Our story
Middle Eastern cooking, in the heart of Santos.
Behind Yallah
Hagay Elle
Born in the Middle East, Hagay Elle combines an international outlook on life with his global, aesthete-based network. His Middle Eastern cuisine pairs taste with a high sense of hospitality and a distinctive crafting style.
He brought that sense of curation from his career as a fashion photographer, composing luxury goods into images for print magazines. His life then, revolved across the fashion stages of New York, London, and Paris, where he lived for more than twenty years. As he was sharing flats with makeup artists, fashion stylists, and models, he became accustomed to hosting and crafting meals, setting up tables with European sophistication and diverse cuisines.
He moved to Lisbon in 2020, riding his motorcycle fast through the night, all his life in two bags, and he never looked back. Lisbon became his home ever since, and in return he granted the city with Yallah, a Middle Eastern restaurant on a lovely pale-blue terrace in Santos, facing the French Institute. There, in the European Southern always shinning sun, his crowd of stylish friends who share passion for innovation and luxury, beauty and taste, gather around his outdoor tables.
Find him seated at the terrace, always surrounded by a bunch of friends and girlfriends, laughing in English and speaking French. He will surely call you in, as if we were still Paris in the 1990s, when internet was just about getting a cool transparent jelly-blue Macintosh.
A former chapel, a place to gather
A place in Santos
Botanical pictures and hanging plants. Outside, blue tables sit along the cobbled street.
