My thoughts on Jewish food.
You’d be mistaken for thinking that the only seder is the Passover seder. There’s the seder for Tu B’Shvat, when we eat a selection of items from the earth’s bounty and recite relevant passages from the Torah. And there’s also the Rosh Hashana seder when we eat specific foods, the Hebrew names of which are …
Last week this space spoke of sweet Sfardi almond cigars, as a treat appropriate for the High Holidays. Now the Ashkenazim are demanding equal space. The problem is, many people really don’t like plain old boring honey cake. So (don’t) give them cake! Give them Lebkuchen, which are a chewy cookie bar with a glaze. …
The Hebrew Scriptures mention almonds ten times, the first mention being in Genesis, where the almond is referred to as “among the best of fruits.” Maybe that’s why the seven-branched candelabra used in the Temple was designed to resemble almond branches topped with blossoms. Also, the almond tree is the first tree to bloom in …
All week long, Jews of modest means wait for the Sabbath when all manner of delicacies are served. As one popular Shabbat zemer goes, the Sabbath “is a time to delight in all kinds of pleasures: fatted geese, quail, and fish.” The more, the merrier. Ashkenazi Jews often ate gefilte fish on Shabbos, because fish …
For Jews who spent time in Central and Eastern Europe, a ¾ done dill pickle made a perfect teething ring. A pickle has everything you could want in abundance: it’s cold, crunchy, salty, sour, and redolent with dill. A real dill pickle is fished out of a barrel. Pickles are like most Jewish food, born …
The story of Jews in the Diaspora was one of making things stretch. Clothes, food, wood, coal. All of these things were to have every last drop of use squeezed out of them, in the case of Kvass, quite literally. Kvass was a rough homemade liquor made out of the stale ends of Russian black …
When it’s too hot to cook, you want simple things you can make. Things without a lot of ingredients but with lots and lots of flavor. Borscht, the dairy version, fits the bill. It’s plain, healthy, and can be served cold. It’s so easy to make it’s almost not a recipe. If your mom opened …
Coffee a Jewish food? Why not? A new study shows that coffee is the key to longevity. What’s so Jewish about that? Think about it: what do Jews say when they toast each other? They say, “L’Chaim,” to life! Wishing someone longevity is definitely a Jewish thing, ergo coffee is a Jewish food.
Food writer Patti Shosteck wrote a wonderful book back in 1981 called A Lexicon of Jewish Cooking, that gives the reader the history and religious background of various Jewish foods. The first entry is for Adafina, of which Shosteck writes: “Uncovered, the aroma and taste of adafina enticed Jew and non-Jew alike. Compared to the sardines, …
Moroccan carrot salad is one of the most popular salads on the Shabbat table or at a simcha. There’s a reason for that: the salad is cool, but spicy, light, yet somehow substantial. It makes your palate tingle for what comes next, which is the purpose of any good salad worth its salt. To make …