ALLENTOWN, Pa. – A full-service restaurant offering freshly prepared kebabs, falafel and other tasty dishes has ended operations in Lehigh County.
The Allentown location of Ayat, a popular Palestinian restaurant with around a dozen locations open or coming soon in multiple states, closed this past week at 1243 W. Tilghman St.
The Allentown restaurant, which opened in 2023 at the site of the former Bellissimo Restaurant, was Ayat’s first Pennsylvania location.
Another Pennsylvania location of Ayat is coming soon to Sansom Street in Philadelphia.
It’s unclear what led to the Allentown restaurant’s closure and if any other Ayat locations are planned for the Lehigh Valley.
Co-owner Abdul Elenani did not immediately return a message seeking more information, and a hand-written note posted on the Tilghman Street restaurant’s entrance door simply reads, “Sorry we are permanently closed.”
The Allentown location of Ayat is pictured shortly before its opening in 2023.
Ryan Kneller
The full-service Ayat, which debuted in Brooklyn in 2020, is a “casual bistro where you’ll find honest, authentic Palestinian food made with love,” according to a description on the business’ website.
Over the past several years, Elenani and his wife, Ayat Masoud, have grown the business to include other locations in New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania.
Additional locations are coming soon to Texas and Washington, D.C., according to the business’ website.
Elenani created Ayat in honor of Masoud, a Palestinian lawyer with a passion for food.
The restaurants’ kitchens are “fueled by olive oil, bold spices, fresh ingredients and a whole lot of love,” Elenani wrote on the business’ website.
“Ayat is honest, hardworking, and loves her career; but there is a different kind of love that radiates through her when she is cooking,” Elenani’s message continues. “Seeing this passion in her and experiencing her delicious food, it was clear to me that the community needed to experience this too. So I created a bistro named after her where she can come to cook with local ingredients sourced from our FalahiFarms. A space where she can share her passion for food with the community she loves and works hard for.”
Ayat offers dozens of salads and hot and cold appetizers, including hummus, labneh, baba ghanoush, falafel, kibbeh, tabbouleh, fattoush, grilled halloumi and watermelon salad, muhammarah (roasted sweet red peppers blended with walnuts and pomegranate molasses) and beitenjan (fried eggplant drizzled with tahini and pomegranate molasses).
Customers also can enjoy traditional laffa and platters (served with rice, pickles, green salad and wood-fired pita) such as falafel, shawarma (beef, chicken or mixed) and zahir with beitenjan laffa (cauliflower, eggplant, fries, hummus, tahini, tomato and pickles).
Other menu highlights include mashawy dishes (served with rice, pickles, green salad and wood-fired pita) such as BBQ chicken, lamb chops and beef or chicken kebabs; and items from the wood-fired oven such as wings, zaatar manaqish and lahma bi ajeen (blend of ground beef, tomatoes and onions on a classic crust).