I meet chef Fadi Kattan in London’s Notting Hill neighbourhood a few weeks ahead of his new restaurant’s opening.
The restaurant, Akub, sits among a row of colourful houses and quaint cafes that have become the hallmark of the area immortalised in the Julia Roberts and Hugh Grant romcom of the same name.
Kattan leads me through to the restaurant, which presently resembles a large construction site – with loose wires hanging overhead and a strong smell of sawdust.
“We have a lot of work to do,” he says, laughing. “But I’m excited.”
The kitchen is not yet fully installed and the tiles still need laying out, but Kattan assures me that the restaurant is already fully booked for opening day.
The French-Palestinian chef is famous for his restaurant in Bethlehem, named Fawda, which is Arabic for chaos.
“It’s called that because it’s based on chaos,” he explains.
“We don’t have a menu. People pre-book, and I cook whatever I get my hands on from the farmers,” he adds.
In Palestine, Kattan’s business philosophy is based on how many people will be eating at his restaurant on any given day, he then heads off to local markets to get hold of whatever ingredients he can get his hands on.
Customers eat whatever he decides to make with the ingredients, something he says forced him to think creatively.
“But imagine trying this in London, there’s no way it could work,” he says.
Since the English capital offers different obstacles to the ones found in the West Bank, he says that Akub will be taking a slightly different direction.