beirut’s best Arabic restaurant. Elegant, refined, understated. And fun.

Or choose the Movenpick Hotel’s Burj Al Hammam Restaurant (booking essential), for elite-style Lebanese food and shisha at the most expensive joint of its type in town. Amazing food, including the incredible lamb meshwi, the kibbeh nayyeh (raw minced lamb with cracked wheat)….. ChI doesn’t really do meat, but there are times….. and this is one of them. (Abandon all hope of tomorrow’s dress fitting comfortably. It won’t!)

Or for a casual lunch (and good shisha), visit Al Balad restaurant in an old-style Lebanese house in downtown Beirut next to Salmontini Restaurant, Sports Town and the Italian Embassy. In the heart of Solidere, it is an Arabic restaurant popular with locals and foreigners alike and affordable for all. Tel: +961-1-985375

Another great casual lunch joint is Socrates – the neighbourhood favourite of the old AUB student days. Located right next to the American University of Beirut on Rue Bliss, at the end next to the AUB Gate and Hardees, it serves traditional daily dishes that taste truly home made. Tel 01-363011 / 01-364150 / 01-36415

Meanwhile, the newly opened Fiona on one side of downtown and Bice’s on the other, are examples of Lebanese taste and chutzpah (both launched in precarious 2007), in defiance of prevailing economic and political indicators.

Above La Plage at Palm Beach, there is an excellent Arabic fish restaurant with the same name. La Plage is a revived port with huge mirrors for sunbathing (or checking people out)!

While back across the road and back inside the Palm Beach, India, the recent “refugee” from downtown into (hopefully) safer quarters, does brisk business.

Casablanca stands alone as “the best in the west” (Beirut). Located in an old white house in the rapidly-disappearing Ain Mreisse fishing port, this fusion restaurant is the brain child of clothing entrepreneur/designer Johnny Farrah and his Chinese wife Cyn. The food is original, blending classic Chinese with home grown organic Mediterranean. The atmosphere is friendly and fun and the location is one of the coolest anywhere. A must!
 


 

Author: Emma Hooper