Fridge Voyeurism From Israel
Are you an organic food addict? Or do you insist on eating food that grown locally, but pesticide-ridden, to spare food miles (or to serve an ideology?)
As food production is a major source of greenhouse gas pollution (Read: Global Warming), eating locally, and consuming less meat is one way we can do our part.
Following a worldwide trend, where people are opening up their fridge to show people what’s in their fridge (and on their palette) today I will expose myself and show you what’s in mine. It feels a bit like opening my underwear drawer to strangers, but here goes:
CONTENTS (Door on right): Bio eggs, butter, organic strawberry jam, milk, mustard, sundried tomatoes, pomegranate concentrate, goat’s milk yogurt, V8, tehina, capers, guava juice, orange juice, batteries (not for eating!), coconut juice, goat’s yogurt, and the old Canadian maple syrup (thanks Mom!).
SOURCE: There are a number of imported items here like the V8 from North America and the juice from Egypt. The jam is from the United States. Phoeey on me, but it looked so good. And the pomegranate concentrate, I think is from Turkey, while syrup is from Canada. All the milk products are produced locally and bought at Eden Teva market or local non-organic shops. Milk costs about $1.50 a liter in Israel (non-organic), the organic yogurt about $3 a bottle.
CONTENTS: (from top to bottom, left to right) organic lentil sprouts, organic goat’s cheese, chessick fruit, soft regular white cheese 5%, organic red cabbage part of a weekly CSA veggie box delivery (choose from a list of CSAs here if you live in Israel); more cheese including a Rockfort goat’s cheese, Syrian dates, spicy lettuces, cabbage, parsley, green onions, carrots, leaks, tomatoes, radishes, cucumbers, and spinach.
SOURCE: Vegetables come from an organic farm, which delivers a box of whatever’s in season, once a week. Some of the cheese is from Eden Teva market, a health food store in Bnei Brak; some cheese is from Arab supermarket on the corner nearby my house. Reducing food miles is important to me from an environmental perspective. I try to eat locally produced food, and things which are in season.
CONTENTS: It being Passover in Israel means that a lot of the bread products you might see here other times of the year have been cleaned out, eaten or burned, as per Jewish custom. Moving on, there is some sort of white fish, hamburger organic and regular, rice (stored in freezer to keep the bugs out), and a strange kind of sheep tail fat (bottom right) for making a Bukharian food known as Osh Pollo. It is wrapped like that because someone (on their request) was supposed to “smuggle” it to the US where no such sheep tail fat can be found. It stays frozen in the meantime. (As a once a week meat-eater, Osh Pollo is very yummy and highly recommended.)
SOURCE: The frozen products come from Eden Teva Market, a health food store, a regular grocery store, and the sheep tail fat, a local market. Normally you won’t find so much meat in the freezer, as I tend to buy it when I want it. I have no idea how much meat costs per kilo, because I buy it so rarely. The organic hamburger, enough to feed 4, cost about $25 for the box, times 2 what you see above.
Want to know more about fridge voyeurism? Read this post in its original form with more details at Canada’s Israel. Or a past Green Prophet post on a fridge in Jerusalem.
We’d be happy to feature your Middle East fridge on Green Prophet, if you dare. Send us some pics and describe contents and food source, so we can know a little more about you, and what you eat. Send to contact@greenprophet.com.
Foto Friday – Visit Israel the Virtual Way
Filed under: Art, Foto Friday, General, History and Culture, Travel
“Snob! Have you been to Tiberias yet?” The late great Israeli humorist Ephraim Kishon quipped that those words were scrawled across the Acropolis, chastising those Israelis who preferred to travel abroad rather than tour their own fair country. Today, fortunately, Israelis — and anyone else for that matter — can sit in the air-conditioned comfort of their Athens hotel and visit the sites of Israel in full color — thanks to a new feature on the Ministry of Tourism website: the Virtual Tour of Israel. The new multimedia experience includes 100 videos, 130 panoramic views and dozens of photographs. Here’s a classic:
Ten virtual, ten-day tours are available online, including: general interest itineraries, Jewish interest, Christian interest, Culture and History, Nature, Family, Archeology, Active interest, Mobility challenged and — last but certainly not least — Food and Wine.
Sites that can be visited include Caesarea… Jerusalem… Mitzpe Ramon… the Dead Sea…
The Bauhaus architecture of Tel Aviv …
Here’s Tiberias – we are not snobs!
The Haifa Port, where my running club, the Holyland Hash House Harriers, will be running this weekend with 40 sailors on shore leave!
By the way, the Ministry of Tourism website is available in 11 languages and is updated on an ongoing basis.
Is there a chef in the house?
Nothing fishy about this
Less than a year out of his army service, he’s pursuing his love of cooking and having a great time doing it. Now, he’s a very nice guy, but what really endears him to me is that whenever he stays over when she’s on a break from the army for a day or two, he takes over the kitchen to prepare feasts for all of us based on the recipes he’s learning in his classes.
The kitchen looks like a hurricane ripped through it, as he never just prepares one dish – it’s always something like lightly breaded Salmon filets with sauce of dried tomatoes, basillicum and onions, with a side of thyme-spiced, broiled sweet potatoes. The aromas are intense, and the flavors more than meet the expectations.
Israel’s developed some world class chefs in the last few years, and I think we may have another one in the works. I’ll continue to be his guinea pig, so to speak, any time.
Fancy shmancy donuts from Roladin
Chanuka. Time for presents, lighting candles and of course the ubiquitous sufganiya – Israel’s answer to the jelly donut. For years the only sufganiyot available were disgustingly delicious with their oil soaked dough and semi-vile jelly filling. Granted there is a novelty to eating this traditional classic donut and starting about a month a half before Chanuka they are available everywhere. So if the urge hits, satiation is immediate.
Roladin, Israel’s chain of “upscale” bakeries take the donut to a totally new level. They pride themselves on offering lower calorie (though not low calorie, and they are still fried but are about 1/3 smaller than the average donut) sufganiyot with unique and high quality fillings.
This year is no different. Their offerings include a sufganya filled with a halva white chocolate ganache with white chocolate frosting and candied pecans. Ate it. Was amazing. And the other really unique one is clearly marketed at adults. It’s filled with white chocolate ganache that is mixed with arak with white Belgium chocolate frosting. They of course offer the standard jelly-filled as well but with a high quality fruit filling that has no additional sugar.
Photo of classic sufganya courtesy of SavtaDotty from Flickr under a Creative Commons license. Photo of fancy donut courtesy of Roladin
Hot pastrami
I shouldn’t be stating this here, on a blog that should be touting everything Israeli. But let’s face it, to say that the deli meats here bite the big one means you’re actually able to take a bite. Which is kind of incredible, we’re a country of Jews, and kosher deli and Jews go together like pastrami on rye with mustard.
So after being away in the US for a full month, I couldn’t think of a better present to bring back to my long-suffering wife, deprieved of both me for a month and good deli for 20 some years, a pound of fresh corned beef from our favorite kosher deli – Rubin’s in Boston. Call me a hopeless romantic.
Actually, I’ll explain why it’s a better present than a diamond ring. Way back when, when we were both in college in Boston, my wife worked the Sunday waitress shift at Rubin’s. I’d drive and pick her up in Brookline at the end of her 12 hour shift, and she’d come into the car carrying various delicacies like knishes, stuffed cabbage and, of course, some fresh deli, and her uniform would be entrenched with the aromas of a day’s worth of food. I could hardly wait to jump on her, but first we’d go home and pig out – in a kosher way.
Since most of my visits back to the US have been solo recently, we always joked about me bringing her back a taste of the past. But I never thought it would be possible, given the 24-hour door to door travel and the logistics of bringing a pound of beef through the homeland security glare.
But last week, I threw caution to the wind, and after feasting on a pastrami sandwich with a side of potato salad and a Dr. Brown’s, I bought the pound of corned beef, threw it in the trunk of the car in the 35 degree weather and dashed the two hours back to my brother’s home in Maine. Then straight to the freezer with the fragile treasure.
On the morning of my flight, I packed the corned beef with an ice pack, wrapped it in plastic and placed deep in the oversized army knapsack I borrowed from my daughter. 22 hours later, in my kitchen in Israel, the corned beef was thawed, cool, and heaped high on some pita (hey, we’re in Israel). My wife was in heaven, and later, we remembered the aphrodisiac qualities that good kosher deli provides.
Israeli kitchen makes me hungry and inspires
I’ve been blogging in some shape or form for over six years now and though food has always been a topic I’ve written about it’s never been the exclusive topic of any of the blogs where I’ve written. About three years ago I considered starting a blog called “The Middle East Confit” but the idea never came to fruition, it just marinated in my mind. Then we had a baby, then work got real busy and then…well…yeah. I barely find the time to blog at my own blog – most of it coming from lack of inspiration rather than time.
I’ve been thinking about writing exclusively about food and plan on redesigning my blog in the coming weeks (months?) Where did this inspiration come from? The excellent Israeli food blog Israel Kitchen. Written by Miriam, a current resident of Petach Tikva who has live in both Jerusalem and Tsfat and even spent some time in Venezuela. Her recipes are varied. Running the gamut from that Ashekenazic staple Kasha Varnishkas to Tunisian Mafroum (meat stuffed potatoes). She also makes her own wine.
Miriam’s photography is top notch as well with colorful photos of her travels around Israel. She visits shuks, cheese makers, wineries and restaurants.
So if you are looking for a taste (nyuk nyuk) of Israel not to be found elsewhere be sure to visit Israeli Kitchen.
Cholentpalooza
Now that the winter months are upon us once again, it’s time to bust out the old crock pot. The heavy stew that we call hamin or cholent might not have been so appropriate during the heat of the summer, when the manner in which it sits in the stomach can become cumbersome (although many argue that it should be served 52 Saturdays a year), but now pretty much all of us can agree to dig in.
It’s the definitive savory, hot, dense pan-Jewish comfort food, and it always has been. When you are forbidden by your Deity for thousands of years to light a fire or cook on Shabbat morning, loading up a pot with savory goodness on Friday afternoon and praying for a yummy mush to come off the fire 30 or so hours later made a lot of sense. Even the goyim agree that slow-cooked stews are the way to go.
In my home, when late February rolls around and we start to get a little less excited about the standard Ashkenaz combination of barley, beans, potatoes, onions, garlic, cubed beef and our off-the-record blend of seasonings, we sometimes opt for alternate recipes, like pseudo-East Asian cholent (heavy on the shitake mushrooms, green beans, sesame oil and soy sauce) or pseudo-Hindu cholent (coconut milk, whole cinnamon sticks, many sweet potatoes and no meat).
Others keep cholent new by adding secret ingredients, such as lamb fat (gives the whole thing a glossy coating of sinful flavor), whole heads of garlic (fun to peel and spread on bread), beer, hot dogs and the like. There are many recipe variations out there.
Now Netanya’s Blue Bay Hotel is gearing up for its first annual Hamin Festival, a celebration of the onset of cholent season. With festivals – especially those built around consumerist themes – popping up across the land at an alarming clip, why shouldn’t they? From 11 a.m. through 2 p.m. on each Saturday in December and January, Blue Bay is set to offer a cornicopia of hamin options, including traditional recipes from the Ashkenazi shtetl, Persia, Morocco and even Libya (they put beets in it!).
There will even be traditional ethnic musical performances (bouzouki, oud and wind instruments abound) to enhance the flavors, and when the weather permits, guests will be invited to sit outdoors, facing the sea. Admission costs NIS 59 for adults (children pay slightly less, dessert costs slightly more), and there are takeout options as well.
In the Simpsons episode “Homerpalooza,” Homer goes on a festival tour thanks to his formidable stomach. If he thinks getting shot in the belly with a cannon makes for a difficult yet exhilarating gastronomical festival experience, he should try visiting the Blue Bay Hotel over nine upcoming Saturdays in a row.
Wedding Survival Tips
Matching yarmulkes and matchbooks, engraved invitations, tuxedoes and matching bride/bridesmaids outfits, and lots and lots of flowers. Sounds like a wedding. B
ut not an Israeli one! Like most other things in Israel, weddings are like you remember them from “back there” – but different, in a number of ways.
1. Dress – What marks Israeli weddings more than any other featuring is a lack of formality. Having been to weddings where the couples were from all sorts of different backgrounds – secular, modern/ultra-orthodox, very wealthy or otherwise – I’ve come across exactly one tuxedo, and a few suits (usually on the grooms). The most formal any guest is willing to go is usually a sports jacket (not necessarily matching the slacks, either), but the vast majority wear Dockers-style pants and a shirt – white at religious weddings, or a variety of colors where the guests are of a more secular orientation.
2. Venue – In Israel, you’ve got two choices for a venue: In town, at a catering hall (usually in an industrial zone), or, an increasingly popular choice, at an outdoor country location, usually in a kibbutz or moshav. All venues, though, sport the “open chuppah” – with the actual ceremony held under the stars, regardless of the weather (I was at one where it snowed!). In urban halls, this usually entails going up to the building’s roof, which is gussied up for the occasion, while at a country location, the ceremony is held at the most picturesque spot on the property. The venue will also sport just a few dozen chairs, with most people standing – and unless you are at a very ultra-orthodox wedding, you’ll find that, even if there is nominal separation (like standing on different sides of the aisle the wedding party marches down), lots of couples end up standing or sitting together. Because there’s no American-style Sunday in Israel, a Saturday night event is unheard of, and Sunday ceremonies are rare – the preferred evenings being Monday or Thursday.
3. Food – Of course, we go to weddings to help our friends celebrate, and not for the food (yeah, right). But if you’re expected to give a couple hundred shekels as a gift for the new couple, you might as well make a night out of it. The one universal rule for Israeli weddings is – come early, because that’s often when they put out the best food. Pre-ceremony hors d’ouvres and smorgasbords, served while family and friends gather, nowadays often feature treats like sushi, Mexican tortillas and wraps, stir fry, etc., and that goes for catering halls geared to nearly all crowds. It’s at dinner that the differences show themselves; at religious weddings, you often have to wait awhile for dinner to be served, because the major celebratory dancing of the evening takes place first – and the food itself isn’t always, let’s say, gourmet level. Buffets are always better than sit-downs – and generally, from my observation, the more secular the couple and the families, the better the food (it’s all kosher, of course – otherwise no rabbi would conduct the ceremony). In either case, don’t feel like you’re missing something if you leave before dessert.
4. Entertainment – If the food is better at “less religious” weddings, the entertainment and fun is much better where the young couple come from a religious background. The bride and groom invite all their yeshivah or seminary friends, and there is wild and spirited dancing (separate, of course), with friends honoring the happy couple. Depending on how talented the couple’s friends are, you could also get a great “floor show” – with kids performing magic tricks, swallowing fire, juggling, breakdancing, or doing other “shtick” in honor of the newlyweds. At weddings with a more secular tone, they start off with Jewish-style dancing, too (with men and women usually forming separate circles, as well), which will drift into mixed horas or disco-style dancing after awhile. Regardless, after a couple of vigorous rounds of “simcha” dancing on a warm night, anyone who was wearing a jacket has stowed it on the back of their chair – and you realize why no one is wearing a tuxedo!
A festivus for the kosher eaters in us
Filed under: Business, Food, General, Religion
Running parallel to the kosher wine revolution (which has taught us over the past 15 years or so that it doesn’t have to be grape cough syrup to be rabbinically approved) has been the kosher food revolution (which has taught us over the past 10 years or so that it doesn’t have to be boiled chicken necks to be rabbinically approved). Much has been written about the kosher gourmet scene in various cities, and as affluence and religious observance become decreasingly exclusive concepts, the scene has only flourished.
Case in point with the Chef Eats Kosher Festival, already underway at 40 restaurants all over Israel and running through Thursday. Part co-opted marketing campaign, part celebration of a niche business community’s renaissance, and part charity drive (more on this below), Chef Eats Kosher is the brainchild of production company One Mouth. In a statement released through their publicity agents, One Mouth principles Tal Nechemia and Eran Zingler summed up the wave they’re riding:
“In recent years, we’ve seen a steady increase in crowds of people looking for experiences going out that are high-quality yet kosher. Tens of thousands came to the first kosher festival in Petach Tikva that we put on this summer, and the success of the Chef Eats Kosher Festivals in recent years has encouraged us to bring it back….”
The main draw to this fourth incarnation of Chef Eats Kosher is its affordability: When else can one enjoy a specialty three-course meal at a top-tier (well, most of them are top-tier, anyway – Jerusalem’s only participating eatery is, strangely, the local branch of the Yotvata café) restaurant for the extremely affordable price of NIS 84?
And at every Chef Eats Kosher-participating table are envelopes for donations to Table to Table, a Ra’anana-based organization which rescues leftovers from restaurants and events and serves them to the needy. The Table to Table-Chef Eats Kosher charity drive alone aims to help some 5000 schoolchildren, although the envelopes on the tables are for cash donations.
A partial list of 2008’s Chef Eats Kosher restaurants appears in English, along with some recommendations, here, while the full, Hebrew-only list can be seen here.
Photo courtesy Dan Peretz.
Nabbing the Elusive Rye
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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