Harvey's Smokehouse

About

Harvey's Smokehouse 7 Shimon Ben Shetach Phone- 02 624 6444 Hours - Sunday through Thursday, 12 noon to last customer Friday - closed Saturday - 7:30 p.m. to last customer Kashrut - Rabbinut yerushalayim meluderet Kansas City--my home town; well, Overland Park is more accurate, even though it's just across the state line. Still Kansas City is the home of barbeque. For most Jews growing up there, however, there were no kosher restaurants, so barbeque wasn't a natural part of their culinary tastes. Imagine my surprise when I wandered down a Jerusalem restaurant street, walked into "Harvey's Smokehouse" and spied Kansas City barbeque on the menu. Harvey Sandler has an interesting culinary history. Sandler is a chef by trade and comes from Vancouver, British Columbia, where he owned a kosher catering company. At the end of December, 2009, he and his wife and four children made aliyah. After getting settled, he became chef at Papagaio, where he stayed nine months. Then living in Efrat, he opened a take-away place for a year. In 2011, he was interested in obtaining a larger place and, as such, found that Gabriel, on this same restaurant street, was for sale. He acquired it and ran Gabriel for six years. Late last year, he and a partner decided it was time for a change, so they closed Gabriel December 14, 2017. "We had the space and realized the biggest trend in America today is barbeque. It is starting to come to Israel, but it didn't exist in Jerusalem, and people wanted something different," said Sandler. On December 17 (yes, three days after Gabriel closed), Harvey's Smokehouse opened. Welcome to the only smokehouse in Jerusalem! The main room, with seating for eight, is long and narrow with a staircase to the left to an upstairs dining room which seats 40. A large mirror is on one wall. On another wall is a wonderful work of a camp fire, done by Jerusalem artist, Solomon Souza, a friend of the sous chef, who has dazzled Machaneh Yehudah shoppers with his spray-painted