Several years ago, Rabbi Deborah Prinz and her husband Rabbi Mark Hurvitz were traveling in Bayonne, France.  While glancing at a placard in one of the museums they were visiting, Rabbi Prinz was shocked to read that Jews had brought the fabrication of chocolate to France in the 17th century.  As she would come to realize, Jews played a vital role in of early production and distribution of chocolate in Europe.  Even as far back as Christopher Columbus whom some have speculated might have been Jewish and some of his crew may have been converso. If true, then it would have been Jews who brought cacao to Europe.

A few months back on The Jew & The Carrot, we posted about an amazing Israeli social justice organization called Bema’aglei Tzedek, which created an ethical seal for restaurants called Tav Chevrati (social seal).  The seal ensures that the restaurant provides basic rights to workers and also basic accessibility to customers with physical disabilities.  Started only a few years ago, the Tav Chevrati seal is now on a third of all restaurants in Jerusalem, and is expanding to Tel Aviv and other cities.

I recently had a chance to speak with Bema’aglei Tzedek’s Executive Director, Dyonna Ginsburg (pictured at left) and here her thoughts on the socio-economic gaps in Israeli society, the power of public pressure on the Israeli government, and why she only eats in restaurants with the Tav Chevrati seal.

Enjoy the interview, below the jump!

Rabbi Gordon Tucker is the Senior Rabbi at the Temple Israel Center in White Plains, New York. He served as the Dean of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America (JTA) from 1984 until 1992, and on the Committee on Jewish Law and Standards of the Rabbinical Assembly from 1982 to 2007. His most recent published work, Heavenly Torah: As Refracted Through the Generations is a translation with commentary of Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel’s three volume work in Hebrew.

Right before Thanksgiving, I had the chance to speak with Rabbi Tucker about his thoughts on Hekhsher Tzedek, how food and social justice connect, and where change comes from in Conservative Judaism (hint, read the title of this post)

Read all about it below the jump (plus – a special, candid photo of Rabbi Tucker on Hazon’s New York Jewish Environmental Bike Ride!)…

(x-posted at Jewcy)

Watching Chef Sandy Stollar cook is kind of like having front row seats at the Daytona 500. Born in Queens to a Colombian-Argentinean Jewish family, Stollar embodies all the fast-paced energy of a native New Yorker, and all the credentials to make it in the big city.

Unlike most (ahem, all?) kosher chefs, Stollar trained at the Culinary Institute of America (CIA) and shined her knives at some of the best non-kosher restaurants in New York City (the Russian Tea Room, Osteria del Circo, etc.) More recently, she started her own private chef business called The Kosher Tomato, which caters to Jewish individuals and families across New York and New Jersey. She also teaches cooking classes at the Center for Kosher Culinary Arts in Brooklyn – a school which houses the first accredited kosher culinary training program in America.

Stollar, who was recently featured in the “Heeb 100,” is undoubtedly one to watch in the coming years. Below, she shares which foods she misses most from her pre-kashrut days, her thoughts on why kosher cuisine has such a sketchy reputation, and her favorite ways to make a nice piece of chicken.

What do you get when you cross Friday night with with more than 350 ethically-aware, foodie Jews?  Shabbat dinner at Hazon’s Food Conference!  The harder question is, what do you feed them?

Bay Area resident, Roger Studley, is currently working to create a kosher, free-range/humanely-slaughtered meat business on the West Coast.  In the meantime, he is busy coordinating the schecting and preparation of nearly 20 heritage turkeys, which – if all goes as planned – will be served to conference participants  on Shabbat.  As far as I know (and as far as my little bit of researching/asking around has revealed), this is the first time a Jewish conference has ever sourced its own kosher meat directly from a local farmer – aside from Hazon’s food conference last year, of course!

The Jew & The Carrot got in touch with Roger to find out how planning was going, and hear his opinion on Agriprocessors, the Jewish vegetarian debate, and his vision for the future of kosher food.

Read the interview below the jump and join the fun by registering for Hazon’s Food Conference here.

Rabbi Julian Sinclair is an author, educator, and economist. He is also the co-founder and Director of Education for Jewish Climate Initiative, a Jerusalem based NGO that is articulating and mobilizing a Jewish response to climate change.  Before starting JCI, Julian worked as an economist advising the UK Government and for a British political think tank.  Meanwhile, he authored the book Lets Schmooze: Jewish Words Today and is working on completing a Phd in the mystical thought of Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook.  Phew!

Sinclair lives in Jerusalem and has been featured on NPR and interviewed for the New York Times by our own Leah Koenig.  Hazon is delighted to invite Rabbi Sinclair as a presenter at this year’s Hazon Food Conference, December 25-28, 2008.

Get a sneak peek at what Julian has to say below the jump.  And find out more/ register for Hazon’s Food Conference, here!

There’s a joke that all fun secular holidays have “Jewish” equivalents.  Halloween has Purim, Christmas has Chanukah, etc.  But Chanukah, in all its fried deliciousness, does not offer an opportunity to bake the mother of architectural sweets: The Gingerbread House.  Now, the Jewish harvest holiday of Sukkot has stepped in to fill this wide gap in the Jewish culinary calendar with The Gingerbread Sukkah.

Boston resident Julia Greenstein (daughter of renowned baker, George Greenstein)  makes gingerbread sukkahs every year with her family.  These miniature “dwelling structures” are as temporary as their real-sized cousins – if only because they are irresistible to eat!  Find out how she does it, and how you can build your own cookie sukkah below.

What do halva, shakshuka, and attayif (cheese filled pancakes eaten by Muslims on Ramadan) have in common?  They are all Israeli foods featured in The New Book of Israeli Food: A Culinary Journey.  Nextbook recently sat down over dinner with author, Janna Gur, who is the founder and editor of Israel’s leading food and wine magazine, Al Hashulchan Gastronomic Monthly.  Listen to a podcast of what she has to say here.

Purchase Janna’s book, filled with delicious recipes and stunning food photography, here.

If ever there was a day for foodies to curl up with a mug of fair trade coffee and the newspaper, today’s the day. The New York Times Magazine’s (first ever, I believe) Food Issue hit stands this morning, so if you haven’t already scanned the whole thing online, find yourself a comfortable chair and a couple of hours to savor it the way papers were originally intended to be read.There’s a LOT of good stuff inside – enough to be slightly overwhelming. So before you dig in, take a look at The Jew & The Carrot’s recommendations on what to read, skim, and skip. Get the most out of the magazine and still have some daylight left to play. Below the jump!

Behold the rain which descends from heaven upon our vineyards; there it enters the roots of the vines, to be changed into wine; a constant proof that God loves us, and loves to see us happy.“ - Benjamin Franklin, July 1779

Jeff Morgan is a man with a mission. As if being an author, winemaker and wine educator (not to mention a former professional musician) doesn’t keep him busy enough, he is also on a quest to change the way the Jewish community thinks about – and drinks – wine.

He and his business partner, Leslie Rudd, are the creators of Covenant Wines, a kosher wine company that strives to “harness quality commensurate with the rich and profound story of the Jewish people.” That might sound like a lot to swallow, especially considering that Jews tend to be linked with a legacy of barely drinkable kosher wines (ahem, Manischewitz). But the former West Coast editor of Wine Spectator magazine is on to something sweet.

I spoke with Jeff right before Yom Kippur to hear more about his vino-philosophy. He shared his thoughts on the current state of kosher wine, where it’s headed, and why consumers should think twice before reaching for a Mevushal bottle.

Want to WIN Jeff’s amazing kosher wine? Tell us your favorite wine memory to be entered into a drawing to win two bottles of Covenant’s Red C Cabernet Sauvignon, 2006. This wine is made from grapes grown on a 2-acre parcel of land in Napa Valley and aged for 18 months in French oak barrels. Total retail value, $84. (Only one comment per person will be entered into the drawing – please comment by Sunday, October 19.

A farmer, an educator and an activist, Michael Ableman is also a photographer and a writer. His three books include his latest, Fields of Plenty: A farmer’s journey in search of real food and the people who grow it, for which Ableman traveled North America chronicling the passion and prowess of the new generation of American farmers. He currently farms in British Columbia with his wife and two sons, and will be joining us as a presenter at the Hazon Food Conference in December, 2008. (Click here to find out more and register for Hazon’s Food Conference.)

I talked to Ableman about his hopes for the sustainable agriculture movement, his many hats, and Judaism’s connection to the cycle of the seasons.

Find the full interview below the jump.

Over the next four weeks, Jews will be sitting down to together to more celebratory meals in succession than they likely do the entire rest of the year.  Many of those meals will be kosher, and many more will include meat as either a main or side course – or both.  Meanwhile, Jewish people around the country are also beginning to think differently about the meat that they eat, in light of the immigration raid on the kosher meat plant, Agriprocessors earlier this year, and of all the transgressions related to the conventional meat industry (CAFOs, hormones and antibiotics, worker abuse, etc).  For some people, the easiest response is to go vegetarian.  But for people who choose not to go the veggie route, what are the options?

We asked some of the leading voices of the New Jewish food movement to answer the question:  “If I choose to eat meat over the high holidays, what is the number one thing I should consider?”

Read their responses below – and share your own.

If you read The Jew & The Carrot frequently, you have likely read about the crop of sustainable, kosher meat coops sprouting up in communities across the country. But what about other faith traditions? As it turns out, one organization in Chicago is on a different religious path, but entirely the same wave length when it comes to ethical meat consumption.

In 2001, a Chicago-based interfaith educational organization, Faith in Place, created Taqwa, an Eco-Food Cooperative that offers meat that satisfies religious dietary requirements of the Muslim community (halal – or lawful), while simultaneously meeting fair labor and ecological standards. Today Taqwa serves organic pastured beef, lamb, and chicken to about 80 families, about half who are Muslim. All the animals are humanly raised by local Illinois farmers, and slaughtered solely by qualified Muslims. According to their website:

dhabiha (the Islamic procedure for slaughtering that is comparable to kashrut) meat is considered the only type of meat that is deemed lawful for consumption by many Muslims. For others, it is the preferred mode of slaughter. For Muslims and non-Muslims alike, it is important to note that research has proven that severing the four major blood vessels of the neck and draining the blood is the most healthful manner of slaughtering animals.

Last week, I spoke with Faith in Place’s Executive Director and Taqwa co-founder, Reverend Dr. Clare Butterfield who shares in the desire to eat humanely raised animals with other members of her home congregation Unity Temple in Oak Park (the Unitarian Universalist congregation). She told me about the inspiration behind Taqwa, why the model of Muslim meat coops cannot exist on a larger scale, and why that’s okay.

Read the interview after the jump…

In the beginning, there were vegetables. Then came fruit, and it was good. Now, Community-Supported Agriculture programs across the country are partnering with local farmers to include everything from milk and cheese, eggs, flowers, meat, and even locally-grown wheat berries in their members’ shares. This broad expansion indicates that people across the country are clamoring for more opportunities to eat local food, and that the CSA model provides the structural support to make it happen.

Hazon’s Tuv Ha’Aretz Jewish CSA program is no exception. This year, the Long Island Tuv Ha’Aretz program, which is run out of the Reconstructionist Synagogue of the North Shore, partnered with 5 Spoke Creamery to bring their kosher, raw-milk, artisanal cheeses to members’ tables. The cheese share was a first for the Tuv Ha’Aretz community and the company, which had never distributed their products via CSA before.

We interviewed Tuv Ha’Aretz coordinator and The Jew & The Carrot contributor, Eric Schulmiller, as well as 5 Spoke Creamery owner, Alan Glustoff to find out how the partnership panned out. If you’ve ever read The Onion’s Point/Counterpoint segment, the dual-interview below is kind of like that – except replace the biting sarcasm with earnestness and a passion for all things cheese.