HARISSA TUNISIAN KOSHER FOOD NORTH AFRICAN CUISINE WORTH SEEKING OUT

“Harissa” Restaurant and Events New Name                    Honors Owner-Chef Alain Cohen’s French-Tunisian Heritage                Got Kosher? Bakery, Commissary Name Remains the Same

(Pico-Robertson, March 16, 2018) Chef-owner Alain Cohen’s newly named HARISSA RESTAURANT AND CATERING COMPANY will expand its California-inspired French-Tunisian cuisine menu of the former “fGot Kosher? Café and Catering Company.” HARISSA will also now serve the finest wines and beers.

The “Got Kosher? name has been identified with innovator Cohen’s renowned original pretzel and flavored challahs. The Bakery and Commissary will retain the same name and space. Cohen also remains the creative force behind the hefty, made-to-order gourmet sandwiches with authentic ingredients with distribution to local and international distribution, inspired by his stint with master Nancy Silverton at La Brea Bakery.

Born in Tunisia and raised in Paris, France Alain worked in his father’s kosher Tunisian restaurant, Les Ailes (The Wings) since the age of nine. Success as an innovator came early to him as a teen-ager when Cohen introduced a French-Tunisian fusion menu that turned Les Ailes into an overnight sensation. The Grillades section, now with a health-conscious American flair, marks the very refined Parisian dishes that helped make Les Ailes into a Paris landmark. Harissa’s specialty dishes features unusual and regal couscous plates, including a rare wedding feast version.

HARISSA Restaurant’s new expanded menu still features signature California- inspired salad, and entrée favorites reflecting the vibrant Sephardic heritage of Cohen’s homelands, and is still California inspired.

Harissa punctuates the signature Tunisian Tuna Sandwich, several appetizers, the Couscous feasts, the Harissa-spiced Burger and the Grillades.

Harissa, in its original and purest form is a red pepper sauce made up of red chili peppers, garlic and salt. It is flavored with coriander, cumin, caraway, and combined with tomatoes as needed in the cooking. “But Cohen’s family recipe harissa is the standard by which all other blends are measured”, according to a Bon Appetit magazine staffer. The emphasis is not on the spiciness but on the balance. The motto at HARISSA, remains, “only as hot as you like it” for customers.

Seasonal ingredient Prix fixe menus and special dinners featuring beers and meshuval wines  will be featured as part of the opening celebration.

About Harissa

The hot red pepper sauce made of red chili peppers and garlic, is flavored with coriander, cumin, olive oil and often tomatoes. And almost all of these found in the iconic Tunisian Sandwich.   At Harissa Restaurant, harissa is only as spicy as a customer likes it. However, the heat is considered differently in Tunisia where it originated. “Spicy,” in fact, is so valued in Tunisia that an old wife’s tale that says a husband can judge his wife’s affections by the amount of hot peppers she uses when preparing his food

Historically, the distinctive spicy fieriness is influence of neighboring Mediterranean countries, many of whom ruled Tunisia one time. The list is impressive: Phoenician, Roman, Arab, Turkish, French, and the native Berber people. And, of course, out of this nomadic lineage came the ingenious conical- lidded pot, the tagine.

Most importantly, in Tunisia, we consider the version from Tunis to be the absolute standard for all others. The one from Tunis is pure and with no spice.  it is “the mother tincture, the essence of Harissa,” to which the other have added variations.

Each city in Tunisia became well known for their individual versions, made by adding a different spice to the sauce on a base of cumin, coriander, caraway and so on.   For example we have the harissa of Sfax, the one from Nabeul, the one for Gbes,