Nabbing the Elusive Rye

October 30, 2008 - 3:06 PM by DavidS · 1 Comment
Filed under: General

For the culinarily curious, Israel is heaven on earth. With Israeli immigrants – who know how to cook – hailing from all over the world, you could eat a different ethnic/national cuisine every day for a month. Not to mention feasting on the staples of Israeli cuisine – falafel, grilled meats, and the rest (note to those looking for an arguement – tabbuleh and humus were perfected by Jews from Syria and Lebanon, who brought them here when they got thrown out of their host Arab countries! But that’s for a different post.)

You can even get “American food” in Israel – fast food, of course, but there are also restaurants, many of them kosher nowadays, that specialize in burgers, barbecued wings, chili, etc. And deli – they have that here, too, with pastrami, corned beef, and the like available at an increasing number of restaurants, takeout places, and butchers.

There’s only one thing missing – an American style bread bakery. There’s a good place in Jerusalem for brownies and seven layer cake, if you’re in the mood – but bread is something else. In recent years, bagels have become an in thing among Israeli foodies – but they’re not the bagels you remember from the “appetizing store,” as we used to call it in the old country. Here the bagels seem to be baked, not boiled – definitely not what any self-respecting H&H frequenter would call a “bagel.” And don’t even ask about bialies!

Forget the bialies – I’ll settle for a Jewish-style rye loaf. But it just hasn’t been available in Israel. Rye bread lovers are forced to settle for “black bread” (“lechem shachor”), a poor substitute. Somehow, among the pitas, pretzels, “lachuch” (Yemenite style sponge bread), and all the rest, that New York Jewish staple – rye bread – got lost in the shuffle.

Until this morning, that is – when the Saidel Bakery opened for business in the Ginot Shomron neighborhood of Karnei Shomron (a Jewish community in Samaria, inside the security fence, about 15 minutes from Kfar Sava). Les, the chief baker (pictured standing in front of what he said was “the largest brick oven in the Shomron”) works all night turning out sublime New York style rye bread, rolls, and bagels – which is really an accomplishment, since he’s from South Africa!

A refugee from the dot-com world (he used to design web sites), Les has been baking since he was a kid, taking an example from a rebbe of his, who used to bake whole wheat bread with his students, as an educational, social, and relaxation activity. Les refurbished the bakery area (in the back of his house) and built the display cases – and the oven – himself. A real renaissance man! Baking bread is a tough business, as anyone who has spent time around commercial bakeries and restaurants knows – so it’s clear that the goods this bakery produces are not just food, but a labor of love.

And the taste – fantastic! Les hopes to expand his offerings and supply stores in the area as well, but for now, the only place in the country to get a real Jewish rye is in this pleasant but a bit out of the way community over the Green Line. Naturally, the fact that the bakery is in the Shomron will prevent some Israelis from enjoying Les’ bread, hesitating to come out here because of their political views. They certainly have a right to feel that way – but I can’t say I’m too sorry. Fewer of them means more rye and bagels for us!

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Tags: american food, bagel, baker, bakery, barbecue, biali, bread, burgers, chili, cold cuts, cook, corned beef, cuisine, deli, eat, Food, Ginot Shomron, Karnei Shomron, les, pastrami, rye, Saidel Bakery, samaria, South Africa, wings

I’ll have mine sliced

October 6, 2008 - 9:20 PM by Jessica · Leave a Comment
Filed under: A New Reality, Food, General

As the country gears up for Yom Kippur, beginning on Wednesday night, the preparations are happening all over the place, in varied ways. There’s the greeting that people use during this time of year, when they say Gmar chatima tova, or chatima tova, meaning, may you be written in the Book of Life. That’s a switch from last week, when people were just saying Shana Tova, or Happy New Year. Chatima tova is kind of a heavy greeting to be tossing out to everyone you see, and you gotta hope that it’s heartfelt, because otherwise, what book will you end up in?

And those are just the greetings. There are those of us who are seriously thinking about repentance and forgiveness. And there are those of us who are thinking about the 35th anniversary of the Yom Kippur War. And then there are those of us, yours truly included, who are thinking about the food needs for the next five days, given that Yom Kippur ends and then Shabbat begins. I’m thinking about it because of a food incident last week, before Rosh Hashanah.

I was at Rafi, our local bakery, to buy challot for the chag. Truth to tell, I don’t usually like their challot, but I do like their babka, and in the interest of time, we were willing to eat their challot for the holiday. So I got there at 10:30 am on erev chag, which is usually early enough to have your pick of the challot, and lo and behold, there were no challot to be had. The shelves were empty and people were lined up at the counter, waiting for the huge, round challot to come out of the oven. I got lucky, and snagged one tremendous challah right away, and then a fresh batch came out of the oven, fulfilling all of my challah needs.

But as I was waiting to pay, an American guy runs in, bicycle helmet still on his head, and asks, in English, if there’s any sliced challah available, or if the bakery has a slicing machine. A hush immediately sets in over the crowd. Who would want their challah pre-sliced? What kind of person is this? The owner, of course, said no, because who ever wants their challah pre-sliced?

The saga continued. He called his wife from his cellphone, asking if she still wanted challah given that it wouldn’t be pre-sliced. “Yes, yes, I promise I’ll slice it very carefully, you’ll never know that it wasn’t sliced in a machine,” he told her. “If they don’t slice it here, I can’t imagine that there’ll be another bakery where they do.” The rest of us looked at each other, shrugging our shoulders, because, hey, clearly there’s no bakery that slices challah ahead of time.

Anyway, I took my pile of challot home, where they all got eaten (torn, not sliced), and now I’m thinking that I’d better get to the bakery much earlier on Wednesday, and on Friday. Because I’ll tell you one thing: I may not like their rest-of-the-year challot, but their High Holiday challot? Fab-o.

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Tags: babka, Book of Life, bread, cut, holiday, repentance, Rosh Hashanah, Round Challah, Yom Kippur

B-bye bourekas

July 31, 2008 - 9:14 AM by Jessica · 1 Comment
Filed under: A New Reality, Environment, Food, General, Israeliness

Chef Erez Komorovsky, the founder of Israeli sourdough heaven Lehem Erez, says “there is no logical reason” for Israelis, who “live in a land of abundant olive oil, to go anywhere near trans fat, unless they are locked into a conference room for most of the day. ‘And then their situation is not all that great,’ he says.”

Komorovsky is quoted in a Haaretz article about saying b-bye to bourekas, those layers of filo dough slathered with margarine, as well as rugelach (yes, including Jerusalem’s famous Marzipan bakery in Machane Yehuda) and other popular pastries that Israelis love, yet are smothered in trans fat, read margarine, canola or soy oil.

I’m chuckling over Komorovsky’s conference room comment, since it’s simply so right on the mark, given the Israeli penchant for putting out plates of potato bourekas, chocolate wafers and sesame-studded pretzels, along with water and soda at pretty much any conference room gathering, whether it be at the Knesset or a venture capital firm boardroom. Okay, maybe Herzliya venture capitalists are sticking to fresh fruit and sparkling water these days. But every bakery slides out its trays of vegetable- and cheese-filled bourekas each day, along with cinnamon and chocolate rugelach, and people buy them by the box and bagful.

“Israelis’ affection for bourekas and manufactured pastries, along with the long work days that lead to snacks of this sort, are liable to have disastrous results. Another risk factor is the widespread use of margarine in Israel – in part due to kashrut considerations – since margarine is entirely trans fat,” according to the Haaretz article. And while “the good news for Israelis is that restaurants here are better than in the United States. Even McDonald’s in Israel stopped using trans fats as far back as 2004, and switched to canola oil,” we’re still a country that likes its trans fat in plenty of products.

I’m hooked on these concepts right now because I’m reading Barbara Kingsolver’s excellent new book, “Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life”, and contemplating finally starting my compost pile and growing some more vegetables in our garden. Don’t know whether that will actually happen. But I’ll tell you this much: No more bourekas in this house.

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