Pretty soon after Christmas, we jetted off to make the most of an extra week of holiday in the country I was born, Israel.

This is a seriously foodie place and I often think it’s almost impossible to eat a bad meal there. Most interestingly it’s often the most simple looking places where you can find the most surprisingly delicious food. We’ve previously eaten stunning food in petrol stations and seemingly abandoned towns. The diverse background of the people who live there has rubbed off on the cuisine, in Israel you can eat foods of European, Turkish, North African, middle eastern and now more popular than ever, Asian influence.

This all means that as a culinary experience, Israel is pretty hard to beat particularly if you’re partial to the Mediterranean diet.

First stop on sampling Israel’s burgeoning fine dining scene was Mizlala in a trendy area of Tel Aviv. This delightful non Kosher restaurant had a very sophisticated vibe, as cool and swanky in fact as any London restaurant. It also felt very familiar in a lovely Ottolenghi-esque way. And the food lived up to it, beautifully cooked unusual ingredients, and brilliant flavour combinations.

Another more traditional place we enjoyed a downright delish meal was in our very favourite Israeli location, Caesarea. Not only is it full of scenic Roman ruins but also plenty of proper good restaurants and to top it off its on the sea so it’s worth it just for the views. At this restaurant even the waiters were foodies, they kept plying us with gorgeous free dishes. My favourite meal set up in Israel is the salad selection, you don’t choose you just get a vast array of little dishes each with a different delicious fresh little salad, some are fresh tomatoes, some with pickles, some with tahini aubergine. It doesn’t get better than this and this restaurant did it exceptionally well, and the bread was some of the best I had. A definite winner.

Falafel and hummus are practically the Israeli national dishes and on this latest trip we discovered probably the best falafel in the world (or at least pretty close). Take a look at this beaut, also happens to be located in a beautiful little artsy town.

Another wonderful thing about Israel is the produce, it’s such quality that it gets shipped all over the world (you’ll often notice a lot of our fruit and veg in the UK is from there). So to have the joy of enjoying it super fresh is even better. Here’s our New Years Eve dinner there…

With infinite time, I could go on and on about the food in Israel but let’s just leave it with this…this is airport food in Israel… Ahh I miss this place already.