More Fish for the Nine Days: Sole Patties in Herb/Lemon Sauce

The Nine Days before Tisha B’Av are winding down, and so is our desire to eat fish.  I picked up  my cookbooks, turning the pages at the fish recipes, looking for something interesting and different. I found it in Claudia Roden’s Book of Jewish Food. Kefta de Poisson au Coriandre et Citron Confit – fish [...]

Read Full Post »

Israeli Kitchen is One Year Old

It’s the first anniversary of Israeli Kitchen. I’ve been thinking about the past year, in a way that’s supposed to be reserved for my own birthday, but I was too busy cooking and enjoying my home celebration to meditate much then. Let me think it over now.
It’s been a pleasure, and a challenge, writing every [...]

Read Full Post »

Sauteed Fish in Dry Sauce

So what’s a dry sauce? I think I made it up, but it could be my unconscious plagiarizing some cookbook I’ve read. But it’s a sauce that’s moist rather than thick and liquid.  We’re eating lots of fish these meatless days. This is what I made for lunch on Friday.
Sauteed Fish in Dry Sauce
Serves 4 [...]

Read Full Post »

Eggplant Soup

It amazes me how Israelis love eggplant. We”ve been eating it fried, pickled, grilled, flame-roasted, creamed, combined with all kinds of vegetables and flavorings and eggs – since the austerity years of the 1950s. Meat was expensive and scarce, but eggplant grew easily here and there was always lots of it. Cooks in those hard [...]

Read Full Post »

Eight Meatless Days

This time, it’s not about economizing; it’s about the Hebrew month of Av. From the first day of the month, which starts today, till the ninth, we observe the Jewish calendar’s darkest days, mourning the destruction of the Holy Temple in Jerusalem and many historic calamities associated with the day. This culminates in the fast [...]

Read Full Post »

Nut and Herb-Crusted Chicken Fillets

What did we have for Shabbat?…Well, shnitzel.
In Israel, any boned, skinless cut of meat, poultry or fish is called “shnitzel.” Normally shnitzels are breaded and fried, a quick method that  prevents the meat from drying out. They’re easy to make and popular light fare for sizzling summer weather,  when you come in from the street [...]

Read Full Post »

Always Ancient, Always New – Walking Through Jerusalem

Jerusalem is so contradictory. For all its deep, tangled historical roots and self-conscious cosmopolitan air,  it’s still a small town. Sometimes, climbing onto a crowded bus during rush hour, squeezing past old folks laden with bulging shopping bags and tired soldiers talking into cellphones, hoping you’ll find at least a standing space with some elbow [...]

Read Full Post »

Cheese Tartlets and A Blast from My Brazilian Past

See that book? It’s  Comer Bem – Eat Well, by a possibly fictitious ” Dona Benta”. It was the “Joy of Cooking” of the Brazilian home when I lived there, 40 years ago.  Like the “Joy,” it provides recipes but also teaches measurements, temperatures, substitutions, and menus.
It’s meant to be the manual of the beginner [...]

Read Full Post »

Yellow Watermelon

A novelty in Israeli, the surprising yellow watermelons have all the sweet, juicy flavor of red ones.

Read Full Post »