Dr. Shakshuka

Very disappointing experience. This place is dishonest with pricing. We were brought completely different dishes than what we ordered and ended up paying 270 shekels. We also left a 10% tip. Afterward, we realized something was wrong and came back to ask how much one beer and one bottle of Coke cost. We were told 36 shekels for each drink, which makes no sense. When we asked to see the menu and prices, the staff laughed and said there is no menu. Very unpleasant experience, especially when you leave a 10% tip and still get overcharged. And for the record — we’re not even tourists.

Tourist Trap (.) Not in a good way. From the moment you walk in, as you are welcomed by branded t-shirts with Dr. Shakshuka's face, full wall frescoes of the proprietor seasoning (salt bae style) pans of shakshuka, and a life sized cut out of the "chef" himself, you know this is not a good idea. We sat and attempted to escape but the waiter said the shakshuka was only 49 shekels. Tempted by the price we stayed. We ordered 2 bottles of water to quench our thirst (sorry no tap) and our total for 2 ended up at 135 shekels. Service: We went at around 8:45 am, note Tel Aviv is a late city, so we were the only ones there. The wait staff was, what it was, nothing special. Food: I gave 3 stars for the food, which is nothing I couldn't make at home in 20 minutes.

Food was okay, not extraordinary, but satisfying. The waiter told us that the price for "business lunch" will be 87 NIS per person. We were fine with the price as it seemed to be a good value for so much food (we were served 15 items - salads, hummus, tahini, meat, shakshouka and lot of bread, quite good lemonade). Anyway 87 NIS * 2 persons gives 174 NIS, our waiter even wrote the price down for us. He seemed quite stressed the whole time, he was pressing us to make a quick decision - we thought it's because the place was busy (around a half of the tables in the outside area was taken). I also didn't like that the waiter was smoking a cigarette just a few meters away from our table. When it came to the payment time, the waiter didn't not came with a terminal for card payments, he insisted that it will be faster and more comfortable if he'll go inside alone and charge the card himself. But... He came with a receipt for 190 NIS. I have no idea for what that additional fee was taken as it hasn't been explained. Because of this we decided to not tip them, so this lunch was a bit cheaper than planned anyway.

We walked in and got seated right away within minutes they brought out some salads to start off with and within 10 minutes our food was already on the table. It was an absolutely delicious shakshuka (we had a plane shakshuka, lamb shawarma shakshuka land one sausage shakshuka) and so were the salads. Great friendly service and a nice atmospher, no wonder they won the best shakshuka in Israel award. We met the owner and he was the nicest guy ever. If you’re in Tel Aviv-Yafo area this is a must place to visit and it’s about 30 minutes drive from almost any area near Tel Aviv.