So, I sat down and figured out what we’re going to serve folks for the Seder. The only who non-vegetarian items on the menu are my grandma’s traditional gefilte fish, whose absence would lead the masses to charge on the Bastille, and chicken broth, to which we will provide a mushroom broth alternative for non-carnivores. Apart from that, some of this stuff has already been featured here (but will be served in a more festive manner), and some of it will be posted when I do trial runs for everything. Caveat for kosher keepers – we eat grains and legumes during Passover, and, while there’s a chicken broth option, the parfait is dairy.
On the table during the Readings:
seder plate homemade olives nuts and almonds deviled Eggs
Firsts
gefilte fish tomatoes stuffed with quinoa salad mushrooms stuffed with vegetables and herbs
Soup
chicken broth Shiitake mushroom broth
Entrees
eggplant-tomato bake with soy and herbs roasted roots/root mash greens with garlic lentil pancakes onions stuffed with rice and spices green salad with avocado and grapefruit colorful veg salad
Dessert
lemon parfait matzoh layered chocolate cake fruit plate coffee and teas
And here’s something else that’s pretty cool; these easy strips are excellent in a sandwich with mustard.
Block of firm tofu Soy sauce Grated ginger Brown rice / whole wheat flour Olive or canola oil
Slice up a block of firm tofu into thin (2 mm) slices. Place them on a tray, pour soy sauce, add ginger slices and leave the whole thing alone for a few hours. Then, come back; wash and dry the tray, and spread some flour on it. Heat up some oil in a pan. When the pan is hot, you have to work fast; dip each slice in the flour, coating it from all sides, and fry it in the pan. Flip after about 30 seconds, get out of pan after an additional 30 seconds. Yum!
A simple lunch for us today, making use of more celery stalks.
1 cup white beans 2 carrots 5-6 celery stalks 1 tbsp olive oil 1 tbsp schoog (sort of a Yemenite salsa) or other hot sauce 2 tbsps soy sauce 2 tbsps dill
Place beans in large bowl, fill with water, and leave overnight. Next morning, strain, and simmer in fresh water until tender. Set aside. Chop carrots and celery stalks, so you have small pieces. Heat up olive oil and add schoog or salsa. When you get teary-eyed standing over the wok, add soy sauce and vegetables. Toss and cook 7-8 minutes or until barely tender. Then, add beans and dill, toss around for a couple of minutes – and, enjoy!
These days we’re a bit excited, foodwise; we’ve managed to convince all our family, which lives in the North, to come have the Passover Seder with us in Tel Aviv! Usually in our family, as for many families we know, the younger folks go hang out with the older ones. The parents or grandparents put up the holiday at their house, and the thirtyish folks come as guests.
Last year, we had the Seder here in Tel Aviv, and though a good time was had by all, we were afraid it was too much to ask for folks to drive all the way here on a holiday evening. However, it seems they enjoyed it so much that they want to come back – if anything, they were concerned whether it wasn’t too much for us to have them over! It certainly isn’t. In holiday times, small apartments seem to expand and make more room for rowdy, happy guests.
Everybody’s enthusiasm is interesting in light of the fact that, at our place, they can’t really expect large trays (or small trays, for that matter), of juicy meat; we serve a vegetarian meal. Our only concessions to tradition are my grandma’s fish balls and her clear chicken broth. Last year, someone brought a dish of fish, we forgot to serve it, and when we remembered, no one wanted any! They were quite happy with the lovely array of spring vegetables and fruit on the table. It’s important for us to have a beautiful, colorful display of seasonal local vegetables, because we see Passover, first and foremost, as a Spring festival. We like to read the story behind the holiday, of liberation and freedom, as a metaphor for, or a parallel to, the liberation of the Earth and Her children – trees, bushes, flowers, roots – from the winter cold, and the freedom to bloom and ripen.
The reason I exhaust you, kind readers, with all this theological and familial information, is because plenty of the recipes that will show up in this blog for the next month or so are “practice sessions” for the Seder meal. Some of them are things we made last year, and some are things we’ll try this year for the first time.
One humble but flavorful vegetable dish was a mix of celery and Shiitake mushrooms in a gentle, herb-flavored sauce. Here’s how we made it last year.
Celery and Shiitake Mushrooms in Broth and Soy
1 tbsp canola oil 3 garlic cloves 1/2 inch piece of ginger 1/2 tbsp of Thai Curry, or fresh ground red pepper large head of celery, with about 10 fresh, green celery stalks 10 dried shiitake mushrooms 1 cup hot water 1/2 cup vegetable broth 3 tbsp good quality soy sauce A few stalks of parsley, sage and thyme
Place mushrooms in a small bowl, and pour hot water on them. Leave to soak for about twenty minutes. In the meantime, you can prep the other ingredients: remove celery stalks from head, wash well, and cut into small, 1/3 inch pieces. Chop up the parsley, sage and thyme. Slice up the ginger and garlic cloves (bear in mind that, when feeding large crowds, some will dislike the ginger, so if you’ll need to fish it out before serving, do not chop it too thinly). Heat up the canola oil in a wok, add garlic cloves, ginger and Thai curry or red pepper. After about a minute, when kitchen becomes fragrant, add the celery stalks. Move them around the wok for a couple of minutes. Then, go back to your shiitakes, squeeze them well and keep the liquid. Slice ’em up and add to the celery stalks. After a couple of minutes, add to the wok broth, soy, herbs, and as much of the mushroom water as you like. It’ll be very flavorful. Stir and cook for another ten-fifteen minutes, or until celery is soft and nice, and most of the liquids have been absorbed.
The art above is by Arthur Szyk (see more beautiful and interesting Judaica at http://www.szyk.org/szykonline/index.html)
Yesterday, I had lunch with my dear grandparents at their house.
Lunch at the grandparents’ is always a source of joy. Beyond the pleasure of hanging out with them, my grandma is a fabulous cook. Her cooking influences hail from Russia and from Egypt – two places where the family had been before being in Israel. Accordingly, we get some traditional stuff like gefilte fish (carp balls, which, as opposed to the Polish version, are spicy rather than sweet) side by side with spicy exotic vegetable stuff. However, decades of cooking with the same ingredients have made my grandparents completely ignore the world of whole grains.
Ahhhh, don’t I like all those “traditional foods” advocates, who say that whatever your grandma cooks is good for you! Don’t these people know that white rice and flour, and refined grains, have been available for a long, long time, and enjoyed a reputation of being more palatable? While the grandparents know the benefits of fresh fruit and vegetables, and cook wonderful, creative dishes with them, they are a little bit afraid of whole grains.
So yesterday, my grandma took the plunge, and cooked quinoa from a packet that included some raisins and almonds and nuts. It came out very good, but she was very hesitant about doing other things with quinoa.
“You can buy this in bulk, like rice”, I said. “Really?” she said increduously. “But then how do I know about the fruit?” “You don’t have to have fruit”, I said. “You can cook this with vegetables”. I got strange looks. “Yeah”, I said with lots of conviction. “All those amazing dishes you make with white rice? You can make all of them with quinoa”. “Wow”, my grandpa joined the conversation. “This is really good.” “Like your mejeddera“, I said. “You can make your mejeddera just the same, with the lentils and onion, except use quinoa instead of the rice”. “You know”, said my grandma corageously, “I went to the store and almost bought brown rice. Except, with those rough peels, how can it cook at all?” “C’mon”, I argued, “if it wasn’t cookable, why would people sell it an eat it? Of course you can cook it. It takes a little more time”. “But it probably has a different flavor”, said my grandpa. “Yeah, it does”, I replied. “It tends to be a bit of an acquired taste for folks who are used to refined grains. But it’s really good once you get used to it”.
A short discussion revealed that the grandparents do eat barley and buckwheat and quite a variety of beans. “There”, I said, “you do eat beans and whole grains. So you can just add a couple more to your repertoire”.
My grandma promised she’d do some experimenting, and we’ll see the results next week when I come back for lunch. Hurrah!
In the meantime, for your sakes and for posterity, I’ll try and collect her traditional wonderful Russian and Egyptian recipes, and come up with healthier versions for them whenever needed.
Extremely easy recipe, and a good substitute for burgul, or, as Americans call it, “bulgur”. True, not the traditional main ingredient, so probably not for purists; but very tasty nevertheless. Simply mix the following ingredients:
2 cups cooked quinoa 1 fresh cucumber, chopped into teeny-tiny pieces 3 tbsp chopped fresh parsley 1 tbsp chopped cilantro juice from 1 lemon
We’re en route to Berkeley, California, where we’ll spend the next two weeks – mostly working, but also meeting old and new friends. We’re very happy about the trip, but also somewhat concerned – my health still is far from perfect and the last thing I need is the jetlag.
And the food.
Say what you may about Israeli politics, behavior, whatever – it wins the food competition with America, hands down. When I moved to Berkeley in 2001, I could hardly bring myself to shop for anything that wasn’t vegetables or fruit – everything seemed processed, fatty, and strange. Getting used to foreign food is always a challenge, but apparently American food is particularly problematic. Many Israelis who have lived abroad (my sample includes lots of grad school students, who also sit and study a lot and therefore have somewhat sedentary lives) find that they gain a lot of weight in America.
Is it possible to live and eat in America without feeling bad and gaining a lot of weight? I maintain it is – at least in California. If you stick to the following principles.
1) Go slow at first. It’s hard enough to adjust to a new place, whether you’re visiting or staying to live there. Get a few familiar foods, just so your stomach doesn’t get as homesick as the rest of you. Being so food-obsessed, I remember how I almost cried with joy when I bought a bag of small, deep green “mediterranean” cucumbers at the overpriced yuppie store. Not all of us can afford shopping at places like that on a regular basis, but sometimes it’s important.
2) At the same time, pay attention to the quality of stuff. What is generally good in one place, doesn’t necessarily have a good equivalent elsewhere. For example, in my second year in America I finally realized that the low fat cheese market was a disappointment in comparison to the stuff in Israel, and shifted to tofu, which was much better. On the other hand, good luck finding a decent veggie burrito in Tel Aviv (and if you have found one, please, let us all know!).
3) Do not eat weird processed fake foods (and I don’t mean these, though they certainly are entertaining). The nature of a globalized, large scale capitalist food market is that it offers a load of new, pre-packaged products for our consumption. There is no need to eat stuff that has an unappetizing, artificial list of ingredients.
4) Exit the supermarket and head to the nearest farmers’ market. The markets have much better and fresher – and often cheaper – produce.
5) Do not be afraid of new vegetables. Before coming to America, I didn’t know of mustard greens, bitter melon, jicama, bok choy, and other wonderful things. In my first year in California, I played a game that you may find fun: Vegetable of the Week. Each week I bought a vegetable I didn’t know, and tried to cook it in various ways. My diet got richer, and my palate was certainly happier!
6) Make use of the advantages of immigration countries! In America, try Asian and Mexican restaurants – it’s best to avoid the sanitized chain versions, and go for the real thing.
7) And, finally, find a way in which, when you’re sad or lonely or homesick, you can have and enjoy an old favorite… a small bag of Bamba does wonders for Israeli kids and kids-at-heart, anywhere in the world…
Safe travels!
(images for this post from: www.shcp.edu/ftp/American%20Food-David%20Foro and www.israelimages.com/medium/17126.jpg)
In a house that receives its weekly quota of fresh vegetables and fruit from Chubeza on Mondays, Wednesday is an interesting day. Gone is the excitement of Monday, when the box of new edible toys made its way to our living room, and when we had the freshest salad ever and had a few ideas what to do. Gone is also the laboriousness of Tuesday, when we executed one of those ideas (soba soup with greens – this time, not too exciting. Shame, shame, shame, amazing spinach and carrots gone to waste). What now? What now?
Well, as Chad points out, we do have squash.
Squash is a strange vegetable, to me, at least. It’s stringy, and it has a very tough skin, and it has a wonderful color. While Americans eat their squashes on a regular basis and make all sorts of wonderful things out of them, Israeli squash is often too watery-juicy (and not very “buttery”) and therefore, isn’t too good to mash. When baked, its consistency is more like zucchini. Thing is, it’s tasty.
So, I have a large piece of organic squash in my fridge, and while I *could* make some soup or stir fry, I’m not inspired. So I decided to open this up for discussion: What do you suggest I do with the squash?
One of the reasons for the big break I took from posting was feeling exhausted after spending a month and a half flying back and forth between Israel and the US. The constant jetlag, the lack of adequate food, and the stress of travel, took their toll, and the doctor has officially pronounced me exhausted.
In Chinese medicine, exhaustion can be the manifestation of several different conditions, depending on the person involved and the symptoms he or she experiences. But in many of these variations, the issue has to do with a depletion of the body’s reserve of qi, the energy of life. In my case, the exhaustion manifests itself in (of course!) various annoying digestive issues, headaches, tiredness and moodiness, muddled thinking, and a very strained set of back muscles.
One of the doctor’s recommendations for this situation was a bowl of oatmeal every day. Oatmeal is a pleasantly warming and healthy grain, that provides energy, vitamins (particularly B vitamins), minerals (particularly manganese) and an abundance of fiber. Apparently, there are many people who are allergic to wheat but not to oats, despite the fact that both grains contain gluten. Oatmeal with cinnamon and dried prunes and raisins is truly excellent; cinnamon is a very warming spice in Chinese medicine, and if you add a vanilla pod of a drop of natural vanilla extract, your oatmeal will truly rise to unprecedented levels of yumminess.
Now, please give this a try: I know you’re all busy in the morning, but I find that making oatmeal out of steel-cut oats (as opposed to the quick-cooking rolled oats) doesn’t take up a large chunk of time, especially if you lower the heat after a while and let it happily simmer while you take your morning shower. So, here ’tis, and it’s really worth it.
Oatmeal – 1 serving (more can be made by simply multiplying the amounts!).
1/2 cup steel cut oats 1 1/2 cups water 1/2 tsp vanilla 20 organic raisins 3 organic dried prunes, chopped up into raisin-size pieces a drop of vanilla extract, or 1/2 vanilla pod
Place all ingredients in a small pot and heat up. Do not wait for it to boil – when things start getting warm, lower the heat. Go about your business, stopping by the stove to mix up your oatmeal every 5 minutes or so, so it doesn’t stick. At some point, the oats will change their consistency and the whole thing will be a lot more porridge-like. Spoon into bowl and enjoy.
