cakewalk

I seriously admire your restraint. I could never, ever have remained silent, I would have dead people in my kitchen and dining room.

My understanding of "kosher style" is not that all ingredients are kosher. I always thought "kosher style" meant that the meat is not necessarily kosher (and probably isn't, usually because of its expense), but that the caterer/restaurant will not mix meat with milk products, will not serve pork products or shellfish or anything else that is clearly not kosher. So whatever you decide, you should make sure that your customer base is on the same page you are in terms of what "kosher style" means. Religiously observant Jews are obviously not going to eat at a "kosher style" restaurant no matter how you define the term. But there does seem to be a market for others. Many Jews are not religious and don't mind eating non-kosher beef, but won't eat pork or shellfish and won't mix meat and milk. And of course there are many non-Jews who simply like "Jewish food" (which I'm using to mean classic Ashkenzi food.) So there's definitely an "audience" out there, but I don't know anything about your neck of the woods, so I don't know if they're in your neighborhood.

I was living in Israel and a roommate, whose Hebrew was very, um, "new," came back from the supermarket with a large bag of coconut. For some reason she was very excited about it. Turns out that she incorrectly read the Hebrew for coconut (which is kokos) as couscous. Not food related, but after I had just moved to Israel I went with a friend to the dreaded Ministry of the Interior, where we had to fill out forms for a zillion different things relating to our immigrant status. There was an immeasurably long table (longer than any Seder table I have ever seen) filled with form after form, all in Hebrew. My Hebrew was also very "new" at that time, and I chose what seemed to be the correct form. My friend and I were waiting on line and filling out the forms when someone kindly informed us that those forms were for death certificates.

I'm always amused by people who don't keep kosher at all, except ... when they make a Passover seder. Oy. But in truth I don't see anything hypocritical about these behavioral inconsistencies. Hypocrisy enters the equation only if one starts to tell other people what they "should" do, while at the same time doing whatever he/she might like. That sort of thing goes well beyond religious practice, of course. Carrot Top: And what saying about laws and sausages might that be?

That is exactly what was going through my mind as I was reading that post. I always assumed it was a much more complicated process. I think I might be giving this a try. (After the summer.) Great blog.

Good one. Garbage cans without lids? Major yuk. I have a friend who has three cats. I guess you could say they allow my friend to share the apartment with them. I cannot eat there. We meet and go out for a meal. Always. I had a roommate once who washed out plastic bags and hung them up to dry. It wasn't environmental consciousness as much as it was anal retentiveness. I used to wonder about her sanity, but this business of reusing ice cubes beats all. In my brother's apartment there is a path from the fridge to the microwave.

That sounds very familiar. What, I should leave it in the freezer?

That's a perfect description. I don't like regular snickers bars (so sue me ), but the ice cream bars are my favorites.

Eat it! Very Atkins. If there are a lot, you can add a single/few whole eggs and make a less rich egg salad. Alternatively, you can separate the eggs, freeze the whites, then zap the broken yolks in the microwave. ← You do not understand. Hard-boiled eggs are evil. Plus my brother told me that if I made a less rich egg salad, he wouldn't eat it. ← You're right, it was for tart crusts. And I was looking specifically for linzer torte recipes, so it makes sense that it would be an Austrian technique. Two out of two, you are impressive!! Can you make "hard boiled" egg yolks in the microwave? Interesting idea, I never thought of that. But then, I never thought of just using the yolks! Many thanks. (I think I'll give this technique a miss for the time being.)

I was reading through some pie crust recipes and came across something I had never seen before. There was a recipe that suggested using the yolks of hard boiled eggs in the crust. It said to discard the whites, push the yolks through a sieve, and then add them to the crust recipe. Has anyone ever done this with a pie crust? How is it different than using a raw egg or egg yolk? Thanks.

Allergies or no, she said NO onions. I'm with grandma. (Although I probably would not have thrown the plate. At least not that far.) I can't tell you how much I always enjoy reading these threads whenever they roll around.

Oh I just love the idea of traumatizing children because of their parents' mistakes, oversights, and/or negligence. It's such a compassionate and mature way of handling things. The kids can take it.

Egg salad is a happiness producer. I don't care for hard boiled eggs either, but egg salad is a different animal, much much more than the sum of its parts. I like it on whole wheat toast. A bit of cider vinegar in the egg salad brings the taste buds to nice places. I suspect this will be dinner tonight.

I always get a chuckle out of the fast food chain called "Chirping Chicken." If I eat chicken, I want it to be well past the chirping stage.

Heavens no. ← cakewalk, I'm enough of a snob that I'd love to be the one that wrote that quote, for it would mean that the NYT had paid me to write something, which they didn't. Unfortunately, it came from the linked/quoted article. But I like the line and love your response even more. ← My skills with links and quotes are nothing to write home about, which is why the quote ended up looking as it did. Sorry. But it is a great line, isn't it?

Heavens no.

Grapefruits are kosher. Are they Jewish? ← Nah. Too many Jews on Lipitor from all that Jewish food.

Make it as goyish as possible. "Interesting and attractive" to whom? Many still eat it and cook it. (See Pam's posts.) Since so many [American] Jews over the past several generations have moved away from religious observance (kashrut, shabbat), and so many other ethnic cuisines have become popular, the competition is much greater than it used to be. When people had a choice of only one cuisine, that's what they ate. If they have a choice of five, the original one is inevitably going to lose out. Another thing crossed my mind about the "lack" of Jewish delis: the children of the old deli owners, well, they went to college. An example: on Jerome Avenue in the part of the Bronx where I grew up there were two Jewish delis: Epstein's and Schweller's. The neighborhood is no longer Jewish, and (as far as I know) neither of these delis is still open. (Although I think there might still be an Epstein's in Westchester.) However, I think they would still have a thriving business if they were open (different customers, but so what?) But there was no one to take over the business, because the kids became doctors and lawyers. This is quite common, not just in the "deli trade," and I think it has a lot to do with the demise of the "mom and pop" stuff, delis included. So you will find a lot of people who moan and groan about "no good Jewish delis," -- but who wants to run one? [bTW -- my father was a kosher butcher, he worked in a meat packing factory and they used to have a smokehouse. On weekends he always brought home all the deli stuff. I hated it. Still do. Except for those long strands of frankfurters. Now they were good!]

Right. This is the same point I have also been arguing. Your coq au vin example is an interesting one. But, to be clear, don't think Fat Guy and I are arguing the same point. I'm in your camp, suggesting that "Jewish food" consists essentially of kosher adaptations of the cuisine of the country in which Jews live(d). savethedeli, and to a certain extent Fat Guy, seem to be arguing that "Jewish food" exists as a distinct cuisine in the same way that, e.g., Italian, Indian and Chinese food exist as distinct cuisines. I do think it's possible that, once Ashkenazi Jews moved out of Eastern Europe to other parts of the world, bringing with them their Eastern European culinary traditions and retaining different "old world" dishes in their new homes than non-Jewish Eastern European immigrants, the Jewish adaptations of old world Eastern European dishes that were preserved by immigrant Jews came to be regarded by Jew and non-Jew alike as "Jewish food" rather than "Eastern European food" in the "new world." ← It's not just the adaptation of recipes. Certain things are, for the most part, considered "Jewish food," while others are not. Coq au vin, no matter what you use in place of the bacon, is not considered "Jewish food." Matzoh balls, however, are. Both might be adaptations of a recipe from a "host" country where Jews lived, but both did not make it into this "Jewish food canon."

This you call an ANSWER??!! Oy! I guess there are too many answers to that question. (Yes, it is a question!!) And the answers do not always agree. So much the better, it gives us more food! Stepping outside the realm of food for a minute (just for a minute): can a white person write black literature? Can a man write from a woman's perspective? If you didn't know anything about the authors, would the books give it away? So if my upstairs neighbor (Mary, by name) made zup mit luckschen every Friday night, would it be Jewish food? And what if she made it on Wednesdays?

Yes, as in: "You don't have to be Jewish to love Levy's. Real Jewish rye bread." Remember that? I never understood what was Jewish about rye bread. Especially Levy's. That stuff tasted nothing like the bread we got at the (Jewish) bakery. Re the "only eating Jewish at holiday times" stuff: well, all that was fancy holiday food. Latkes are Hannukah food; cholent is Shabbat food, as is chopped liver, challah, etc. During the week they ate bread in milk or some cottage cheese, plain stuff, so I guess there was no particular reason for that to remain.

Speaking of Jewish foods becoming mainstream: there's a greasy-spoon diner on 10th Ave. and 37th or 38th and every year at Passover time there's a sign in their window (hand written) that says, "we make the best matzoh-brei!" It's an absolute marvel of mainstreaming. However, since it's during Passover, I've never eaten it.

Oh that sort of thing would never happen here.

And this you call Jewish? Feh. Question: when does Jewish food become Goyish? Answer: see above. Seriously, I suppose the question becomes: what's Jewish about it? If the origin of a recipe is Jewish (and I'm not really 100% sure what that might mean) but the recipe has evolved to something "other," is it still Jewish food? One can order the above in a restaurant and still ask the question ... "why don't Jews eat Jewish?"

...and what's the point of this? ← Well what's the "point" of this entire website??!?!? It's not unusual for people here to try to define something food-related in order to come to a better understanding of what it is. I think levels 7-10 go beyond "amateur." For me, one of the distinctions would be "following a recipe" and "replicating a recipe on one's own."