Monday, October 12, 2015

A Taste of the East

I feel like I'm constantly ranting about how people always equate Jewish food with Eastern European food: matzoh balls and gefilte fish, bagel and lox.  I didn't try matzoh ball soup until college, was introduced to lox at a weekend sleepover in elementary school (and thought it was really weird; I've come around), and have yet to meet a gefilte fish I want to eat.

So, I wanted to share some photos from an event I participated in September.  Having had so many "yes, I'm Jewish, and no, I never tried matzoh ball soup until college" conversations, I jumped at the chance to demo a traditional Iranian Jewish recipe at A Taste of the East, a night welcoming Rosh Hashana -- the Jewish New Year, with flavors from The Middle East and Mediterranean.  It was a night of dinner, music, and storytelling, all celebrating the culture of Sephardic Jews.

LISA GRISSOM

I performed one of three demos of Sephardic Jewish food.  Orly Olivier of Petit Takett made Tunisian harissa, and Deborah Gorman of Sorbabe made bourekas–Turkish-Greek cookies filled with ground walnuts and dipped in a sweet syrup.  And I made faloodeh sib–a refreshing combination of rosewater and shredded apples that is the traditional Yom Kippur fast-breaking food among Iranian Jews.
LISA GRISSOM


LISA GRISSOM

It was a great time. I'd never done anything like this before, but cooking and chatting in an industrial kitchen with these ladies was a treat and an education, and sharing my family recipes with a warm, interested crowd, while being schooled on some foods that were new to me, felt wonderful.

NICOLE YOUNESI
As people milled through the space, I stood at a table decorated with black and white photos of my grandparents and shredded apples against a box grater, and then added sugar, water, rosewater, and ice to perfectly balance the rosewater's intense aroma with just the right amount of sweet.

30 YEARS AFTER
I had a couple friends, a few cousins, and my parents in attendance.  I was really happy to have these familiar faces in the crowd when we arrived at the storytelling portion of the evening.  I spoke about my uncle, a distinguished physician, affectionately known by his grandkids as "Lulu", who would leave Yom Kippur services at the synagogue early to go home and prepare faloodeh sib for his family. I wasn't the only one tearing up as we remembered this sweet man.


Recalling old memories of food and family, as we make new ones with new friends.  More of this, please.

4 comments:

  1. Very interesting post, Tannaz jan. As a result of this post, I Googled a few things to learn more about the Jewish community. Is there a recipe that goes with this post? :)

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    1. Fae jan, recipe will have to wait for the cookbook, but honestly it's pretty simple -- you can figure it out to your own taste with the description in the post. happy to answer any questions for you about your recent research =)

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  2. Hi Tannaz,
    do you bring all this to a boil or you just mix everything. Is it a hot thing or is it eaten cold?

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    1. Hello! No cooking at all. It just sits in the fridge (usually throughout the Yom Kippur day), and is eaten cold, over ice.

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