Before launching her Palestinian food truck Falastini earlier this year, Rahaf Al Khatib ran cooking workshops and dining pop-ups under the name Beit Siti (“grandmother’s home” in Arabic, and often spelt ‘beit sitti’).

The events were a way to preserve her grandmother’s recipes and share her culture, which she continued to express, through the truck, in dishes such as makloubeh (a rice dish packed with fried cauliflower, eggplant and chicken or lamb, flipped upside down before serving) and musakhan (confit onion, sumac chicken and yoghurt sauce loaded into a wrap or served atop crisp fried flatbread). The maroon wagon outside Preston’s Pony Club Gym was an instant hit.

“We’d been running as temporary traders doing pop-ups, so by the time the truck arrived, people already knew about us, so we’d already outgrown it in a lot of ways,” Al Khatib tells Broadsheet. “It’s a great problem to have, I recognise.”

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The whole time she’s been “itching” to find a permanent venue. When Broadsheet calls, Al Khatib has spent the day prepping food she’ll transport to the truck for cooking. “It’s a challenge without our own kitchen … we’ve been using hired spaces so it’s a lot of running around.”

By the end of the year, she’ll open her own kitchen and dining room at 150 Bell Street, Coburg. The lease was made possible by a serendipitous windfall – an unexpected inheritance earlier this year from her mother, who passed 10 years ago. “We were quite young when my mum passed away, I think she wanted us to do our best without knowing we were going to have a cushion.

“She was very active in the Palestinian community in Melbourne and she always had a dream to open up a community centre … so it felt like the planets aligned on that.”

The homey new eatery will continue the Beit Siti name and offer Al Khatib the freedom (and space) to flex her cooking skills and host events once more. “The food truck is more grab-and-go style, so that limits you. I want to mess with more seafood and things like that.

“Something you can sit down and eat but also take home to your family. I think that’s missing from that pocket of Coburg at the moment.”

There’ll also be a pantry stocking house-made condiments, spice mixes and other Beit Siti products. Plus, a bigger selection of pastries, thanks to a shiny new oven. “My grandma taught me how to cook savoury food, but my mum is the baker,” says Al Khatib.

Her ananas brûlée is based off her mum’s upside-down pineapple cake, and served with fresh za’atar from her garden. She’s also adapted it to be gluten-free and vegan. “I think that inclusiveness of food we can all eat – or a place where everyone can come and be fed – is really important.”

That inclusive philosophy will extend to the venue’s events program, which will include embroidery, music, cooking and language classes. “Conversational Arabic is something people have been asking for a lot,” says Al Khatib. “It also allows us to have a space to run our [fast-breaking] Ramadan iftars. I’m not religious at all but that’s something I think brought a lot of community together earlier in the year.”

The space itself will be cosy, comfortable and dimly lit, and decorated with lush fabrics and other items belonging to Al Khatib’s grandma. “She’s a seamstress by trade so I’ll be displaying her work, like dresses she’s embroidered or things I’ve brought back, and a lot of old family photos, so you can feel where we’ve been and also where we’re headed.

“Ultimately this is a space for the whole community,” she continues. “I want it to be a very safe space for people who have just arrived, as much as people who have grown up here. I think our needs are different but we also have so much in common.

“I hope people receive it with the love and care and intention I’m trying to deliver it with.”

Beit Siti will open by the end of the year at 150 Bell Street, Coburg.