How sweet it is that Meli European Taverna has added its “unexpected Greek” cuisine to the menu of dining options in center city Easton. The restaurant takes its name from the Greek word for honey, and Meli, which launched in March, is a honey of a spot for unique dining and drinks.
The restaurant makes its home in the space previously filled by the French bistro and brasserie Maxim's 22. After a half year of renovations, Meli's décor shimmers like the Aegean Sea in mid-summer.
Turquoise murals behind the bar, based on a Greek superstition and symbol for good luck, create a backdrop of oceanic color. Large rattan chandeliers hang suspended in mid-air. Upholstered dining chairs, the color of butternut squash, sidle up to honey-toned tables. Graceful, shapely urns throughout the restaurant tie this modern-day taverna to ancient Greece, where they would have been an integral part of everyday cooking and dining.
The from-scratch fare is inspired by what's served at the tables in Greek households. These are the dishes you would find at a family dinner, not in the traditional tavernas, says Meli co-owner Melissa Zannakis, who's visited Greece several times and has family there.
Greeks travel a lot from country to country in Europe, she says, so their home fare incorporates “techniques, ingredients and foods” of cuisines from across the continent, especially those of France, Portugal, Spain and Italy. Meli—thanks to Zannakis and co-owner Maria Manakos, her sister-in-law—is “introducing the Lehigh Valley to a new feel for Greek food,” food that's playful and features an unexpected twist.
Meli's menu bears out the European influence. The French aromatic mirepoix forms the flavor base of several dishes. Mushroom risotto is built on Italian Arborio rice, and you'll find aioli, customarily considered to hail from coastal cuisines of France and Spain, on the menu. The Portuguese wine Madeira serves as a foundation for sauce with scallops, and a side dish, the classic French Potatoes Savoyard, is worth writing home about.
Executive chef Salah Eddine Ben Attou, born and raised in Morocco, formerly a chef at Philadelphia's Buddakan and executive chef at Bethlehem's Yianni's Taverna, proves Greek honey is a perfect namesake for the restaurant. This honey—deeper in color and richer in flavor and fragrance than the Lehigh Valley's variety, says Zannakis—embodies the essence of Meli's menu, which offers dishes with deep, resonant flavors and aromas that invite adventurous palates.
Grilled octopus, tender yet firm and meaty, is charred in all the right places, the smoky notes balancing its mildly sweet flavor. Finished with extra virgin olive oil and Greek red wine vinegar, the octopus pairs well with the accompanying grilled cipollini onions and burnt lemon.
Fried calamari's coating is perfectly crisped, fine foil to the tender rings, and tomato chili oil adds a touch of spicy heat. Four beautiful roasted baby eggplants, collapsed with concentrated flavor, are robust with tomato and a nuanced background layer of garlic.
Like a still-life painting, beet salad is a visual feast. Red and yellow beets and red onion, dressed with red wine vinaigrette with oregano, look dramatic against a spray of arugula and an artistic smear of mizithra (ricotta-like fresh cheese) mousse. What lovely balance in taste and texture.
Move over potato chips—make room for Meli's zucchini variety. These ever-so-thin fried squash slices, dusted in a fine coating, are warm, crispy and easily addictive. Dip just one into the creamy tzatziki sauce, and you have to finish the entire plate.
A salad hailing from the island of Crete, dakos salata is built on crumbled barley rusks (twice-baked bread like melba toast) topped with a layer of tomatoes, then a layer of feta mousse. Basil oil dresses the layers, seeping down into the rusks, infusing the crunchy bread with tastes of summer. Texture takes center stage here.
Touched with savory herb butter, grilled Certified Angus Beef® rib eye, on a bed of roasted leeks, is melt-in-the-mouth tender and appropriately partnered with the rich, gratin-like Savoyard. (Consider ordering the rib eye just to savor this delectable side.) Strips of daikon radish, arranged geometrically and flavored with soy, balance the rich steak and potatoes.
Traditional Greek pastitsio gets playful treatment at Meli. Deconstructed, the dish features braised, succulent short rib, dark with intense flavor, paired with paccheri pasta (large tubes) with béchamel sauce and shredded mizithra cheese. This is comfort food on steroids.
When it comes to comfort food, however, the pastitsio gets stiff competition from a mouthwatering braised lamb shank, topped with French-influenced tomato concassé and feta. Brown buttered noodles feature hilopites (Greek noodles), so savory in their nuttiness you have to slow down to eat them to ensure enjoyment of every molecule.
A whole grilled branzino is splendid in its elegant simplicity. Mild sweet flesh, supple and moist, becomes even sweeter in juxtaposition with its crisp, smoky skin, finished with the citrus freshness of lemon vinaigrette.
Now let's talk about simple elegance. That certainly applies to bougatsa, a playful twist on a traditional Greek brunch pastry, much like a custard pie. At Meli, bougatsa becomes dessert with shards of house-made phyllo, drizzled with honey, standing tall like a drip sand castle at the beach, atop vanilla pastry cream and cinnamon ice cream. The interplay of textures is inspired, and the interplay of flavors is pretty inspired too.
There's playful inspiration in the bar program as well. Consider the standard menu-starter prosciutto-wrapped melon. Meli has imagined it in drink format featuring pineapple-infused Wheatley vodka, Midori, lime juice and Skinos Mastiha (a herbaceous spirit from the mastiha tree found only on Skinos Island). A garnish of prosciutto jerky finishes the creation with panache. This easy-drinking cocktail refreshes with a clear hint of melon flavor.
Beverage director Joshua Coates studied and trained with professionals at the forefront of today's bar renaissance—Alex Day and David Kaplan, for example—and brings a technique-focused approach to bartending. Meli's beverage program has its own fully equipped kitchen, Coates says, with sous vide machines, immersion blenders, vacuum sealers, induction burners and more.
Uniquely, you'll find cocktails on draft at Meli's bar, and its zero-proof cocktail collection is as inclusive for non-drinkers, says Coates, as the alcoholic drink selection. Bartenders hand-cut ice for drinks from the restaurant's large blocks frozen on site. This ice, clearer and more dense than traditional ice, ups the ante when it comes to drink quality.
The theme of playfulness in drinks and dining that drives Meli is intentional. It all boils down to this: Zannakis says she and Manakos are “aiming for the restaurant to be fun, to offer a high level of service with a laid-back feel.” That goes for the bar, too. Coates says, “It's an unpretentious place to have fun.” Just so no one forgets, though, there's a reminder on chalk panels at the bar—“We are here to be of service and have a wicked fun time.”
It's the playfulness that sets Meli apart from Yianni's Taverna, the more traditional Greek restaurant in Bethlehem, that Zannakis and her sister-in-law have owned since 2009 when they took over their family's Gus's Crossroads Inn. This longstanding Lehigh Valley restaurant was built and nurtured by Gus and Eleni Zannakis. In October 2024, the family will celebrate 50 years of business at the Bethlehem location.
Melissa Zannakis says her parents-in-law, Gus and Eleni, raised their family in Easton, and family members still live in the city. She and Manakos are thrilled to be opening Meli in the city's center, because the restaurant has settled in such a great spot, but also because “it feels a bit like the family is coming home.”
Meli European Taverna
322 Northampton St., Easton | 610.672.4730 | melieaston.com
Hours:
Tues.–Thurs.: 4–9 p.m.
Fri. & Sat.: 4–10 p.m.
Sun.: Noon–8 p.m.
Happy Hour: Tues.–Fri.: 4–6 p.m.; Sun.: 6–8 p.m.
Bar remains open after kitchen closes.
Cost: Mains: $19–$54
Parking: On-street and
N. Fourth Street Garage
Reservations: Recommended
WHAT TO ORDER
Sip a cocktail on tap. Dakos salata is a must-try… it's so Greek. Branzino is deliciously healthy. The visually stunning bougatsa is a dessert like none other. For goodness' sake, though, don't miss the zucchini chips!
Published as “Inside Dish” in the May 2024 edition of Lehigh Valley Style magazine.
