There were days when Tel Aviv was different. Yes, it goes without saying, but which Tel Aviv exactly was yours? Which Tel Aviv did you like best? As in Secrets of Secrets, your favorite music will always be the one you fell in love with in your youth – so your favorite Tel Aviv is probably the one that was when you first really got to know the city.
A quiet and busy corner. Classic restaurant. Photography: Matan Sharon
For me this is the Tel Aviv of the beginning of the millennium, the Tel Aviv I visited for concerts and parties, before and after the army, the Tel Aviv I knew for the first time. The food sources of Tel Aviv in those years were not too complex. We have not yet seen the spectacular culinary wave that swept the city in the fields of street food, so if you wanted something more complex than a hamburger or pizza, good luck, friend. And even in these areas there were no records worth noting, but these were our records, and we loved them. After parties at Slow Moshe, we continued to Florentin and devoured basil pizza. Not because it was the only pizza, but because it was the only pizza we wanted.
>> this week pizza and burger, last week tacos and sushi. What is this, a crossover episode?
A few years later, as a student who had just moved to the city, we already had a level, at least to a certain extent. Basil was replaced by other local pizzerias, and Moses and Agadir were replaced by Wolfnights after the aforementioned lost a bit of their uniqueness with each new branch added to the chain. This is what eventually happened to Wolfnights, which were replaced by premium burgers, which were then replaced by mega-premium burgers, which lost the kingship to chef burgers And so on. It’s only natural, they don’t call it the food chain for nothing.
The classic Wolfnights hamburger, 2015. Photo: PR
As you continue down the chain, not many are left behind. I haven’t eaten at Wolfnights or Basilikum in years, and I’m probably not the only one, because the pair of legendary restaurants – not to mention old ones – decided to remind Tel Aviv who were here until not too many years ago, the pizza and hamburger of the moment, even if it was only for a moment. This is how “Classic” was born – a transformer/diner/rebranding exercise – that combines Basil’s pizza, Wolfnights’ hamburger and pasta? How the hell is the pasta related?
The location chosen to lead the move is the mythical branch of Wolfnights in the old north, on Yehuda Maccabi Street – which I want to say was the first branch of the hamburger chain, but I couldn’t verify. That’s why I arrived in the sleepy old north in the late afternoon. I said sleepy? I meant packed with families as if we were in a barn. Well, it’s August after all, in the old north, in a restaurant that serves pizza and hamburgers as well as pasta. I think now I understand what the hell pasta is about.
Where were you? you changed Classic’s “Wolfnights Special” dish. Photography: Matan Sharon
For the sake of the classics, I ordered a Wolfnights Special meal for 300 grams (85 NIS including drink and chips, 66 for 220 grams), a meal that was for quite some time my go-to burger in town. Only since then some changes have happened. First, the bacon Over the years, the legendary has become a goose breast, an almost insulting alternative. Besides, the Emmental cheese on the burger has also become thin and almost tasteless. Everything else – the bun, the garlic mayonnaise sauce and of course the patty – were fine. Even beyond the unfair comparison to the distant memory, it’s just a mediocre burger Fair enough by today’s standard. Good burger, but not over the top.
>> We were also at KFC, and it wasn’t easy
Along with the hamburger, I also ordered an abruzzo pizza (spicy tomato sauce, mozzarella, green onion, potato and campfire onion. 77 NIS for size L, 95 for XL), because if you can order both a hamburger and a pizza, Matan orders both a hamburger and pizza. Indeed, it is a basil pizza – it is hard to miss the crust rolled over the sauce, the load of ingredients and the medium dough. Yes, there’s that word again. And not only on him – it was a nice dish, certainly filling (thanks to the potato), but the automation of “Classic” is well felt in it. I mean, it feels like a pizza that was prepared back in the days of old Tel Aviv, and hasn’t really changed since then, and this time it’s for the worse.
Pizza does not bounce. Classic basil pizza. Photography: Matan Sharon
The world has moved on, and our palate with it. What used to be considered good pizza is now considered mediocre. The bar was raised and the two old institutions – Wolfnights and Basil – remained in place. They will no longer be what they were before, and that’s not necessarily a bad thing. Because here, instead of a trashed hamburger joint, Yehuda Maccabi Street got a reasonable family diner where you can order a hamburger and old fashioned pizza – and also pasta, although I didn’t taste it, no thanks – and this place is ideal to bring all the kids, have a quick bite to eat and immediately forget that it used to be the slow – Girl from Tel Aviv. The glories of the past may be dead, but there is something comforting in knowing they still live on.
Classic, Yehuda Maccabi 53, Sunday – Thursday 12:00-23:00, Friday 12:00-17:00