Foto Friday – Hanukkah in Jerusalem

December 11, 2009 - 5:41 PM by · 1 Comment
Filed under: Foto Friday, General, Holidays, Israeliness, Life, Pop Culture, Travel 

Hanukkah, the Festival of Lights, starts tonight with the lighting of the first candle on the hannukiya – the seven-branched menorah. Jerusalemites have a tradition of lighting oil based hannukiyot encased in glass boxes against the wind. It is a beautiful sight.


© pmos_nmos

Of course, it is more dramatic when lit up at night!


© RomKri


© RomKri

Hanukkah this year fell on a chilly Friday but despite the foreboding clouds it felt like the city was settling into a holiday mood, with young couples taking their babies out for a stroll at the new Mamilla Mall and overwhelming demand for sufganiyot at the Roladin bakery-cafe.

roladin_sufganiyot_box_menuBoth Nicky and David have blogged about the caloric and nutritional disaster that is our local holiday fare, so I will only add that Roladin has, for several years now, taken up the mantle of master sufganiya baker. They’ve created a whole series of so-called gourmet doughnut delights – the “Hanukkah Collection 2009″ – ranging from pistachio and banana to dulce de leche as well as the traditional red mystery jam. They’ve also devised a gaily decorated long square box for easy transport.

This week’s photos of Hanukkah in Jerusalem are courtesy of the wonderful Jerusalem Shots site. I should note that, as I do each time before sitting down to write the holiday column, I tried to figure out the current spelling of the Festival of Lights’ name, this time putting Google on the case with the following results: Hanukkah – 1,920,000 hits; Chanuka – 222,000; Hanuka – 219,000; Hannukah – 141,000 ; Channukah – 129,000; Chanukka – 71,800; Hannuka – 66,100. So, (although it’s not spelled as it was when I was a girl) — Hanukkah wins.

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Latkes vs. Sufganiyot – The Real Story

December 7, 2008 - 5:38 AM by · 3 Comments
Filed under: Food, General, History and Culture, Holidays, Israeliness, Life, Pop Culture 

Holiday food is very seasonal in Israel. It’s hard to find a slice of honey cake in February, and for the eleven months before Passover season, you have to search the supermarket high and low if you’ve a yen for matzah (there’s plenty of matzah meal, though – what would Friday night soup be without matzah balls?)

The holiday treat with the longest “season” is the sufganiyah – the Israeli equivalent of what’s known as a donut in the U.S. I saw my first sufganiyah of the season three days after Sukkot ended, and by now, a couple of weeks before Chanukah, sales are at a fever pitch. As every American knows, there are donuts (Entenmann’s style, chocolate with the hold in the middle), and donuts (Dunkin style, fried up and stuffed with fillings). Israeli donuts are more like the latter. The traditional version leans to a jelly filling, but each year there are more varied options – the other day, for example, I got one with a creamy peanut butter filling, and one covered with enough green frosting to make it look like something they’d give out at a St. Patrick’s Day parade.

Sufganiyot are seen as the “Israeli” Chanukah treat, while potato pancakes – “latkes” – may be more familiar to folks in the U.S. and Europe, meaning that, to Israelis, they’re the preferred holiday food in the Diaspora. Hence, among some locals, it is considered déclassé to prefer latkes; real Israelis go for the donut. But the story is a bit more complicated. Sufganiyot vs. Latkes is not an Israel – Diaspora thing, it’s a Sephardic – Ashkenazic thing. That’s right – like with the general acceptance of rice and legumes on Passover, the Sephardic majority has given its imprimatur to Israel’s Chanukah food culture.

Potatoes were more common in Russia and Poland, while the Levant and northern Africa had more access to wheat; hence, both cultures took what was available, fried it up, and served it. Since plain fried potatoes – or fried flour – aren’t the most appetizing foods, both cultures came up with ways to enhance the appearance and taste of their dishes; sour cream and jam for latkes, and honey or sugar syrup for the fried flour creation. Thus, the modern sufganiyah, with its jelly filling, actually takes a bit from both cultures – and, with the expansion of western donut culture, the traditional sufganiyah now has competition from American-style donuts and fillings.

The common denominator between sufganiyot and latkes, of course, is that they’re deep-fried in oil, commemorating the miracle of the oil of the Chanukah menorah. Lots of oil guarantees lots of calories – flying in the face of another Western import that many of us subscribe to, healthy eating. But there’s another, less fattening aspect to Chanukah cuisine, not as well known but quite traditional; the consumption of cheese and milk products, based on the story of Yehudit, who drugged the Greek general Holofernes with cheese, putting him to sleep and killing him, thus enabling the Jews to achieve a major victory. For Israelis who want to avoid the fried stuff but still eat Chanukah-style, then, the answer is easy; just indulge in some of the many low-calorie yogurts, puddings, ice-cream, and other dairy treats Israel is rightly famous for!

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