The wonderful and unique talent of Chef Sagi Levy from Kibbutz Shinir can be found in quite a few culinary establishments in the Upper Galilee. If for a moment he will not be modest, one can quietly attach the title to him – the chef who had the most influence on the food in this wonderful land between Agamon Hula and Metula. And in addition, he is a diverse man who writes poetry and has the ability to criticize music.
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Chef Sagi Levy
(Photo: Avihu Shapira)
Levy has been through a lot since he opened his first restaurant at the age of 26 in Tel Aviv, and now, after 35 years in the profession, it’s time to stop for a moment to make an interim summary and talk about the plans for the next 35 years.
Levy (56) was born and raised in Kibbutz Mahaniim, but after his military service, like many of his generation, he left the kibbutz for the big city of Tel Aviv. “I was in the school of guys that I call as a documenter of the kibbutz society ‘Look back in anger’ – the generation of the shared accommodation,” he says. “I had a pretty happy childhood, but I was kind of an oddball.”
As a child he even dreamed of becoming a musician and the connection to the culinary world only started after the army. “At the age of 15, I already had a relatively broad perspective on music. I heard Charlie Parker and the explosion of music in the 60s and 70s. The Beatles, Led Zeppelin and also modern jazz. I really wanted to play, until I finally realized that I was very bad – Not everything I hear in my head goes into my hands. After the army I saw that it was very easy for me to cook and then I ‘degraded’ to this profession consistently: at the age of 26 I already had a restaurant in Tel Aviv and after that another restaurant.”
After about two years in Tel Aviv, Levy decided to sell the restaurant. “This was the period after the murder of the late Rabin – people came to restaurants mainly on weekends. I sold the business, and after that I got to work with some good chefs from whom I learned the profession quite intensively.”
Later he became the chef of the CSKA Moscow basketball team, a time he remembers with longing. “I hung out with the team’s oligarch owners on yachts for 15 years as a freelancer. I received a payment per cruise. I have been to the Maldives, Sri Lanka and all kinds of other exotic places. It was very good money and a good atmosphere.”
About twenty years ago he made a comeback and returned to the Upper Galilee. “I received a call from the owner of the focaccia, who asked me to help him in the stages of setting up the restaurant, and I fell in love with the north all over again. The focaccia previously only sold pizza and we introduced a full menu. I stayed in the north, bought a house in Kibbutz Shnir and screwed up.”
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Chef Levi. “I like to cook for the soldiers”
(Photo: Avihu Shapira)
About 14 years ago, Levi opened “Klompus”, an American diner for hamburgers and meat that is one of the most famous in Israel, and then moved to a deli in Kibbutz Dafna, where a meat factory based on his products was built. When the Corona period began, he went independent, and today he works as a private chef and hosts events at his home and other places for high society.
In addition, he continues to engage in establishment and consulting for restaurants and works at the booth at “Odies” – the northern brewery where he is a guest every week. “I worked with the leading restaurants in the north. I did consulting for ‘The Mornings’, ‘Dag on the Dan’ and ‘Django’, where the entire menu is based on my products. I also established places in the center. I have been working in consulting for the ‘Third Ear’ for a long time For many years, it’s a music center that also has a culinary scene here in the north. The place is based on my products, soups in the winter and sandwiches throughout the day. I do all the fermentation and smoked meats by hand.”
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Chef Levy with the late former President Shimon Peres
(Photo: Private)
Levy’s specific specialty is charcuterie – a branch of cooking and culinary, which focuses on the production and preparation of various products based on meat.
“I was in the bakery for a while and exhausted,” he says. “I made tens of thousands of quiches, pastries, and salads. When I ran out, I went into the whole meat section through the focaccia. At the time, we established the ‘Klompus’, which was a butcher shop at the time, we saw that it was good and we grew it to a factory that today sells between 10 and 13 tons of meat. I continue to work under them And all my products are from there. I got into it and opened an alternative to doing things the way I like, of course with the existing basics because there is no innovation without tradition. In recent years the lactan section has intensified, and I have a bunch of lactans working with me. Of course, everything is from local raw materials. I have Turkish influences About half Turkish and influences from Eastern Europe because I’m also half Polish.”
In addition to being a chef, Levy is also a music lover and critic and a poet. His living room looks like a temple to music and is loaded with thousands of records. Today he weaves together his two loves, music and food. “I have written several books of poetry, never books about food, because it is not interesting enough. There are many wonderful chefs in Israel, but my inspirations are music, literature and poetry. My good friend, the international musician Alber Begar, told me ‘You cook the way you are I write and you write like you cook – everything with a beat. I do everything with a beat.”
Levy worked as a music critic in the early 1990s and published three books of poetry, which he says are a little difficult to digest. “My books are not mainstream, I write a lot about Israeli society and some of the disintegration of the way of writing, which is through my bedroom for example. My books are love books soaked in rage. My first editor defined me as a French school – like Baudelaire, Valery and poets who influenced A lot about my writing. I’ve always been a kind of reactionary, never mainstream, neither in my perception of music nor in my perception of culture, so I’m connected to a lot of guys. On the one hand, my perception is very national and Jewish, and on the other hand, most of my friends are from the left. In my opinion My philosophy is that I welcome everyone.”
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Chef Levi. Connected to music
(Photo: Avihu Shapira)
How is life in the Upper Galilee since you returned?
“I call it paradise without the tree of knowledge. It’s a lovely place, wonderful people and one big kibbutz. At the level of the profession, I will quote the late Yuki, the owner of ‘Hadag on the Dan’ and a great man, who said ‘We depend on each other or side by side The second’. I applaud all restaurateurs wherever they are. There are good restaurants and there are culinary reserves in the north. The chefs also come to take pictures with me. They filmed the show ‘On the Napkin’ at my place. Meir Adoni, at the time when he lived in Shenir, filmed the programs for Channel 2 at my place. In the program ‘On the Napkin’ I was a kind of waiter and the chef, who is a friend of mine who grew up with me in Fokache, was Ali Hativ Marger and I was the host of the whole event.”
Would you like to participate in reality shows?
“I refuse these kinds of programs. With all due respect to the productions, this is a very populist image of the profession that I don’t believe in. The cart is put before the horse. All kinds of children become chefs out of nowhere. In this field, you have to go a long way with a little suffering and experience – to mature A little and then break through. Chefs are not rock and roll stars, I see myself chopping wood and pumping water.”
Who is your spiritual father?
“My spiritual ancestors are musicians: Neil Young, Van Morrison, Frank Zappa and Robert White.”
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Chef Levi. works in consulting for the “Third Ear”
(Photo: Avihu Shapira)
Do they inspire you in food too?
“Yes, in music there are things that are also present in cooking such as tonality and non-tonality. There is harmony, sometimes ‘less is more’. In my poetry I also incorporate a lot of being in the kitchen, because I spend most of my life in kitchens.”
What qualities do you think a chef needs?
“A chef is first of all a leader, that people will believe in him. He also needs a country way and the craziest self-discipline there is. I call it the compromise is death – a clichéd way of explaining the situation.”
Levy also works at the Rananim school for children with special needs and in various voluntary philanthropic initiatives. “My life is very versatile. I have been working with youth promotion for years and see myself as an educator and road mapper. At the time, I founded a cooking course called ‘Cooking Dreams’ with very good people, and I worked at a Rananim school. I connect with youth defined as at-risk youth and special children better than to conventional people from the settlement. I also did master chef workshops at the Kiryat Shmona police and I like to cook for the soldiers. I try to do it every year at the checkpoints.”
What is it to you to feed people?
“Hadva, I like to prepare food for people. Here at home I host events for up to ten people and outside in the yard for up to 30. We come to private homes with a cart and a team, a celebration.”