Posted by Erin Zimmer, April 18, 2008 at 11:30 AM
La Chaim! Stock Up Now!
While bread gets cracker-ified during Passover, chosen bottles of soda get stripped of their high-fructose corn syrup and are sweetened instead with the real deal. No need to hunt for imported Mexican colas or hitch a ride south of the border for the cane sugar cola that tastes so great.
That's right: Passover Coke is here! (Or Passover Pepsi, if you're on that side of the Cola War.)
Both Coca-Cola and Pepsi make a real-sugar version around this time of year, and you can find it by looking for yellow caps on Coke bottles or white caps on Pepsi. But to be sure you really have a sweet, sweet sugariffic cola in your hands, check the cap for a "P" next to whatever kosher symbol appears (see photo).
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Posted by Emily Stone, April 3, 2008 at 12:30 PM
This is a true story: when I was about five years old, I asked my mother how Moses and his friends had time to stop in the middle of the desert to dip their matzo in chocolate. Turns out I wasn't the only curious kid. This Passover season marks the 20th anniversary of Chuck Siegel's (the Charles of Charles Chocolates) matzo-dipping party. But the whole scene got started with apples—not dipped in honey, but in caramel. Chuck, then owner of Attivo Confections, was vacuum-sealing his candied Granny Smith apples with heavy-duty equipment. "The guy we bought the bags and the machines from was Jewish, and still is Jewish," Siegel said. "And he said, 'my daughter really wants to make some chocolate-covered matzo—can we come over and put some matzo through the enrobing line?'"
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Posted by Adam Kuban, March 17, 2008 at 4:00 PM
If there are two cuisines Arthur "The Food Maven" Schwartz knows best, they're Jewish and Italian. He's already done an Italian book, so he tackles the likes of latkes, kreplach, knishes, and kugel in Arthur Schwartz's Jewish Home Cooking. If you're not lucky enough to have grown up with a bubbe fussing over you and cooking you some of the most amazing comfort food ever, then this book can help you approximate the experience yourself.
Win 'Jewish Home Cooking'
We'll be excerpting a recipe a day this week as part of our ongoing Cook the Book feature. The first of those will be up shortly, but for now it's time to let you in on how you can enter to win a copy of this book. Simply tell us what your favorite Jewish food item is in the Comments section below.
Winners will be chosen at random from among the commenters, and comments will be open until noon ET, Monday, March 24. The standard Serious Eats contest rules apply.
Posted by Erin Zimmer, December 18, 2007 at 5:15 PM
It's a fusion tradition that ain't on swanky menus but is very rooted in America's melting pot culture. Just think of cream cheese wontons (right), Soy Vay products, and how many Peking Dragons are open on Christmas. This dude [video] knows what I'm talking about. It's a curious overlap, but this post on the New York Times City Room blog went where few other Jewish-Chinese fusions have gone before.
Pastrami egg rolls and Chinese hot dogs, available at Eden Wok on 34th Street in Manhattan.
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Posted by Lia Bulaong, April 4, 2007 at 4:59 PM
Okay, so it's a few days late for Passover, and I apologize for that profusely, but these dioramas of Peeps reenacting the Ten Plagues of Egypt are hilarious nonetheless. [via Dooce]
Posted by Lia Bulaong, March 28, 2007 at 6:00 PM
Joan Nathan of the New York Times talks to Ana Benarroch de Bensadón, author of a cookbook of Sephardic dessert recipes. After Spain expelled its Jews in 1492, her family lived for centuries in Tangiers; she moved to Madrid with her husband in the 1960s after political instability in Morocco, and brought with her dishes that had all but been forgotten in Spain over the last 500 years, notable for how they combine their Jewish, Spanish and North African roots while still keeping kosher:
No dish is as Spanish as a creamy flan. But hers is made with oranges, almonds and sugar, with no cream or condensed milk that would keep it from sharing a kosher table with meat dishes. Dishes like these were also cooked by Jews who stayed in Spain after the expulsion and pretended to convert to Christianity.
“To prove that they were like Christians, the Jews made flans, but used orange juice, sugar water and almonds so they could eat the flan with a meat meal,” she said.
The piece includes recipes for her orange-almond flan, chocolate olive oil mousse, and almond-lemon macaroons; all the recipes involve eggs, so they're not vegan, but the lack of milk and cream makes them good options for the lactose intolerant. I eat everything and don't need to keep kosher, but I might just try these making some of these anyway, they just sound so delicious.
Posted by Lia Bulaong, March 28, 2007 at 2:30 PM
Carole Kotkin of the Miami Herald has nine great tips to cooking matzo balls, for those of you making Passover meals for Monday. Tip No. 8: "To ensure tender matzo balls, do not uncover the pot, even to peek, for at least the first 20 minutes."
Posted by Lia Bulaong, March 14, 2007 at 3:29 PM
"Each year, Coca-Cola makes Coke with sugar for observant US Jews to drink during Passover. And the rest of us get to go along for the ride. This is a boon for those who don't like Coke with high fructose corn syrup and who have to seek out the superior sugared Coke in small Mexican restaurants and grocery stores." BuzzFeed's post on Sweet Sweet Passover Coke has the ten best links to what is, as a non-Jew, my favorite Passover treat!
Posted by Lia Bulaong, February 13, 2007 at 10:34 AM
Shuna Fish Lydon, on Jewish Comfort Food: "It is my ultimate opinion that there are no real bagels in the Bay Area. I have tried and retried them all. I've been cajoled by hopeful and starry eyed non-Jews as well as other deperate New York Jews. Nope, they do not exist here. Just because bread is round does not mean it's a bagel. When a bagel is a bagel, every gram of your being knows it. It's taste and texture, the smell of your grandmother's kitchen. It's whipped butter, freshly sliced red onions, and too much cream cheese."
(A friend of mine who grew up in the Bay Area but lives in Brooklyn brings a sack of bagels home for his parents every time he flies home, per their standing request. They're not Jewish either, they just really like New York bagels!)
