Zhug bursts with Mediterranean flavors in Cleveland Heights: Q&A with Douglas Katz and Todd Thompson

Curried lamb and apricot hummus and a side of zhug to spice things up. David Petkiewicz, cleveland.com

CLEVELAND HEIGHTS, Ohio -- Zhug has found steady business in Cleveland Heights' Cedar-Fairmount neighborhood on every night of its first week of business.

The new restaurant and bar, run by chef and restaurateur Doug Katz and director of operations Todd Thompson, doesn’t take reservations, instead depending on the busy Cedar-Fairmount neighborhood to provide its customers. And so far, they said, new spot has been received well.

Zhug takes over the space formerly occupied by Liquid Planet, at 12413 Cedar Road, replacing it with a unique Mediterranean and Middle Eastern eatery. A full bar offers inventive cocktails, along with a complete wine and beer list.

The menu’s food options are all inspired by the name of the place: “zhug,” or a spicy Middle Eastern chutney made of serrano peppers and spices. Dishes are served family-style, and many of the individual plates -- which include hummus, kafta, squash donuts and more -- were inspired from a recent trip that Katz, Thompson and chef Andrew Mansour took to Tel Aviv, Israel.

It's the latest restaurant opening for Katz. Earlier this year, he opened a new concept called Chutney B. in Shaker Heights' bustling Van Aken District. He continues to run his longtime staple Fire Food & Drink, and Fire Spice Company. He's also the chef partner at Cleveland Museum of Art's Provenance Cafe.

We chatted with Katz and Thompson about the new restaurant, inspirations behind the menu, and their other business ventures.

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Specialty drinks: The Gazoz #1, a non-alcoholic drink with Rooibos and hibiscus tea, lemon juice and honey syrup, and the Zhug #3, dry gin with fennel roots and fronds, Falernum, lime juice. David Petkiewicz, cleveland.com

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Zhug is inspired by a trip to Israel. I was wondering how that travel has been used to influence the menu here, and at all your other restaurants as well?

Katz: "Before that -- at Fire [Food and Drink] -- we have an Indian clay oven, a tandoori oven, and so we've learned a lot about using spices in cooking. After opening Fire, I created a company called Fire Spice Company, where we toast and ground spices and put them in boxes with recipes. From that, we opened a new business this year called Chutney B. The focus in that is Thai, Indian and Morroccan rice bowls, using great curries and spice. We also top those bowls with chutney. The traditional Indian chutney would be hari chutney, but at that restaurant, we use zhug. It's a green chile chutney, with serrano chiles, green cardamom, lemon, parsely, all different spices.

"We decided that, here, we wanted to open a really fun bar room, a high-energy bar feel, and to focus on Middle Eastern and Mediterranean, because those were two areas where we hadn’t really focused as much. That’s really what Zhug is about. We took a trip to Tel Aviv to really do some research and development on the idea, and every night we were saying to ourselves, when can we come back here and do it again? We did that, and I also went to Morocco last year, and we went to New Orleans, and I went to Denver, and we really explored Israeli restaurants. We’re calling this Middle Eastern mezze, which is really just shareable food that you enjoy with your friends or other people."

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A side of zhug to spice things up. David Petkiewicz, cleveland.com

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Could you talk more about the menu -- highlights from it, things you want to mention?

Katz: "Noah Biddle is our bar manager, and he has created an amazing cocktail list. We have non-alcoholic and alcoholic cocktails. Todd [Thompson] has curated the wine and beer lists. Andrew Mansour is our chef. Both of us, for a year, have sat down and gone through so many iterations and so many ideas. We’ve had so many tastings on the actual menu. I think what’s important is having a mixture of meat items and vegetarian items and vegan and gluten-free. We tried to create a menu of about 30 items where people could mix and match things that go together. We have a lot of different vegetables. We’ll change the seasonal items, seasonally. We use a lot of local.

"We use local Miller Farm grass-fed beef for our kafta, which are little beef grilled patties served with feta and fennel and radishes. We have a braised lamb dish, local carrots from Rainbow Farm right now with hazelnuts and a coconut lime sauce. We have great octopus that we smoke in-house, and serve with potatoes and saffron aioli and olive tapenade. We have great bread to eat with all of it. We have a curried lamb hummus, with apricots. We have nigella seed and burnt onion hummus, all of course with a lot of different-flavored oils. We have desserts -- a mango sorbet with a chili syrup, and we have truffles. A tahini ice cream sundae with a ganache hot fudge and salted pistachios."

Thompson: "The reaction has been great. We were, of course, nervous about introducing this dining style, mixing it all together. Obviously there are places that already do that -- but, doing it the way we wanted to do it -- we weren’t sure coming from a background like Fire, which has a traditional way of dining, that our guests would be agreeable to it. But it’s been great, no problem at all. They really enjoy the idea of sharing food."

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Local cracked wheat salad with shaved apples and carrots. David Petkiewicz, cleveland.com

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It seems like at all your restaurants, there are all kinds of dishes to compliment dietary restrictions. Why is that aspect important to you?

Katz: "It’s super important, and where we’re located, we’re right next to the hospital. People come to Cleveland to have their health checked. The amount of restricted diets, and the amount of care that people have for their diets is so important to our customers. Also, Mediterranean and Middle Eastern dishes tend to match well with these kinds of special diets that are current today."

Thompson: "There’s meat on the menu, but it’s not the focus of the menu. Even the meat dishes are not like a traditional 12-ounce pork chop with some potatoes and carrots. The meat is mixed in, but it’s not the focus. I really think that’s where dining is heading, and I also think it’s environmentally conscious. That was not the main motivating factor, but it sure doesn’t hurt. We feel good about that, and it’s also healthy. I think all but three things on this menu are gluten-free."

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Zhug in Cleveland Heights. David Petkiewicz, cleveland.com

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I noticed the design is very different from what it used to be when it was Liquid Planet. Could you talk about the layout of the restaurant itself, and what you’re going for with the design?

Thompson: "Kelly Shaffer is our designer, and what we really wanted to do when we came in here was accentuate the ceilings. It's a beautiful old building, and we really wanted to work with that. Instead of a new buildout, we wanted to use something that had some flavor to it, some history to it. I think the food does, too, so the space was important to that. We wanted to make it elegant, but also very friendly and open, with a cool vibe to it that accentuates that bar atmosphere. Something a little bit exotic -- not kitschy, but exotic."

Katz: "We’ve had so many artists take part in the design. Kelly [Shaffer] brought team of people. Shred & Company built our bar, they did all of our steel work, the cart shelf, the tables, the front table, the shelves. Billy Ritter did a lot of the ceramic pottery, and if you look at the artwork on the walls, those are Billy Ritter pieces that have been photographed onto muslin material. Keith Arion built out the space. He lives in Shaker, and he’s an amazing general contractor. He was really stress-free through the entire project."

Thompson: "That was a part of the collaboration as well -- local farmers, local artists. Shred & Company, you can tell by the look of the tables, that those are handmade by local people. It really shows, it’s worth the time, and energy, and investment to do that. I think it adds a great deal to the overall experience. Plus, they’re great guys. All the people we work with are so great, and just made the project that much more fun and energetic."

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Zhug in Cleveland Heights. David Petkiewicz, cleveland.com

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In Cleveland Heights, Katz Club Diner was damaged in a fire five years ago. What's it like to open Zhug in this community, a couple of miles from the diner?

Katz: "Really fun. I live about five blocks from here and five blocks from the diner. We cater out of the diner and we just leased to Rising Star Coffee, so they're actually open in the front of the diner. And this is five blocks the other way, in this really vibrant bar scene with Vero and Parnell's and Nighttown and the Fairmount and Luna and Appletree Books. So to be able to open this kind of place in my own neighborhood is just so fun. It makes it so nice to live and work in the same area. We know that we can't go to Tel Aviv every week or every month, but now we've brought Tel Aviv to Cleveland Heights, and can remember that every day that we're working, and share that with everyone as well."

Thompson: "I mean, Tel Aviv and other elements through travelling is just so important, to see the elements that exist in different cities and what’s going on, and mix that with the things that are exciting about what’s going on in our own city, and put it all together to create this unique melange - it all comes together."

Katz: "When you go to a restaurant today, I think restaurants are about exploring culture. We have such diverse culture in Cleveland these days with all the cultural institutions, with the hospitals. I think to be able to eat in this way where you’re sharing small bites of food -- instead of going to maybe a more traditional restaurant and ordering the first, second and third courses, it’s super fun to be able to do this as well, because it’s so new to Cleveland."

Thompson: "We wanted to work with that communal aspect of dining, and how that is so traditional in a lot of the world. Sharing plates, sharing foods, sharing flavors -- we wanted to put that into this type of atmosphere, so you’re going to have good cocktails and walk around and talk to your friends. This doesn’t have to be a fine-dining type of restaurant. I love those types of restaurants, but they’re very formal. This is completely the opposite of that."

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Zhug in Cleveland Heights. David Petkiewicz, cleveland.com

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There are no reservations accepted here. Why?

Thompson: "I think reservations go hand-in-hand with fine dining. We wanted everyone to have an equal opportunity to eat here. With the neighborhood we have, it’s almost like an extended waiting area. If our bar is full, you can put your name on the list, and you can go to Parnell’s, or Appletree Books, and we’ll text you when your table is ready. I think that just allows everybody an equal shot, and in a neighborhood restaurant I think that’s important. If we take reservations, that means that the prime dining times, every night we would be taking reservations and that would mean no one could ever just walk up. We want that feeling -- that you could just walk up -- because we’re not fine dining. We can pull tables together, we can do whatever we need to accommodate whoever walks into the front door. Reservations are pretty staid. It makes for a pretty static environment. We want to make sure it’s open and fun, and that we have the ability to work with customers however they show up."

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Zhug in Cleveland Heights. David Petkiewicz, cleveland.com

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Earlier, you mentioned the Spice Company -- I think it’s interesting how you bring a ton of flavors to your restaurants, but you’re also bringing these flavors into peoples’ homes. Could you talk about the success of that?

Katz: "It’s a product we created. It’s not the thing I spend most of my days on. Around the holiday time, it becomes more popular. What’s nice is, we sell them at Fire. Whenever people walk in and are visiting from out of town and experiencing some food item, on their way in or out they’ll buy them for their friends. It’s a nice thing, we’re able to give people something. I haven’t written a cookbook; I look at that, sort of, as my cookbook."

Like mini-cookbooks.

Thompson: "But they’re interactive. You get to do it."

Katz: "And we can give people the techniques we use in the professional cookbook to use at home."

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Zhug in Cleveland Heights. David Petkiewicz, cleveland.com

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How is everything going at Fire, and at Provenance?

Katz: "Really great. We have a team of close to 90 people now. We are so lucky we have an amazing management team. We’ve grown in a very calculated way, where we have people taking new positions on where they’ve been with the company for a while and we can really nurture their development. It allows us to stay strong at Fire, it allows us to stay strong in the other places. Provenance is run by Bon Appetit, I’m the chef partner, so it doesn’t put as much strain on the operation, though it does take up some of my time."

See more photos of Zhug below.

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Zhug in Cleveland Heights. David Petkiewicz, cleveland.com

Zhug

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Specialty drinks: The Zhug #3, dry gin with fennel roots and fronds, Falernum, lime juice and the Gazoz #1, a non-alcoholic drink with Rooibos and hibiscus tea, lemon juice and honey syrup. David Petkiewicz, cleveland.com

Zhug

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