Nesetled in a quiet corner of Kuala Lumpur’s Taman Tun Dr Ismail is Yafa. The restaurant is arguably one of the first eateries in the Klang Valley to focus entirely on Palestinian food and is the brainchild of Malaysian Zara Ahmad Riza and her Palestinian husband Ahmad Hallalo.
The restaurant is named after an eponymous historic Palestinian port city often called “the bride of the sea”. It was the largest city in Palestine but after the declaration of the state of Israel in 1948, over 90% of Palestinians in Yafa were displaced. The city is now part of modern-day Tel-Aviv.
The reason Yafa has such a strong personal connection to Zara and Ahmad is because one of the people forced to leave their ancestral home behind was Ahmad’s late grandmother.
“Ahmad’s father was one when the family fled Yafa by boat and went to Gaza in Palestine. They were refugees in Gaza and after Ahmad’s parents got married, they moved to Abu Dhabi (in the United Arab Emirates) where he grew up, although he made frequent trips back to Gaza when he was younger.
“But even till the day she passed away, Ahmad’s grandmother had the keys to her ancestral home – she was just never able to go back,” says Zara sadly.
Which is why Yafa – opened in early 2025 – is Zara and Ahmad’s homage to both the food of the lost city of Yafa, as well as Palestine as a whole. It is also their attempt to share the rich arsenal of Palestinian food that is constantly in danger of being eviscerated, given the ongoing conflict there.
“When the opportunity to open a restaurant came about, it was my way of doing activist work through food,” says Zara.
At Yafa, Zara and Ahmad have crafted a menu built on Palestinian recipes that Zara personally learnt from her mother-in-law who visited KL often and spent months teaching her how to make classic Palestinian dishes.
“I’m the only one who is not Palestinian in Ahmad’s entire family so I think his mother was worried. Like, ‘Oh no, what is he going to eat in Malaysia?’. So I had to learn everything from her, which is great because she’s a good teacher and a great cook,” says Zara.
Despite hiring people in the kitchen, Ahmad and Zara still pop in every day to have a meal at the restaurant to ensure everything is being made to their exacting standards.
To start your Palestinian culinary voyage of discovery here, opt for the refreshing Watermelon & Feta Salad (RM23).
The salad features watermelon, Palestinian-style feta cheese, mint leaves, olive oil and crushed pistachio scattered atop.
This is a simple, uncomplicated dish that delivers so much satisfaction. Palestinian-style feta cheese is much creamier and saltier than its Greek brethren, which gives the dish more multi-layered complexity.
This is accentuated by fresh bursts of watermelon, the nuttiness of the pistachios and the lightly oleaginous qualities of the olive oil, which all converge to provide the perfect summer treat.
Up next, indulge in the Hummus (RM18) which is made with chickpeas, tahini (sesame seed condiment), garlic and lemon.
Hummus is ubiquitous throughout the Levant belt, which includes Palestine as well as countries like Cyprus, Syria, Lebanon and Jordan to name a few.
In this iteration, you can also opt to boost the hummus with a dose of Palestinian spirit courtesy of a green chilli dip that can be spooned liberally onto the hummus to yield a creamy, lentil-rich spread that has fire and a hint of funk wending its way through its veins.
It’s a livelier, more enthusiastic rendition of hummus that gives it a decidedly perky pep in its step.
Move on to more substantial fare with the Zaatar Manakeesh (RM12) or Palestinian pizza with a zaatar spread. Zaatar is a wild thyme from West Asia that is typically turned into a spice mix that makes use of the herb as well as sesame, sumac and salt.
Here, the flatbread’s success is rooted in the zaatar, which is crunchy, lightly herbaceous and nutty with a rugged, earthy quality that tides it all together.
From the Manakeesh family, you could also opt for the Cheese (RM15) variant, which features Akkawi, a mild, milky, unripened white cheese. In this iteration, the cheese plays a soft, subtle role that serves to co-exist amiably alongside the bread as opposed to stealing the show entirely.
If you’re looking for a dish that is a true Palestinian highlight, then you’ll want to savour the Maqluba (RM35 for lamb), a quintessential dish that is synonymous with Palestine.
“Maqluba is normally made as a huge dish for 10 to 12 people so you put it in the middle of the table for everyone to share.
“But we wanted to make smaller portions here so we modelled the rice on nasi kukus, which I tried for the first time a few years ago. So that’s why the rice here is steamed even though in Palestine, we don’t have steamed rice,” explains Ahmad.
Maqluba is essentially meat, rice and fried vegetables like eggplant cooked together and flipped upside down when served at the table.
At Yafa, this dish is accentuated with a yoghurt-based condiment as well as sahawiq, a spicy, herbaceous hot sauce made with chillies, coriander, cumin, cardamom, lemon, garlic and olive oil that is deeply embedded in Palestinian food culture.
This is a dish that transcends geography and borders in that it is instantly recognised as “soul food”. The rice here is packed with flavour and the lamb is so tender, it falls off the fork with zero resistance. The eggplant meanwhile is luscious while the condiments add tartness, tanginess and a lively spirit of effervescence to the dish. If there is one dish you ought to try at Yafa, it is this.
Musakkhan (RM28) meanwhile is another Palestinian staple that is sometimes thought of as a national dish there.
It is made up of roast chicken cooked with olive oil, onions and sumac. This entire concoction is then placed over Palestinian taboon bread, which is typically cooked over hot rocks.
The dish is a masterclass in how simple, high-quality ingredients can elicit so much flavour. Diners are meant to engulf the bread in the chicken, oil and spices and eat everything together, resulting in an acerbic yet deeply nuanced confluence of flavours sure to awaken the senses.
The tartness of this meal may not be for everyone, but if you like your meals laced with contrasts and polarities, you’ll love this.
Moving forward, Zara says there are already plans to expand Yafa’s footprint in the Klang Valley.
“I want to expand so we’re working on something now. And yes, it will be Palestinian food because I like to make my life difficult and do difficult things,” says Zara, laughing.
