Malka VeZipi: Two Restaurants, One Address, and a Taboon That Anchors Them Both

The corner table by the window has the best view in the house, and at nine in the morning it belongs to a couple sharing eggs Benedict on a flaky croissant while a waiter pours filter coffee from a copper kettle. Twelve hours later that same table will be set with linen, a candle, and two coupe glasses of something amber and herbaceous, and a different couple will be tearing into a whole fried fish crowned with a tangle of crispy onion rings. This is Malka VeZipi, a dual personality bistro tucked into the new villa quarter of Ir Yamim Tzafon in northern Ashkelon, and its central conceit is that one room can comfortably host two restaurants if you give them different names and different hours.

Owner Tal Hollander knows the Ashkelon restaurant scene intimately. He ran Paradiso here for years before the pandemic closed it, then opened two Paris Texas locations in central Israel, and most recently launched the beachfront Casa Playa just down the road. Malka VeZipi was his return to Ashkelon proper, conceived in summer 2023 and built out through the months following October, opening in March 2024 with a clear thesis: bring Tel Aviv production values to the periphery without apologizing for either side of that equation. The food concept was developed in partnership with A La Carte culinary consulting, and resident chef Usher Tal designed parallel menus for the morning Zipi service and the evening Malka service. The bird and the queen, working the same kitchen at different shifts.