Where Asia Meets the Mediterranean
Chef Yuval Ben Neriah travelled to India, China, Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam and came back to Tel Aviv with an obsession: the flavours of Southeast Asia, reimagined through Israeli produce and Mediterranean sensibility. The concept he named Asia Terranean is not fusion in the cautious, apologetic way that word usually implies. It is a confident synthesis — har gow made with Jerusalem artichokes, red tuna sashimi with toasted jasmine rice and tuna broth, butter chicken with an Israeli terroir that makes the dish simultaneously familiar and entirely new.
Taizu opened on Derech Menachem Begin and immediately became the restaurant that Tel Aviv talked about — and kept talking about, year after year. The city's restaurant scene moves fast and has the attention span of a start-up, but Taizu has remained at the top of every serious list for over a decade. This is because Ben Neriah does not rest on concept: the kitchen keeps evolving, keeps pushing the Asia Terranean idea into new territory, keeps treating the menu as a living document rather than a fixed achievement.
The room is beautiful — designed with the drama that the food demands, warm and intimate without feeling cramped. The menu is built for sharing, which makes Taizu equally ideal for two people on a first date or eight colleagues at a team dinner. The wine list is serious, the cocktails are inventive, and the service operates at the level of a European fine-dining room without the formality. Tel Aviv's most cited restaurant by people who know the city well. Book weeks ahead.
Best for Impressing Clients
Taizu impresses without requiring explanation. The Asia Terranean concept is clear enough to describe in thirty seconds — five Asian countries through an Israeli lens — and interesting enough to sustain a dinner's worth of conversation. You are not taking a client to a restaurant they have already been to. You are taking them somewhere that feels genuinely original, in a city that increasingly defines what global fine dining can be. The menu's complexity signals that you chose carefully. The sharing format creates intimacy. This is the business dinner that stays in the memory.
Best for Team Dinner
Sharing menus are built for teams, and Taizu's is among the best in the city. Dishes arrive in waves, are placed at the centre of the table, are eaten communally — which means no one is staring at their own plate in silence. The food provides immediate conversation: what is this, how is it made, have you ever had anything like it. By the third course, the team has found its rhythm. By dessert, something has been established that a meeting room never achieves.