Tamar Adler's Fried Jewish Artichokes
Save the Bubbes!
The Curious History of Kosher Salt
Shiva for Stage Deli
Berlin's Jewish Foodie Comeback
The Great Deli Rescue
Romping Through the Jewish Pumpkin Patch
Haimish to Haute, NYC Transforms Jewish Food
Bay Area's DIY Jewish Food Movement
Yid.Dish Recipe Box
'Inside the Jewish Bakery’
The Bacon Problem
Manischewitz Goes Sephardic
Jews and the Booze
Jews and Beer
Taking the Food Tour That Keeps on Feeding
At Kosher Feast, Fried Locusts for Dessert
Live Long and Super: Supermarket History
A Slice of Hebrew Pizza
Grow and Behold: A New Line of Kosher Chicken Launches A Conversation Around Jewish Food Ethics
When In Rome… Eat Like the Jews Do
A Letter to Our Readers
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JCarrot Archives: 2006-August 2010
Shabbat Dinner, With Panache
I am conscious of the meat, dairy and vegetables that I buy and the meals I prepare, but unfortunately, until recently I never gave a good look at how much waste my family produces. Jonathan Bloom’s new book “American Wasteland, How America Throws Away Nearly Half of its Food (and what we can do about it)” takes on the topic of food waste from various religious perspectives. Interviewing several rabbis in his book Bloom discusses the concept of bal tashchit, meaning “thou shall not destroy” but is often interpreted as “thou shall not waste.”
This idea stems from “When you lay siege to a city for a long time, do not destroy [lo tashchit] its trees by putting an ax to them, because you can eat their fruit.” (Deuteronomy) From this passage, the Talmudic rabbis declared a general prohibition against waste.
Recipes can be like a blind date: the ingredients sound intriguing, expectations run high but the finished product is not always as advertised. If the date doesn’t pan out, it’s one evening. But when a recipe that dirties a big pot has the nerve to fall flat?
This deserves the Yiddish thumbs-down “doss hot mayn bobes tam” (“It tastes like my grandmother used to make it”).
Sounds like a back-handed compliment, but cooks of a certain age recognize the expression as swift criticism of food short on taste or flavor.
Throughout Hanukkah donut aficionado Temim Fruchter has shared with us the best donuts from coast to coast to devour during the holiday. In case you missed any of the first seven nights, here’s a recap:
The Donut Diaries - First Night
The Donut Diaries - Second Night
The Donut Diaries – Third Night
The Donut Diaries – Fourth and Fifth Nights
The Donut Diaries – Sixth Night
The Donut Diaries – Seventh Night
And (finally) the Eight Night…
While our blogger Temim Fruchter has been on the search for the perfect Hanukkah donut, I have been hunting down an unusual and creative gourmet latke as a reprieve from classic recipes. So far this year I have sampled 14 varieties – ranging from classic to topped with braised beef, purple potato to ginger and pork belly-stuffed (yes, pork belly, more on that later) – and while my desire for fried potatoes has been satisfied twice over, my appetite for a truly intriguing latke has only barely been whetted.
Innovation in the arena of latkes seems to go one of two ways. Either the cook dresses the latke, as New York Times columnist Melissa Clark proposes in a recent Dining section article, or the cook remakes the latke by adding ingredients or seasoning the of the potato.
Cross-posted from Saveur.
Last Sunday, my friends Anna and Naf deep-fried a turkey in their Brooklyn backyard. I’ll admit that I balked when the invite came – with Thanksgiving and its parade of leftovers still fresh in my digestive memory, I really wasn’t craving more turkey. But my friends had chosen this particular Sunday because it was the fifth night of Hanukkah – and by the fifth night of a holiday culinarily dedicated to fried foods, it seemed only fitting to graduate beyond the world of fried potato pancakes and doughnuts to something larger. Or as Naf put it, “latkes are for kids.” Deep fried turkey, on the other hand, is serious business.
Read more at Saveur.com.
Each night of Hanukkah, donut blogger and connoisseur Temim Fruchter shares with us one of America’s best donuts to devour during the holiday. In case you missed yesterday’s New York City donuttery Bombolini read the post here and check back each day for a different city’s top donut.
What is blissfully Technicolor, rooster-themed and open 24 hours a day? The Donut Whole, in none other than Wichita, KS. No sooner had I walked in than this became one of my favorite donut shops in the country. The shop is a cheerful alcove of vintage jukeboxes and decor, bright colors and serves one of the largest varieties of flavorful cake donuts I’ve ever experienced. While you wait in line, you can explore the shop’s impressive-if-wacky fake rooster collection and watch as the person behind the counter navigates one of the dozen or so impressively stacked donut trays for your flavor of choice. I like my donuts lighthearted – try the Triple Chocolate Fluffernutter (peanut butter and marshmallow), the King Midas (vanilla, salted peanuts and Lyle’s golden syrup) and the PB&G (peanut butter and grape) – and love a donut place that serves up some vegan options, too! And of course, much like meal + wine pairings, some of us take our donut & caffeine quite seriously. Ordering a “large coffee” at the Donut Whole yielded me one of the biggest, strongest vats of coffee I’ve ever consumed alongside a Homer J (mixed berries and sprinkles) in my entire life. And I didn’t regret if for a second.
Hanukkah relevance: One of the best donut places to both have a holiday-appropriate snack and to burn the midnight oil, as it were. Plus, the décor matches your Hanukkah candles, I guarantee it.
As we kindle the Hanukkah lights, eat greasy foods, and exchange presents with loved ones during this season, it is sometimes easy to forget about how powerless the Jews must have felt prior to their victory in the Hanukkah story – regardless of which version of the story you believe. In our present day Jewish discussions of food issues, rarely do we consider power as the primary lens by which to judge the food system. Yet, many of the most persistent and pervasive challenges to a sustainable, healthy and equitable food system exist because of the consolidation of power.
While the United States has anti-trust laws intended to reduce monopolies in the marketplace, these laws have rarely been enforced when it comes to agriculture, allowing companies to dominate an unfair market. For the first time in decades – after years of complaints and advocacy by farmers and groups like the National Family Farm Coalition – the Department of Justice, in conjunction with USDA, is investigating whether US anti-trust laws are being violated by the agriculture sector.
One of my most cherished childhood memories is Christmas Eve at my aunt Carmenza´s house. There, among family and friends, she would produce an endless parade of the traditional Colombian dishes for the holiday. Chief among them, were delicious, golden, crispy buñuelos, savory deep-fried balls of heavy cheese dough, often served as a snack or as part of dessert on Christmas Eve.
Buñuelos were then for me, as they still are for most Catholic Colombians, the quintessential flavor of Christmas. So strong was my association of this dish with the holiday, that for many years after my conversion to Judaism I avoided eating them or making them, as a way to not celebrate Christmas.
Each night of Hanukkah, donut blogger and connoisseur Temim Fruchter shares with us one of America’s best donuts to devour during the holiday. In case you missed the fourth and fifth night donuts click here and check back each day for a different city’s top donut.
Bomboloni does not kid around. They are a serious bakery with seriously gourmet donuts – including, but not limited to, Meyer lemon, Nutella, apricot, passion fruit and fresh apple flavors. To take advantage of their six bomboloni (an Italian word for the filled pastries they peddle) for $7 deal is to feel like a curator, assembling the perfect collection. Will it be Valrhona chocolate and vanilla bean or Nutella and honey? Every donut in this place is a qualified Hanukkah candidate and their gelato’s not too shabby, either.
Hanukkah relevance: Must I spell it out?
Typically we celebrate the miracle of Hanukkah’s burning oil with vegetable or canola oil used for frying latkes and sufganiyot but there are other oils with stronger flavors worth exploring in non-fried treats in the spirit of the holiday. Argan nuts, which produce a very rich oil with the flavor of roasted almond, sesame and walnut, are indigenous to Morocco and widely used in the country’s cuisine. Though in recent years — after some experimentation at Kibbutz Ketura — argan trees now also growing in Israel’s desert.
I first discovered argan oil about eight years ago in London in the Borough Market where I met Ruth Gurdjieff. She had helped start a collective of Berber women in Morocco who might otherwise have no income; they were hired to do the difficult work of extracting the argan nuts from their shells. Gurdjieff was trying to spread the word about this miraculous oil, that not only tastes delicious but is also rich in antioxidants and vitamin E — and is as useful in cooking as it is in cosmetics. I left her stall with a jar of amlou, a wonderful almond, honey and argan oil nut butter, a bottle of oil to drizzle on vegetables, and another — of the same oil (but made with unroasted nuts) to use as a skin moisturizer or hair treatment. (You can sample Josie Maran argan oil cosmetics at Sephora.)
Each night of Hanukkah, donut blogger and connoisseur Temim Fruchter will share one of America’s best donuts to devour during the holiday. Click here to read last night’s installment and check back each day for a different city’s top donut.
I have three words for you: chocolate rosewater glazed. I couldn’t believe this place makes a donut that involves rosewater. Not to mention donuts featuring ingredients as haute gourmet as saffron, rosemary and lemon zest. Though, it’s a bit of a toss-up – Dynamo’s neighbor is an adorable classic donuttery called The Jelly Donut, whose fares will only put you out circa 85 cents and are good in the best old-fashioned-donut way. But if you’re susceptible to the flirtation of whimsical craft donuts and swanky ingredients (as I suppose I am) it seems that Dynamo needs to be on your holiday to-do list.
Hanukkah relevance: These donuts are like tiny wrapped gifts. Masterpieces, really.
This week in the world of Jewish food we’ve all been lusting after delicious fried Hanukkah goods, but in case you need a break, we bring you some healthy Hanukkah culinary options as well. Happy Hanukkah.
For Hanukkah recipes from Mario Batali’s Latkes with Apple Sauce to Brisket Bourguignon check out Serious Eats’ Hanukkah page.
But the recipe we’re really dying to try right now is The Kitchn’s innovative Apple and Cheese-Stuffed Latkes.
Each night of Hanukkah, donut blogger and connoisseur Temim Fruchter will share one of America’s best donuts to devour during the holiday. Click here to read last night’s installment and check back each day for a different city’s top donut.
SK’s Donuts and Croissant, Los Angeles
When you are serious about donut-consumption, you need trustworthy sources in other cities to tell you where the best ones are. Los Angeles is a city where donuts abound, but good donuts are a bit more elusive. My trustworthy source swears by SK’s Donuts and Croissant. Unpretentious, affordable, open late, and boasting what sounds like a dreamy buttermilk bar and a somewhat-renowned apple fritter, it sounds to me like a perfect donut go-to.
Hanukkah relevance: SK’s serves their donuts in a pink box. Festive!
If you spent time in the Middle East, then there is a good chance you’ve had the pleasure (or horror, depending on your taste buds) of experiencing arak. The intense anise spirit shares a flavor profile with Greek ouzo, French pastis, Turkish raki and Italian sambucco, which are all produced according to a similar method, but with slightly different flavorings.
Once relegated to the older generation, arak is seeing a resurgence amongst the younger Israeli crowd. At its most basic incarnation, arak is a popular chaser to accompany a beer. But it is also popping up as an ingredient in the refined, modern cocktails that are slowly beginning to take off in Tel Aviv. At chef Omer Miller’s restaurant The Dining Hall, arak shows up in a number of drinks including the house cocktail where it is mixed with grapefruit, muddled sage and sugar, then shaken with ice and sour mix. The play between savory and sweet makes it Israeli food authority Janna Gur’s favorite cocktail for good reason.
Each night of Hanukkah, donut blogger and connoisseur Temim Fruchter will share one of America’s best donuts to devour during the holiday. Click here to read the first night’s installment and check back each day for a different city’s top donut.
Attention vegans: If you have not been to this incredible (and adorable) donut joint in Seattle, you need to drop what you’re doing and head over (Seattlites) and book a ticket (the rest of you). Now. And attention skeptical non-vegans: “Pleasantly surprised” will feel like an understatement. The flavor and texture of these donuts are sublime. These unique vegan cake donuts (they have some yeast varieties as well, but uncharacteristically, I prefer the cake in this case) are the perfect marriage between breakfast and dessert, with shockingly good donut shop coffee, to boot. Try the cinnamon sugar donuts for an out-of-body experience. Incidentally, they also make a yearly batch of organic vegan sufganiyot!
Hanukkah relevance: I have actually eaten these donuts on Hanukkah proper, so I can vouch for the fact that given their cake-yeast-hybrid qualities, they are so light and melt-in-your-mouth that you could probably eat one for each of the eight nights and not experience even the slightest bit of donut burnout.
Hanukkah is all about the fried stuff. Fritters, pancakes, and pastries are the best known, but just the beginning. Almost anything edible can be fried in oil or animal fat. If it tastes good, Jews somewhere are enjoying it. Even and, depending on where you’re from, especially pickles.
Culinary creativity with a frying pan and deep fat fryer notwithstanding, I love the classics. Hanukkah is a great time to be near my kitchen, particularly when puffy doughnuts have just been injected with jelly. I also make great potato latkes – lots of them.
For as long as I can remember, the thing that has signified Hanukkah - more than the kitsch rainbow-colored candles or the unmistakable smells of frying onions and potatoes merging - has been the telltale bakery box. Maybe you know the one. It’s large, flat, rectangular and white. You can’t tell from looking at the top, but to peer inside once the contents are emptied is to reveal poetry in grease spots - the sure aftermath of something profoundly deep-fried and incomparably satisfying. In a word, sufganiyot.
Sufganiyot – powdered-sugar donuts filled with jelly or custard – are arguably the proud root of my donut fixation. (It started with my first Entenmann’s rich chocolate frosted circa age 5 and has only intensified since then. I have sampled donuts in more than 25 states and have blogged about them on Glazed and Enthused.)
In the desert of Peru, there is no challah bread and definitely no kosher wine. That, however, didn’t stop the participants of AJWS’s volunteer summer program from sanctifying the Sabbath in a special way. They found their kosher substitutions in a sweet bread called bizcocho and a drink made from purple corn known as chicha morada. In an ever-shrinking world, an increasing number of opportunities are appearing for kashrut-observant Jews who wish to visit exotic foreign locales. But the age-old question for the wandering Jew remains: Where can we eat?
American Jewish World Service, which runs 25 service-learning programs each year in rural communities in countries such as Burma, Liberia, and Cambodia, often venturing where no Jews have previously set foot, has devised ways to eat local and kosher food in some of the most remote parts of the world.
From the announcement that the holiday window displays at Barneys would feature statues of food celebrities to “Top Chef” winning the Emmy for best reality series, food is without a doubt having its moment. And so are Jewish food books.
This year produced the first English-language Jewish encyclopedia of food, two books that dig deep into the past of the immigrant palate, a delicious food novel and a surprisingly large Jewish component to a book that chronicles America’s culinary history, among others. We’ve hand selected the best of this year’s crop for every type of Jewish foodie, just in time for last-minute Hanukkah shopping.
The unofficial state motto of Oregon is “Things look different here,” and it’s true. More to the point, people who live here look at things differently. So when the Portland Tuv Ha’Aretz steering committee met to talk about upcoming events a few months ago, we decided to take a fresh look at (or taste of) latkes.
We all love latkes. But let’s face it; after years of potato-oniony goodness, we decided it be more interesting to try some alternative recipes that would give everyone some new ideas for their own upcoming Hanukkah celebration. More importantly, this event was an opportunity to get together, cook and eat; what more could you ask from a gathering of Jews?
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