The first time chef Fariz Choumali visited New Orleans with his wife Adrienne, a New Orleanian he’d met while working in Los Angeles in 2014, he felt an uncanny sense of familiarity with the city.
“Beirut, where I’m from, shares a French culture and vibrancy with New Orleans,” he says. “The first time I went to the French Quarter, with its architecture, music and culture, I felt at home. People come from all over the world to eat food here. I knew this city was for me.”
Choumali has worked for BRG Hospitality (formerly Besh Restaurant Group) for five years, starting at Shaya, where he moved up to executive chef. He’s now the executive chef at Tavi, which opened Jan. 5 in Covington. Conceived as a sister restaurant to Shaya, Tavi shares a sensibility and some dishes, but the chef is introducing a few Lebanese street dishes to the Northshore menu and plans to add seasonal specials as well. “Here we have so many regulars,” he says. “People were waiting for this food. Covington doesn’t have a pace like New Orleans, so our opening was a big deal to the community.”
The former barbershop has been transformed into a new space with broad windows offering copious natural light and a serene blue and white color scheme exuding a welcoming, Mediterranean vibe. There’s a comfy 10-seat bar and a wood-fired oven working in one corner of the space. Tavi is named for partner Octavio Mantilla’s grandson, Tavi, from the Hebrew word for good.
It’s a definition that also fits the array and depth of flavors the chef creates. The mezze, or starters, include serious hummus upgrades. One popular addition is a topping of buttermilk-soaked fried chicken thigh spiced with turmeric and coriander. Then there’s a trio of wild mushrooms sauteed in sage brown butter and spiked with za’atar-spiced hazelnuts atop the creamy base. Accompanying the starters are pitas that emerge from the wood-fired oven as irresistible fragrant puffs of bread. A plate of house pickled vegetables offers a gluten-free alternative.
During a recent Monday lunch, the 85-seat restaurant was packed. Unfortunately, the crowd produces a din, but that is being addressed, the chef says. Sound baffling is in Tavi’s near future. The restaurant also is opening a back patio garden with a bar circling the mature cypress tree that casts welcome shade over the courtyard.
One popular Lebanese street dish is arayes, a grilled pita sandwich stuffed with ground kafta, or seasoned lamb, and served with an herbaceous tzatziki. The sujuk flatbread tops a housemade long roll with crumbled bits of Armenian sausage, made with cayenne, cumin and sumac, held together with melted cheese and a drizzle of tangy pomegranate molasses.
Confit chicken, cooked in duck fat, is a favored entree because of its crisp skin, tender meat and foundation of basmati rice served with tzatziki and pistachios. There’s a farm fresh fattoush salad tossed with sumac date vinaigrette and topped with shiny pomegranate seeds. Other options include a lamb burger served with sumac pickled onions and halloumi cheese, and the shakshuka skillet of poached eggs in a spiced tomato, onion and bell pepper sauce topped with crumbled feta.
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For dessert, tahini chocolate mousse tempts, but the ghazel banat is the clear frontrunner, featuring orange blossom gelato topped with a nest of ghazal banat, a cotton candy treat that disappears on the tongue and carries the earthy crunch of pistachio and halva. A spritz of rosewater completes what must be one of the most intriguing recent desserts on either side of the Causeway.
The bar offers some interesting cocktails, like the Road to Kfar, made with sumac-infused tequila, pom liqueur, lime juice and hibiscus syrup. There are Californian, Lebanese, French and Israeli wines available by the glass, along with beers both local and imported from Greece and Lebanon.
Choumali wanted to be a chef since he was a boy, watching his mother fill every available surface in her kitchen with savory mezze both hot and cold. She’s still inspiring him at Tavi.
“I still call my mom with questions about recipes,” he says. “She can cook everything.”
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