The Laser Wolf team launches a rooftop seafood and cocktail spot in Williamsburg 

By Scott Lynch

Walk into Jaffa, a brand new indoor-outdoor seafood restaurant, raw bar, and cocktail lounge in Williamsburg’s Hoxton hotel and it feels like you’ve stumbled upon some sort of secret.

The place is stylish and nicely spread out, with comfy couches, lots of greenery, sunny seats and shady spots, a few dramatic touches (those water towers!), and some exceptional seafood dishes with a contemporary Israeli twist. And yet, on a beautiful Saturday evening over Memorial Day weekend, it was also improbably serene up here, an oasis of quiet in the middle of the neighborhood’s rager zone on Wythe Avenue.

A patio, and a spacious indoor dining room too (Scott Lynch)

Don’t expect those empty seats to last. Jaffa is operated by the Boka (from Chicago) and chef Mike Solomonov’s CookNSolo (from Philadelphia) dream team that also runs the bustling K’Far downstairs and the stellar Laser Wolf up on the roof, the latter of which remains one of the toughest tables in town. Word will get out about this place. It will attract a crowd. Especially once people discover how good the food is here.

“We’re really excited to show another side of chef Mike’s creativity.” Jaffa’s chef de cuisine Sam Levenfeld tells Brooklyn Magazine. “He doesn’t work with shellfish in any of his other restaurants, so we’re all really putting our heads together to create something exciting here, and to show what new age Israeli food is right now. Even if you’re just at Jaffa for a drink and a quick snack we want it to be something special.”

The Jaffa menu is short but consistently compelling, and almost every dish features some sort of shellfish. There are oysters on the halfshell, of course, a selection of briny East Coast beauties that comes with both a fiery schug and a tangy passion fruit mignonette. The shrimp cocktail is fantastic, the bivalves totally textbook — plump, juicy, sweet, snappy — and the spicy dipping sauce a fun riff on the traditional horseradish-heavy condiment.

Shrimp cocktail, $4 each, and East Coast oysters, $4.50 each (Scott Lynch)

There are thin, pastrami-seasoned slices of yellowtail, a scallop crudo with shipka peppers, a Tunisian tuna crudo with olive and harissa, and Jaffa’s stealth winner in the “raw and cured” section, a platter of potent pickled mussels, each fat little mollusk sporting a dollop of herbed tahina. I’ve never had anything quite like these before, and they are crazy addictive.

Yellowtail pastrami, $20 (Scott Lynch)

For something heartier (and served warm), Jaffa offers a shrimp dish made with arak, the Levantine, anise-flavored spirit. Or, there’s a bright and acidic shakshuka studded with octopus bits.

Octopus shakshuka, $30 (Scott Lynch)

And best of all, a charred scallop and merguez sausage combo that comes in a cast iron pan sticky with harif, a Yemenite hot sauce. All of these can be complemented nicely by the mini-loaf of challah pull-apart rolls, which some may remember from the early days at K’Far.

Scallops and merguez, $29 (Scott Lynch)

Jaffa, the ancient Israeli port city, is known as much for its oranges as it is for its seafood, and so the signature cocktail here is an orange (and vanilla) slushie loaded with vodka and aperol. Other boozy beverages include such summery specials as the Oy Vey (rum, mango, coconut), the Fuzzy Bubblelech (tequila with blood orange soda), and the Gelt Rush (bourbon, honey, apricot), all of which are $18. Beer, wine, and a few mocktails round out the drinks menu.

Boka and CookNSolo have effectively completed their three-pronged takeover of the Hoxton hotel. And all signs point to everyone sticking around for a good long time. “I live in Greenpoint,” says Levenfeld, who came from the Hoxton in Chicago. “I love Brooklyn. I really, really love it. The food, the culture, everything is incredible.” (Totally agree my dude. Though tell Solomonov he now needs to open a Federal Donuts here.)

Jaffa is located at 97 Wythe Avenue at the The Hoxton. Signage is coming soon, but you can find the entrance on North 9th Street, up a flight of stairs. Current hours are Wednesday through Friday from 4 p.m to midnight, Saturday from noon to midnight, and Sunday from noon to 11 p.m.