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ABOUT · the chefs

Two chefs,
one kitchen.

Two chefs who grew up in different neighbourhoods found one kitchen above the sea. Chaim Dayan, from Haifa, a kid of the Wadi Nisnas market. Ziko Hagav, from Ramat HaSharon, a kid of the French table.

01 · Chaim

Chaim DayanHayim Dayan

CHEF DE CUISINE · HOT KITCHEN

Three decades of work in kitchens at home and abroad. At Terrace he runs the hot side: starters, pasta, wood-fired pizza, mains. Every morning at the Wadi Nisnas market, choosing the day's produce from Mt Carmel and the Mediterranean.

Every dish should be a story about the place its ingredients came from.

Chaim opened his first kitchen on Mount Carmel, after years of mornings at the Wadi Nisnas market with his father. There he learned to pick a tomato by smell, read a loaf by colour, respect the season.

For six years Chaim ran the hot kitchen alone. Desserts and breads always sat a beat behind the savoury course, a soft spot he kept circling back to.

A mutual friend introduced them on a winter evening. The first conversation ended past midnight, with an opening menu sketched on a napkin.

02 · Ziko

Ziko HagavZiko Hagav

PASTRY · COLD KITCHEN

Chaim's partner in the Terrace kitchen. The two built a contemporary Mediterranean menu together, a blend of their two cooking styles, deep shared thinking with a personal signature on every plate.

A good dessert is a full stop, not a comma.

Through those same years Ziko worked Paris bakeries, long nights in front of stone ovens. He came home with a stack of books and one question: where can you bake a 36-hour loaf without compromising.

Today the two run Terrace together. Chaim on the hot kitchen, Ziko on the cold kitchen and the cocktails. One menu, a shared signature, a daily argument about the salt.

How we
think about food.

  1. 01

    Close to home.

    85% of the produce comes from a 30 km radius: Carmel farmers, Akko fishermen, a wood-oven bakery in Wadi Nisnas. What doesn't, we're not shy about saying.

  2. 02

    Truly seasonal.

    The menu turns over four times a year. Starters change every two weeks. If it isn't in season, it isn't on the plate.

  3. 03

    Kashrut without compromise on flavour.

    Dairy and fish, certified by the Haifa Rabbinate. No scaleless fish. The kitchen isn't defined by the constraint, it's built through it.

  4. 04

    The plate is half the story.

    The other half: the view, the light, the playlist, the cocktail. If one of them is out of place, the evening isn't whole.

How we got
here.

  1. 2012

    Chaim heads to Tuscany.

    Two years working at a country restaurant near Siena. Where the love of hand-rolled pasta was born, and the healthy slowness of a kitchen that respects the season.

  2. 2015

    Ziko in Paris.

    Three years at Du Pain et des Idées. Learned that bread isn't a product, it's a 36-hour process that asks to be respected.

  3. 2017

    The room is found.

    An abandoned space at Ben Gurion 50, Haifa. Nothing but an old stone wall and a terrace looking straight at the gardens. The decision took twenty minutes.

  4. 2018

    Terrace opens.

    Eight months of construction, an opening menu of 14 dishes, a bar with 11 cocktails. The first night: 32 diners, mostly friends.

  5. 2026

    Today.

    Seventeen on the team, sixty-four seats, a menu that turns with the season. The view: exactly the way it was on day one.

Come meet
the kitchen.

A table for four, a terrace seat or a salon corner. Pick the hour, we'll handle the rest.