There are those who say that there are no coincidences in life. Seeing this article posted at jewschool may just make me a believer in that statement.

Let me start at the beginning. I have a close friend (in honor of Radiohead’s impending new album, let’s call this person “Yid A”) who is a prime example of the increasingly rare species Classical Reform Rabbi. A brilliant and die-hard rationalist (once engaging in a ten-minute classroom disputation on the merits of Kantian ethics with visiting lecturer Rabbi David Hartman), Y.A. lives according to the highest moral standards as exemplified by the biblical prophets. When it comes to the matter of food, my friend is consistent in her/his beliefs. Y.A. buys mainly organic and strongly supports her/his CSA, but wouldn’t blink twice at downing a (free-range) BLT with a glass of milk. Let me put it more bluntly - no student when we were at HUC gave more freely of their time and money to just causes; but Y.A. also went out of his/her way to find the one non-kosher butcher in Jerusalem to do her/his shopping. Read more »

Upon contemplating my impending annual trip to the Lower East Side to purchase my lulav and etrog (anyone in jcarrot-land know of a good source for organic ones?) , I began channeling my Russian immigrant ancestors, eyed a giant fresh beet from last week’s CSA pickup, and had an irresistible craving for borscht. I decided on an adventurous detour from the traditional recipe, checked the usual sources and made a fabulous roasted beet borscht that is great hot or cold, served with a garnish of sour cream and grated apple.

During the process of cooking this dish, I stumbled across my first New Year’s food resolution:

NEVER USE A HAND BLENDER TO MAKE BORSCHT

My second food resolution, lower my cholesterol, will have to wait until after I try this recipe…

Kashi is running a promotion right now, where you can virtually “trade-in” your unhealthy snacks (beef jerky, nachos, cotton candy, etc) for some actual “healthy” ones, free of charge! OK, so maybe a dark-chocolate oatmeal cookie isn’t the most healthy snack in the world either, but at least it’s:

a) whole grain

b) chocolate

c) free through the mail!

Get yours while supplies last.

Congratulations to Shahar Peer, who became the first Israeli woman to reach the quarterfinals at the U.S. Open by defeating Agnieszka Radwanska last night in the fourth round.

Unfortunately, the reporting of Peer’s accomplishment in the Times threatened to incite an international food-incident, when reporter Karen Crouse referred to Peer being “as at home as pastrami between two slices of rye bread” amongst all the Israeli fans at Flushing Meadows.

As an article in New York Magazine correctly (if snarkily) noted, Katz’s Deli is not the official cuisine of the Jewish people - especially not Sabras!! Now, if she had written that Shahar had felt as at home as a fried chickpea surrounded by tahini sauce, well, it still would have been ridiculous, but at least more culinarily accurate.

Best of luck to Peer, and if she drinks enough Kaballah Energy Drink, I’m sure she’ll do great in her match against Anna Chakvetadze tomorrow.

Perhaps it’s no coincidence that a primary source for the teaching that “Elul” is an anagram for “Ani L’dodi V’dodi Li” (I am my beloved’s, and my beloved is mine) is the Shulchan Aruch - The Set Table. This verse from Song of Songs is seen by the sages as a call for us to reconnect with the Divine (our “Beloved”) during this season of teshuvah - renewal and repentance. Yet as we stare at our own brimming tables (and across them), this Rosh Hashanah, I offer the following meditations on this verse’s spirit of reciprocity - not just with God, but with each other and the food that connects us:

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Yesterday, in the New York Times, was an op-ed by journalist and author James McWilliams, about the true impact of the local food movement on the global environment. In the article, McWilliams, himself an enthusiastic member of a CSA, reports that,

“Researchers at Lincoln University in New Zealand, no doubt responding to Europe’s push for “food miles labeling,” recently published a study challenging the premise that more food miles automatically mean greater fossil fuel consumption. Other scientific studies have undertaken similar investigations. According to this peer-reviewed research, compelling evidence suggests that there is more — or less — to food miles than meets the eye.”

These studies, McWilliams writes, actually prove that once factors other than “food miles” are entered into the equation (such as a farm’s water, energy and fertilizer/pesticide use; packaging, etc) the total carbon footprint of food purchased from half way across the world is often actually lower than that purchased from locally-grown sources. Quoting a noted New Zealand environental researcher, McWilliams notes that locally grown food, “is not always the most environmentally sound solution if more emissions are generated at other stages of the product life cycle than during transport.” McWilliams goes on to urge fellow local-food supporters to view these findings not as a threat, but as a challenge to look at the food system in a new way, as both environmentalists and pragmatists.

There is certainly a large challenge present in this article. For one, it could generate unfavorable press for the local food movement when certain elements of McWilliams’ presentation are taken out of context, or are manipulated for political purposes. For some of us, this information might force us to reconsider whether the other values of local foods (taste, freshness, supporting local farmers, community development, worker’s rights, to name but a few) would still compel us to choose the low-spray apples we buy from the local farm, or, as John Mackey of Whole Foods would claim, we’d be better off buying certified organic ones from across the country.

It’s a discussion worth beginning, even if our answers lead to more questions.

FYI, here is McWilliams’ original article from the Texas Observer, on which the NYT piece was based.

And here are some other perspectives on this issue.

Once, a man came to his rabbi and said, “Rabbi, at home I keep strictly kosher. I do everything by the book, but when I go out, I can’t be so kosher. I’m not so strict when I eat out, but at home everything is 100% kosher.” The man’s rabbi replied, “Ok, you’re very lucky, all of your dishes will go straight to heaven!”

I’d like to turn this old joke on its head for a moment. We’re here at this site because we care about our food’s impact on our bodies, our community and our planet. Many of us consider the choices we make as conscious consumers to be “eco-kosher.” That is, we want our food to be “fit” (ethically, chemically, socially, spiritually) for consumption, and we try to base our purchasing decisions on these values.

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This shabbat is called “Shabbat Nachamu” (Shabbat of Comfort), named after this week’s haftarah which offers consolation following the devastating events of Tisha B’Av, commemorated last week.

Since my first visit to Jerusalem, prior to beginning cantorial school, I’ve been torn about the purpose and method for observing Tisha B’Av. On the one hand, I have no desire to see us return to a patriarchal system of priestly castes, with animal sacrifice as the primary form of Jewish spiritual expression, and on the other hand, we Jews can now rejoice in Jerusalem rebuilt in our own time. Read more »

Back in 2000, I was fortunate enough to take part in a “Jewish heritage” tour of China. I came home with some amazing memories, including shabbat dinner and davening with a local minyan in Bejing, and a tour of the Jewish neighborhood in Shanghai where thousands of Jews successfully fled Nazi persecution. Six straight weeks practicing with a Chinese language tape in my car allowed me to successfully navigate the streets of China (or at least ask, “where’s the bathroom?” or “is there pork in this?” at least five times a day). But my proudest moment came when I was able to walk into a store in Shanghai and order a package of my new favorite tea (a sweet concoction called ba-bou-chai - “8 treasures tea”) without uttering a word in English.

I had quite a different cultural experience when I entered a brand-new coffee shop in the Forbidden City and ordered a Venti non-fat caramel latte. Yes, Starbucks (or *$ for short) had managed to outdo the parodies of its own ubiquity by opening a branch in the most culturally innappropriate spot in all of Asia. I shouldn’t have been surprised - American culture had infiltrated urban China to such a shocking extent that an alien plunked down in Tienanmen square would have assumed from the sheer number of KFC awnings that Colonel Sanders was China’s “Great Leader,” and not Chairman Mao. But the juxtaposition of American consumerism and ancient/communist Chinese culture was too great to wrap my head around without a serious infusion of caffeine. Read more »

Check out these great excerpts from a photo essay entitled, What the World Eats, from the book, Hungry Planet, by photographer (and fellow tribesman?) Peter Menzel.

And if you’re ever confused about what blessing to say when encountering a new food, you can use this new handy gadget, from The Jewish Learning Group!

Like me, some of you may have pondered the significance of dairy on the festival of Shavuot. I have mixed feelings about the various explanations I have heard for this association:

• Since the rules about not mixing milk and meat had just been revealed at Sinai, there was no time for the Israelites to buy a second set of dishes so they had to have a dairy meal to celebrate the giving of the Law.
• Using gematria, the letters in the Hebrew word chalav (milk) add up to 40 - the amount of days the people waited at Sinai (or the number of years they wandered in the desert)
• As long as the Israelites followed the words of Torah, they would inherit the land flowing with milk (and honey)
• Just as Torah has been compared to water, so it has been compared to milk (i.e. “Milk and honey are under your tongue” (Song of Songs 4:11).

It’s this last idea on which I’d like to focus the remainder of this essay. When it comes to Torah as milk, the following Talmudic passages some up the values behind this metaphor nicely:

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“Do not wrong one another, and you shall fear your God; for I, The Eternal, am your God.” (Leviticus 25:17)

[This verse] forbids wronging others with words…And if you say: “Who knows if I had evil intentions?” For that reason the verse continues: “You shall fear your God”…[Regarding] anything which is a matter of conscience, known only to the person involved, [The Torah adds]: “You shall fear your G-d.” (Rashi on Lev. 25:17)

“Death and life are in the power of the tongue.” (Proverbs 28:21)

While researching for a d’var torah for this week’s parasha, I came across the following midrash, courtesy of a Union for Reform Judaism TableTalk by Barbara Binder Kadden:

Read more »

My last omer-centric post celebrated the yeastiness of a sourdough starter. Today I wanted to focus on barley. Let’s not forget that the omer period itself is named after the measure of barley, known as an “omer” that was brought to the Temple on the second day of Pesach, marking the beginning of the transition from the barley harvest of early spring to the later wheat harvest of Shavuot.

Hmmm…yeast, barley….what else might be used to celebrate this period? Some commentators say that the transition from barley to wheat marks the transition of the Israelites from a slave people (who lived like animals, the main consumers of barley) to freedom (since wheat bread marked the culmination of civilization). Not so fast, says professor Charlie Bamfourth in a recent Scientific American article: Read more »

(image and recipe below via deliciousdays.com)

Growing up in the late 70’s and early 80’s, my mom often participated in the gastronomic equivalent of a chain letter: a sourdough “Amish friendship bread” called Hermann. A friend or neighbor would give us a cup of this mysterious goo, which my sister or I would lovingly “feed” a cup of milk, flour, and 1/2 cup of sugar every fifth day, stirring on the days in between (yes, other kids had dogs or cats, we had a sourdough starter that lived in the fridge. This might explain some of my food issues as an adult…). Every now and then, we’d give some Hermann away to friends with care and feeding instructions, or use a few cups of Hermann to bake a delicious coffee cake.

Hermann is the perfect post-Pesach pet. You count the days between feedings as you count the Omer, and revel in the sheer yeastiness of the experience, and the resultant baked goods. Plus, you get to share him with friends, and as you give him away, Hermann’s value only increases (much like the Torah we receive anew from Sinai each Shavuot…).

Here’s instructions for starting your own Hermann, and a great recipe for a Hermann coffee cake is after the jump. Happy feeding! Read more »