For much of his life, accomplished restaurateur Arsalun Tafazol distanced himself from his Middle Eastern heritage, opening one dining venue after another featuring seafood, steaks, and Asian, Mexican and Italian cuisine.
Now, 17 years after CH Projects opened its very first eatery, its co-founder has gone all in, embracing his culture in a new North Park restaurant called Leila, inspired by his travels as a youth to his parents’ homeland and more recent sojourns to the night markets of Morocco.
Not only is the two-level restaurant restaurant on 30th Street an homage to his parents’ homeland – they are both from Iran – but it is also a tribute to Tafazoli’s mother, who died two years ago. The restaurant formally opened to the public on Wednesday.
“Honestly, this is not a project I ever thought i would do,” said Tafazoli, a native San Diegan whose parents fled the revolution in Iran and settled in San Diego. His father, unable to make a go of it San Diego, eventually returned to Iran. “When I became Americanized, I didn’t really have friends from that area. And around the time of 9/11, it was pretty (crummy) to be from that region, so I kind of tried to downplay that part of my heritage.
“My mom died a couple years ago, and she really was always a little bummed I didn’t embrace that part of my background more, so I thought this would be a good tribute to her as well.”
Fresh off CH Projects’ most monumental project to date – the $34 million reimagining last year of the 1940s-era Lafayette Hotel and Club – Tafazoli has transformed a former warehouse into a stunning space that features an 18-foot high water feature, live trees, tapestry-adorned walls, and a star-lit ceiling, much of it inspired by time spent in the souks of Marrakech.
While Tafazoli spent considerable time during his youth living in the Middle East, including Turkey, Lebanon, Iraq and Egypt, it was a more recent trip to Morocco that turned into a shopping expedition for his latest project.
“After The Lafayette opening, I went to Morocco for three weeks, and it’s a pretty majestic place in terms of the art and craftsmanship,” said Tafazoli, whose company spent $5 million on creating Leila. “And I really loved the night markets and the souks. There was really an energy I was drawn to and spent hours and hours going back drinking gobs of tea.
“On that trip, I bought lots of what you will see in the restaurant. I wanted to create the energy of the night markets and souks, so I purchased a lot of Moroccan art and furniture. And a lot of the light fixtures, fabric and custom wood paneling – I filled a container, brought it over here and used it for the project.”
As much effort as CH Projects devoted to the design of Leila – as it does with all its restaurants and bars – the hospitality firm also was determined to replicate the food of the Middle East, from Iran and Egypt to Turkey and Lebanon.
“Street vendors would make you kebabs, and some of the most delicious things I had were made with the most basic of setups. So I wanted to recreate that dynamic.”
That ambition, though, was hardly a simple task to carry out. It required hiring a company in London to make a custom, 20-foot-long island hearth that Tafazoli says incorporates four iterations of live fire cooking, including clay and tandoor ovens, a grill, and an open flame area for cooking skewers. Equally ambitious are the restaurant’s house-made breads, including traditional Barbari and fry breads.
Tafazoli is excited about a favorite dish of his – a crispy Saffron rice. But there will be a wide variety of Middle Eastern offerings, some more familiar than others, like platters of spreads and sauces such as labne, muhammara, and cucumber yogurt, kabobs, tabbouleh with bluefin tuna, and braised and grilled lamb shank.
It took a year to find the best executive chef suited for the new restaurant, Tafazoli said. He recruited Wesley Remington Johnson, who had spent time at a well-regarded restaurant in Philadelphia doing a similar type of cooking. Johnson, he said, spent a month in Morocco doing research for the Leila menu.
And the name of the restaurant? That was inspired largely by what is one of Tafazoli’s father’s favorite songs — “Layla” by Eric Clapton. Because the restaurant’s logo is in Farsi, the name was spelled Leila, which Tafazoli was told is the correct Farsi spelling of Layla.
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