This is a play on a classic charoset — a Sephardi-style nut/date spread with a decidedly new-world twist. Cranberries are a new-world fruit, so it’s highly unlikely that they started appearing in any traditional Jewish cuisine too many centuries ago. But hey, it’s been 500 years since Columbus sailed the …
Pork-obsessed Spanish cuisine is not known for being kosher friendly, but classic croquettes can easily be made not only kosher and vegetarian, but kosher for Passover, to boot. Croquettes are breaded dumplings filled with a bechamel cream, flavored with any number of things. I learned the technique from my friend …
Passover is rapidly approaching. The stores have already stopped stocking my favorite cookies and chocolates (no baker’s chocolate for Passover? really guys?) You, like us, are preparing for the week of unleavened bread, whether that means planning a seder, or just coming up with things to eat for the week. …
Purim is approaching, and while I haven’t decided on a costume, I did decide to dress up my hamentaschen in Middle Eastern outfits. Hamentaschen are traditional Ashkenazi Jewish cookies notable for their three-pointed form, which according to tradition resembles the three-cornered hat of Haman, the holiday’s antagonist. (In Hebrew, for …
I guess I lack holiday spirit. It’s Hanukkah, but I haven’t been able to get in the mood for grease. After making six types of latkes last year, and frying them in more than enough oil to keep a hanukkiyah burning for eight days, I went a different route this …
I’m not entirely sure where my mom got this recipe, but I got it from her. It’s a surefire way to impress at a Friday night dinner. It has this warm, yeasty flavor in the hours after it’s baked that dissipates as the hours pass, turning it back into just …
Spot the impostor: It’s not a plant, it’s a cake. It only looks like a plant. (OK, a fake plant. But still.) I got this recipe from my mom, who’s been playing it for laughs since I was a child. This is my second year making it myself (for a …
This cheesecake has a fabulous, tangy flavor, thanks to the passion fruit, orange and lemon. It also almost ended in complete and total disaster due to my impatience. It’s been quite a while since I’ve made a cheesecake — about 51 weeks, right around last year’s Shavuot, to be precise …
Tonight is Lag Ba’omer, the bonfire holiday, and the air will soon be thick with the smell of smoke. One of the possible interpretations for the holiday is that it marks the Bar Kochba rebellion in 132 C.E., which failed and led to the Romans destroying the Jewish settlement in …
When we were in Japan, one of the things we ate on a daily basis was mochi — the squishy, sticky, gooey sweetened rice snack, generally filled with azuki beans. That was one of the things that we missed, since you can’t get it anywhere in Israel, so lo and …
