bonappetit.com
Hungry? No? Don’t worry, you will be in just a minute – we certainly are after collating the brilliant answers our STG Recommended Vendors sent in to the question “what’s your favorite Jewish / Israeli / Yiddishe food?”
It’s an impossible question, with far too many answers, and the mouth-watering selection below is certainly food for thought (see what we did there? Sorry!)
One thing that is absolutely striking is that almost everybody mentioned the heart and significance that goes into Jewish cooking, the echoes of times gone by in each meal, and each family’s very slight variant on that recipe, the food of our culture keeping us together when we are a diaspora, the eclectic melting pot of flavours and backgrounds, of places we’ve visited and called home – and the love passed down in families, l’dor va’dor– from generation to generation.
Jewish food is more than just food – it’s an expression of the unique, Jewish soul. It’s bickering around the table, it’s breaking wonderful news over a matzo ball soup, it’s second helpings of savta / grandma’s signature dessert, it’s that special flavour that only our family gets just right. Jewish food represents love and home – and this comes through in every word below.
Lazy Cat Kitchen
Tania from Dany’s Traiteur Kosher Catering:
“As a Kosher caterer in the South of France, I have an incredible amount of contenders of typical Jewish food to be my favorite: falafel, shawarma, fantastic cous cous, amazing tajine or any” Bkaila” for my Tunisian clients.
But what I love more than anything is when we organise catering for weddings and the bride’s grandmother asks me timidly if she could bring a few oriental pastries that she will make by herself because her granddaughter loves them so much, and because over years and years, from generation to generation in Morocco or anywhere else, they always have these pastries for the dessert in weddings.
And despite all the wonderful desserts our chef pastry makes, all the guests are fighting to have one of these cigars filled with almonds made by Aunt Rachel…”
