Our story
Umi Falafel was founded in 2013 by a Palestinian-Jordanian with his family's falafel recipe, a small kitchen food mixer and an idea nobody in Ireland was asking for.
“umi” is the Arabic word for mother
Chapter one
The plan was simple and slightly mad: introduce hummus and falafel to a country that ran on chicken fillet rolls. The first Umi opened on Dame Street with an open kitchen, a family recipe from Palestine and Jordan, and a counter you could see straight into.
The name came from home. Umi means mother — the recipe was hers, so the restaurant is hers too.
Chapter two
Everything was made by hand from the start. The falafel mix came out of a small kitchen food mixer. Every dessert on the counter — the baklawa, the basbousa — was baked by the founder's wife in their own home kitchen and carried in.
Some of that has scaled. The principle hasn't: the mix is still prepared every morning, seven days a week, and nothing is fried until somebody orders it.
Chapter three
Vegetarian and vegan food was not supposed to be a hit in Ireland. We were told as much. People loved it anyway — and in 2018 the Palestinian falafel sandwich was among the ten most ordered items in Europe on Deliveroo.
Chapter four
We've won a lot of things over the years. Every one of them traces back to the same decision: keep the food fresh, keep the kitchen open, cook it when it's ordered.
Four front doors later, the falafel mix is unchanged: fourteen ingredients, prepared every morning. Come and see it happen — the kitchen is right there in front of you.
from her kitchen to yours
