Leah Koenig
By Leah Koenig
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News Deconstructing Honey Cake
‘Honey cake is not so much loved as revered,” Arthur Schwartz writes in “Arthur Schwartz’s Jewish Home Cooking: Yiddish Recipes Revisited” (Ten Speed Press, 2008). Truer culinary words have never been written. Honey cake is a symbolic super food and an undisputed fixture on many Rosh Hashanah tables. But just as with fruitcake, which routinely…
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Culture Jews and Beer
Nothing cools down a rash of steamy summer nights like a frosty pint of beer. Unless, that is, you are Jewish — because aside from the occasional l’chaim around the Kiddush table or on Purim night, Jews don’t drink. Especially not beer. Of course, anyone who has ever witnessed their Uncle Barry getting soused on…
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News Grow and Behold
When Naftali Hanau graduated from New York University with an economics degree, he left prepared for a career in banking or investing. But the Rochester, N.Y., native chose a different path: one that likely includes more feathers and trucks than those of his fellow alumni. This July, Hanau’s company, Grow and Behold Foods, will launch…
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Culture Say Cheese
At the turn of the 20th century, a young immigrant named Ben Moskowitz took a job as a dairyman among the chaotic jumble of pushcarts and crowded markets in Lower Manhattan. Two generations later, his son and grandson — Joseph and Adam Moskowitz — carry on his legacy at their international cheese and specialty food…
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News Beyond Falafel
With early spring sunlight spilling through the windows, chef and baker Erez Komarovsky is hard at work. Using quick, sure movements, he slices tart green almonds and then stirs them into goat’s milk yogurt. An oversized mortar and pestle on the counter holds lima bean hummus, which he has topped with toasted peanuts and sautéed…
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News Passover Cleaning: Year One
One day last spring, at 11 minutes to midnight, I was on my hands and knees, scrubbing the kitchen floor. My jeans were streaked with dirt and my hands covered with those chalky, yellow rubber gloves that scream, “I’m in serious cleaning mode, people!” There was something soothing about the rhythm of plunging my sponge…
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Food Deconstructing Matzo
In a tradition in which food choices can be as divisive as they are unifying, matzo stands as Judaism’s strongest culinary bond. Kosher keepers and hardcore vegans alike eat matzo; so do Jews from Spain, South Africa and Miami Beach. And while the strictly cultural and staunchly religious Jews share few opinions on theology or…
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Culture Fruits of the Desert On a Table Near You
Even the most devoted locavores have their limits. While eating seasonal, locally grown food can be rewarding, both ecologically and culinarily, there are certain dietary staples that one just cannot find at North American farmers’ markets or through a Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) program. Like coffee. Or chocolate. Or that all-important ingredient of healthy cooking:…
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