Restaurant icon Abla's recognised for 40 years of nurturing Melbourne's Middle Eastern love affair

• The Age Good Food Guide 2023: All the award winners
• Icon review: Abla's

Abla Amad of pioneering Lebanese restaurant Abla's, a pillar of Carlton dining for four decades, has rarely done things for awards or prizes.

Her two-storey dining room in an Elgin Street terrace has changed little in its decor or menu since 1979, despite its undeniable role in broadening our culinary tastes during that time.

But at The Age Good Food Guide 2023 Awards on Monday night, the spotlight was turned squarely on Amad (and her children who now run the restaurant), with the87-year-old restaurateur winning the Vittoria Coffee Legend Award.

Introduced in Victoria in 2013 to recognise those who have made a significant contribution to the hospitality industry over a long period, the award was bestowed on Amad by the Guide's senior panel, led by editor Roslyn Grundy.

"I'm really excited about the award going to Abla Amad," Grundy says. "Her restaurant has introduced a lot of Melburnians to Middle Eastern flavours."

Before Abla's, if you said 'fattoush' on Elgin Street, the response was more likely to be 'bless you' than a salad.

With its home-style Lebanese cooking and generous banquets of cabbage rolls, baba ghanoush, and buttery chicken rice, Abla's was something entirely new for a city still learning the ropes of Italian restaurants.

Senior reviewer Dani Valent jokes that, "Before Abla's, if you said 'fattoush' on Elgin Street, the response was more likely to be 'bless you' than a salad with tomato, cucumber, mint and shards of pita."

It was also a leap of faith for Amad, a Lebanese migrant who arrived in Australia in the mid-1950s. She opened the venue at the urging of family and friends, who believed her cooking should be shared beyond their kitchen table.

Amad's daughter Patricia accepted the award on her behalf at a ceremony at The W Hotel in front of more than 300 hospitality heavyweights.

"She is a really humble person," says Patricia Amad. "Often when she's interviewed and asked 'What's the secret of your cooking', she always says it's love."

That Abla Amad triumphed in a city where tahini was once unavailable and the restaurant had to grow its own Lebanese cucumbers is even more remarkable.

Amad's success was also an essential step on our road towards the dozens of falafel shops now around town, pita on supermarket shelves, and restaurants from chefs including Greg Malouf, Michael Bacash, Shane Delia and Rumi's Joseph Abboud.

"[Yotam] Ottolenghi's recipes might have seemed quite novel in the rest of the world, but because we have had people like Abla in our midst for a long time, those flavours are quite familiar to Melburnians," says Grundy.

Margaret-Anne Amad said that her mother's generosity as a host and a cook is not just something she reserves for the restaurant. "Her hospitality that she had at home flowed through into the restaurant."

Famous diners over the years have included Paul Simon, K.D. Lang and Yusuf Islam (Cat Stevens).

"Anyone gets to feel anchored at Abla's, whether they're part of the great Lebanese diaspora, or just someone whose own culinary traditions might make for a disappointing blog," wrote former Good Food chief critic Gemima Cody in her 2018 review.

Past winners of the Vittoria Coffee Legend Award in Victoria include Gail and Kevin Donovan of Donovans restaurant in St Kilda, Anthony Lui, chef and co-owner of Flower Drum restaurant, and Alla Wolf-Tasker, of Daylesford's Lake House.

The Age Good Food Guide 2023 magazine is on sale now for $9.95 at newsagents and supermarkets and thestore.com.au.