Lulu thrives on Solano

Since the un-merry month of May, I’ve lamented the closure of Mica Talmor’s Pomella. Talmor’s Piedmont Avenue restaurant filled an elusive culinary niche in the East Bay. Served as takeaway or in the small outdoor cafe facing out and onto a parking lot, the chef’s Mediterranean dishes could have qualified as fine dining if the setting had been different. It’s easy to imagine an alternative story, a non-ending for Pomella set up inside something like Jaji’s deluxe headquarters.

When compared with a plethora of middle-of-the-road Mediterranean joints—the ones that sell flavorless hummus, stale pita bread and wan vegetable salads—Talmor continued to refresh her menu with inventive weekly specials. At the same time, the food reflected her commitment to using high-quality ingredients and produce. Pomella’s hummus still ranks as an all-time favorite. But the long-term costs turned out to be unsustainable.

A year and a half after opening at a new location on Solano, I finally had brunch at Lulu. Chef Mona Leena’s “California take on Palestinian cuisine” presented me with a picture of what Pomella could have looked like in a parallel world. Leena’s menu draws from the same region as Talmor’s, but the chef’s preparation of and combination of flavors at Lulu is entirely unique. The food we ordered was traditional and nontraditional at the same time. I could taste the various cultural influences, which Leena had thoughtfully reinvented.

There’s also a welcome sense of play on the menu. We ordered a habi-bimbap bowl ($24) which, apart from the inviting presentation in a bowl, really had very little to do with bimbap. When I bit into them, the kefta meatballs’ hard sear made for a nice and tender crunch—the bowl can also be made vegan. Baby lettuce leaves lined the sides of the bowl accompanied by cucumber and pickled carrots. The basmati rice at the bottom of the bowl had turned a golden color from some undisclosed spice, likely turmeric. I loved the lemon-mint yogurt that complemented every ingredient. But I’d have preferred the liberal pour of dukkah as a side so that I could add it as needed rather than work my fork around it.

We also tried Baba’s Breakfast ($29). This reinterpretation of a crowded brunch plate included: scrambled eggs, a healthy length of lamb sausage, fuul mudamas or stewed fava beans, a scoop of fresh labneh, triangles of pita bread, pickled carrots and turnips, and harissa tots—the undeniable star. My friend also tried a baklava brulee cappuccino ($7), and was immediately smitten with its balance of sweetness and espresso.

The only dish that didn’t work for me was the knafeh ($16). This had nothing to do with the execution of the dessert, and everything to do with its sweet soak in an orange-blossom syrup. I’ve never responded to the taste of floral flavors. Made with delicate layers of katalfi, ghee and sweet cow’s milk, the knafeh hits and maintains a hard floral note.

Leena’s menu at Lulu’s on Solano is more assured and expansive than the first iteration on Camelia Street in Berkeley. When she opened the restaurant there in 2021, I spoke with the chef about the transition she made from her 2020 Mana’eesh Lady pop-up to a brick-and-mortar in the post-pandemic restaurant world.

Throughout her cooking career in California restaurant kitchens, Leena found parallels between California and Palestinian cuisine. Both focus on seasonality and celebrating ingredients versus manipulating them to the point where they’re unrecognizable. Leena described her approach at Lulu’s as a combination of California produce and meats with Palestinian influences, rather than as an Arabic restaurant.

She told me that during her stint at Serpentine, the chef there, Deepak Kaul, was the first person to encourage her to incorporate Middle Eastern flavors in the context of a fine-dining restaurant. “Kaul and I played very well off each other because he brought a lot of Indian flair to it,” she said. “That was my first inkling of, ‘I can make something really cool with the food of my culture.’” 

Lulu, 1106 Solano Ave., Albany. Open Thu–Sun for brunch and dinner.  IG: @luluonsolano. lulusolano.com