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A Land Flowing With Rice and Peppers

by · April 3rd, 2009
Family & Kids, Humor, Israel, Jewish Culture, Kosher, Personal Story, Pesach/Passover
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I have been lucky enough to visit Israel four times over the course of the 18 years I have been alive. Even more fortunately, three of these visits have occurred during Pesach. For most people this would conjure up dreamy images of shawarma platters, or the treat of ordering a steak at any restaurant that serves them. Being vegetarian, however, I found myself in an interesting position. As an Ashkenazi Jew who does not eat kitniyot, the eight days became even more difficult in a land where many people, grocery stores and restaurants consider kitniyot to be kosher for Passover. During a three-month trip to the Holy Land with my graduating class, my fellow vegetarians and I came to discover that Israelis had little imagination when it came to vegetarian options. At many a fleishig (meat-serving) restaurant we were served peppers stuffed with rice. In a Bedouin tent, we had peppers stuffed with rice upon a mountain of more rice. It seemed the Israelis would offer me little more than a hollowed-out and grilled pepper come Passover.

Eating out with my family on Passover yielded some interesting results. One Passover found us subsisting nearly exclusively on my Bubbie’s vegetable soup and salad prepared with a delicious store-bought dressing. We wondered at the dressing every time we tasted it, unable to fathom how it could be kosher for Passover. At the end of the holiday my mother discovered upon peering at the label that it did in fact contain kitniyot in the form of soybean oil. Another time, as my family and I strolled down the cobbled streets of Zichron Ya’akov, we had to stop, stare and laugh at a sign outside a restaurant: NOT KOSHER FOR PASSOVER—WE HAVE MATZOH. Since pondering this for too long would likely make my head burst, I’ll move on to my next story.

By far my worst dining-out experience occurred in the food court of the Jerusalem Mall (also known as Malcha Mall) during Passover. Of the six or so kiosks open, only one was vegetarian, and even there I was hard-pressed to find something that appealed to me. I settled on an omelet sandwich on a kosher for Passover roll. The lettuce was wilted, the omelet had the texture and color of an old sponge, and I found a short, coarse, dark hair on my plate. I forced down the porous roll feeling nauseous rather than satiated. To add insult to injury, I then had to sit in our rented minivan and cover my mouth and nose against the aroma of the kosher for Passover Burger King fare that my father and brother were eating, the smell of which filled the entire car.

You can imagine my skepticism when we planned to have dinner with family friends at a restaurant called Meat and Wine. My parents apparently forgot that they had reared a child born in 1990 who was now vegetarian. Nevertheless, my mom insisted that she had checked out the situation and they had things I could eat. She was right. The very bottom of the menu promised a generous bowl of pasta made from potato starch and graced with grilled vegetables. It was delightful, and reminded me of the kosher for Passover pasta my mom, my sister and I enjoyed at a hotel in Hertzliyah that was so good made us wonder if we were being fooled and it was in fact made with products considered kitniyot.

Next week I will celebrate Passover without my family for the first time. Since I live in a dorm with no appliances save for a mini fridge and a microwave, I envisioned myself wasting away, subsisting primarily on Matzoh with jam, various dairy products, and fruits and vegetables. When I came home for spring break last week, however, I nearly wept when my parents came home from their morning of shopping in Baltimore and presented me with frozen sweet potato pancakes, mushroom blintzes, macaroni and cheese, eggplant parmesan—all vegetarian, kosher for Passover and microwavable. So like my previous Passovers in Israel, it will be a struggle, but it will be fully worth it knowing that thanks to my family, I will be able to observe the laws I was raised to live by.

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9 Responses to “A Land Flowing With Rice and Peppers”

  1. Rachel B. Says:
    April 3rd, 2009 at 11:47 am

    Burger King is kosher for passover in Israel? Awesome!

  2. jean Says:
    April 5th, 2009 at 5:55 pm

    A shame you had less-than-great experiences. Mine were just the opposite. While living in Israel for many years I had some of the best Passover foods ever. The Pesadik sandwiches, blintzes, pashdidot and other foods — never mind the quality and abundance of fresh produce and salads! — are to die for. The cakes and other desserts are beyond anything we have in galut. Wrong place wrong time?

  3. jean Says:
    April 5th, 2009 at 6:00 pm

    Meant to add “and a Happy and Delicious Pesach!” So glad I found this blog. :)

  4. Becca Says:
    April 6th, 2009 at 5:20 pm

    Happy Pesach to you too, Jean!
    Thanks for reading and responding. I did neglect to mention the wonderful produce available in the shuks in Israel, which never fail to stand out in my memories.
    Your mention of cakes and desserts actually reminded me of a heavenly experience at a kosher for Passover bakery in the kikar in Netanya. I can’t remember the name of the place, but I will never forget the taste of the pecan pie we had there!

  5. Adam Jackson, Editor-in-Chief Says:
    April 6th, 2009 at 7:46 pm

    Is “Meat and Wine” the kosher branch in Herzliya of a South African chain that I read about a while back? This is the website of what I’m wondering about: http://www.themeatandwineco.com/israel/herzelia/

    If so, and please forgive my tangential comments about meat on your vegetarian-focused post, if any of your dining companions who did eat the meat can offer their thoughts, I’d be really interested to hear what the meat was like. It sounded like they might have had good steak and interesting South African kosher sausages.

    I was in South Africa in early 2008 – another story in itself – and we found a kosher butcher where we bought “boerewers” and “biltong”, and enjoyed them for lunch on Shabbat with some fruit, vegetables and salad leaves we’d got from the supermarket. Both were delicious, and made me sad that these South African meats don’t seem to be readily (or at all) available in the US or the UK, at least in kosher form.

  6. Melissa Says:
    April 6th, 2009 at 10:21 pm

    If you happen to live on the West Coast, kosher Boerewors sausages are available at Jeff’s sausages in the Pico-Robertson neighborhood of Los Angeles (http://www.jeffsgourmet.com/).

  7. Becca Says:
    April 7th, 2009 at 12:30 pm

    Adam, after checking out the photo gallery of the website you provided, I can say with confidence that the restaurant you’re asking about is the one I went to. I’ll be sure to ask my mom to leave a comment about how the fleishig fare was when we went.

  8. suzette Says:
    April 7th, 2009 at 12:43 pm

    Hi Adam
    I’m Becca’s mom and can safely say the meal we had Meat and Wine was superb. They had a special menu for Pesach, and I remember enjoying some excellent lamb, and most of the others at our table (except for Becca of course) had steak.

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