For 72 years running, some of the country’s foremost scholars have gathered in one of the University of Chicago’s most Gothic halls to debate one of the most challenging questions of our time: what is superior, latkes, the Hanukkah fried potato special, or hamentashen, the triangular Purim pastries? To paraphrase 2018 debate moderator Joshua Feigelson,…
The moment that the Purim ads start appearing in the religious magazines, I begin to hyperventilate: How to design the perfect cellophane-wrapped gift packages of treats, the traditional mishloach manot we deliver to one another on the morning of the holiday? How many — who makes the cut for that all-important list? And what about…
On February 25, 2018, Twitter was set aflame. The cause of the turmoil? Acclaimed writer Taffy Brodesser-Akner’s very public and prolongued disavowal of the festive food of her people, the hamantasch. I know the Internet is as bad as it gets these days, and I sure don’t mean to make it worse, but I have…
This article originally appeared in the Yiddish Forverts. Yes, that’s right. Hamentashen with RADISHES. It’s a thing. Watch Rukhl and Eve prepare this tasty Purim pastry which they learned from the Vilna partisan, Chayele Palevsky:
The Jewish holiday of Purim is fast-approaching: In 2018, the holiday begins the night of February 28 and ends March 1st. The holiday, which commemorates the tale of how Queen Esther spoiled Haman’s plot to massacre the Jews in Persia, is often celebrated in part by baking (and eating) hamantaschen, triangular cookies with a filling…
If you’ve been getting ready for Purim by obsessively baking varieties of these triangular cookies (may I advise avoiding the chocolate chips and using fresh, tart raspberry jam instead) — you might be wondering exactly how they came to be such iconographic representations of Judaism. Worry not, because you’re about to find out. If you…
Midway into my first batch, as the rolling pin clumsily turned my dough into something resembling a map of Africa after a multi-year drought, I wondered what I could have possibly been thinking when I agreed to this assignment. This was my first attempt at baking hamantaschen, the triangular-shaped cookies we eat especially at Purim,…
Not since Hillary Clinton’s infamous cookie-making comment on “60 Minutes” in 1992 (“I suppose I could have stayed home and baked cookies…”) has the act of baking been so politicized — until now. This weekend, Ivanka Trump posted an image of herself on Instagram in which she’s seen making hamantaschen with two of her children….
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