I recently headed back to the office after being at home for nearly 18 months. During that year and a half, I renewed my relationships with my children, husband, self, and…my kitchen. I have always been one to cook and entertain, but being at home upped the ante. I turned play dates into dinner dates. Every Friday was a complete Shabbat dinner. There was usually a homemade something or other for dessert. And we had so many leftovers, we had to literally give them away to the neighbors. During this time, I shopped at my leisure, stopping into boutique markets and buying direct from the farms. I founded a CSA. In short, I found a great deal of happiness and comfort in cooking, especially for those I love. It became more than a hobby; it became a passion.

It did not take long after returning to the workplace for things to slip to the wayside. Even with flexible hours, it is impossible to do all that I did before, much less to have the luxury of time to enjoy it. Pizza night is now one a week. Dessert is often fruit and ice cream. And the neighbors have to fend for themselves. But one thing I refuse to give up on is Shabbat, especially homemade challah.

For me, challah making challah represents everything I want to be. I love the feel of the dough in my hands when I braid it, almost as much as the sense of accomplishment I feel when it comes out of the oven. When I make challah, I feel nurturing and generous and full of possibility. And I was not going to give it up. So I pulled out my slow rise method from my bag of tricks, and wanted to share it with anyone interested in homemade challah for the working woman.

Slow rise is a method that allows you to literally let the bread rise for as long as you need. Well, not forever – you can’t leave it in an Egyptian tomb an expect to come back a century later. But, much as the Pillsbury folks do, you can leave yeast to rise in cool spaces for extended periods. This time old method works well with challah.

For years, I have used Claudia Roden’s challah recipe with great success; it is a wonderful, simple, and parve recipe that always delivers great bread for Shabbat. Like all challah recipes, it has four key phases:

1. Combine/knead ingredients: Combine ingredients and knead, preferably on a Kitchen Aid with dough hook (speed 2 or less)
2. 1st rise: Allow the dough to rise until doubled in size.
3. Braid and 2nd rise: Braid the challah like you would a pigtail, using three plaits. Let rise again until doubled.
4. Brush and bake: Brush with an egg wash and bake away.

Here’s how it works with a slow rise:

1. Thursday night – Combine/knead ingredients: Combine ingredients and knead, preferably on a Kitchen Aid with dough hook (speed 2 or less) – 15 minutes total (2 -3 minutes for the Kitchen Aid)
2. Thursday night – 1st rise: Allow the dough to rise until doubled in size. Let it rise in the fridge for at least 2 hours.
3. Friday morning – Braid and 2nd rise: Braid the challah like you would a pigtail, using three plaits. Let rise in the fridge again until doubled. – 5 minutes to braid, 1 hour plus to rise
4. Friday afternoon – Brush and bake: Take out of fridge and let sit at room temperature 30 minutes before baking. Brush with an egg wash and bake away. – 30 minutes

In some ways, the slow rise is the ultimate metaphor for the multi-tasking mom. The work gets done quietly, in the dead of night, while the dish washer is running and the laundry is cycling, and of course the kids are sleeping. I like the idea that while all that is happening things are rising in my fridge, full of the next day’s promise. It’s a hopeful effort. And homemade challah dresses up any meal, from brisket, to roast chicken, to takeout. It is a nice gesture that makes my family happy, and for me, makes working seem feasible. Give it a try, and enjoy every bite.

Note: Claudia Roden’s recipe is for 4 loaves; I find that 1 tbsp of yeast yields 2 loaves of bread. If you are new to using yeast, please take a look at this piece on how to work with it.

Living with food allergies can make things difficult, especially when it comes to Shabbat. Of course I love eating Shabbat meals at the homes of my friends, but it’s always quite a dilemma for me. If they don’t already know the ins and outs of my dietary restrictions, do I tell them?

Being dairy-free isn’t too much of a problem (usually), since most of my friends serve meat for Shabbat meals, and most Jews are used to cooking parve (neither meat nor dairy) items. It’s the gluten-free restrictions that are the buzz-kill.

Here’s the problem–the list of things I shouldn’t eat pretty much negates typical Shabbat foods: Challah (made with flour). Cholent (because most people use barley, which contains gluten). Kugel (usually made with flour or matzo meal). Soup that has matzo balls or noodles. Schnitzel (breaded). Meatballs (bread crumbs as a binder). Most brands of soy sauce contain wheat gluten. You get the idea.

There are pretty much two scenarios for me when it comes to my dietary restrictions (scenario 2 happens more frequently):

1. People ask me or I tell them in advance what I can and cannot eat, and they proceed to freak out because they can’t make any of their normal Shabbat dishes. I cause them an inordinate amount of stress which makes me feel bad.
2. I don’t tell them in advance because I don’t want to cause any undue stress, and I can usually eat enough at a meal, but then my host/hostess feels bad because they made things I can’t eat even though I’m really okay with picking and choosing.

Now for those who know me pretty well, they’ve adapted to my eating habits and don’t think twice about experimenting with new dishes, and even ask me for ideas. But when I make new friends or am invited by people who don’t know me as well, it gets complicated. To tell, or not to tell?

Do you have friends with Celiac Disease or gluten intolerance? Here are some great Shabbat recipes for the next time you need them:

Gluten-free cholent

Gluten-free side dishes

Gluten-free chicken dishes

Gluten-free beef dishes

Gluten-free muffins (great for desserts)

Do you have food allergies? What has your experience been like?

Global Hunger Shabbat is just around the corner! Join AJWS this Shabbat, March 19-20, for a nationwide day of solidarity, education, reflection and activism to raise awareness about global hunger.

Over 100 synagogues, 31 universities and scores of individuals, Moishe Houses and independent minyanim across the country and in Canada, New Zealand, India, Cape Verde, Uganda, Kenya, Cambodia and Thailand have already signed up to host Global Hunger Shabbat events in their communities.

It’s easy to plan a Global Hunger Shabbat event of your own or find an event at a location near you. Please visit www.ajws.org/hungershabbat for more information and to download activities, resources and suggestions for taking action.

I am lucky enough to live in Eugene, Oregon. I’ve got it pretty good here – great weather, great outdoors, great Jewish community, great abundance of local organic food. But Chinese food? Not so much here in Eugene.

As a Bay Area transplant, I crave Chinese food. I often feel like I literally NEED it. After months searching for something that would quench my Chinese food tastebuds – and realizing that to keep my version of kosher (which is eco-kosher: less about what is and what is not treyf and more about eating only meat that is ideally organic and pasture-raised – and if not, is absolutely free-range, never given hormones or antibiotics, and was humanely slaughtered) – I came to the conclusion that I’d have to make it myself. For both taste and my personal kashrut reasons. Which is some kind of a life lesson right there, I’m sure.

I stumbled upon a recipe for Cashew Chicken from the inimitable Martha Stewart and decided to give it a whirl – and my own flair. And to tell the truth, it is delicious and happily graces our Friday night Shabbat table pretty often.

Cashew Chicken & Snow Peas
Adapted from Everyday Food magazine

Serves 4

• 3/4 cup raw cashews
• 1 ½ pounds boneless, skinless chicken breast, cut into 1-inch cubes
• 2 tbsp cornstarch
• Kosher salt and ground pepper
• 2 tbsp high-heat vegetable oil, such as sunflower
• 6 cloves garlic (or more, depending on your preferences – we like a LOT of garlic in my house), minced
• 12 – 16 scallions, white and green parts separated, each cut into 1-inch pieces
• 2 cups snow or sugar snap peas, trimmed
• 2 tbsp rice or white wine vinegar
• 1 tbsp Rooster (Sriracha) sauce
• 1 ½ tbsp soy sauce
• 3 tbsp hoisin sauce
• White or brown rice, for serving (optional)

1. Spread cashews on a baking sheet, and cook in an oven heated to 350 degrees until golden and fragrant, about 10 minutes. Your nose will tell you when they’re done!
2. In a medium bowl, toss chicken with cornstarch until chicken is coated; season with 3/4 teaspoon salt and 1/4 teaspoon pepper.
3. In a large iron skillet (or other non-toxic nonstick pan), heat 1 tablespoon oil over medium-high heat. Cook half the chicken pieces, without moving them at first so they can brown a bit, and then tossing often, until browned on all sides, about 3 minutes. Transfer to a plate.
4. Add remaining oil and chicken to skillet along with the garlic and white parts of scallions. Cook without moving them at first so they can brown a bit, and then tossing often, until browned on all sides, about 3 minutes.
5. Return first batch of chicken to pan along with snow peas. Add vinegar; cook until evaporated, about 30 seconds. Add Rooster sauce and soy sauce and toss to coat chicken and snow peas, allowing it all to cook a bit, about 1 minute. Add hoisin sauce; cook, tossing, until chicken is cooked through, about 1 minute.
6. Remove from heat. Stir in scallion greens and toasted cashews. Serve immediately over rice, if desired.

I’m fascinated when tradition gets tested by modern science and comes out standing.  I’d cheered when acupuncture was shown to be effective for chronic pain.  Now, I’ve learned that America’s Test Kitchen, which publishes Cook’s Illustrated, has subjected challah to its test kitchen experimentation.  The results: pretty much what you’d learned from your mother and grandmother (or would, if you had one).

The best tasting challah is not too sweet, not too dense, not too fluffy and not from the commercial bakeries.  Their results, from the Holiday Baking 2009 issue, included:

3-3-1/4 c unbleached all-purpose flour

1/4 c sugar

2-1/4 tsp instant yeast

1-1/4 tsp salt

2 large eggs plus 1 large egg yolk

4 tbsp unsalted butter, melted  *

1/2 c plus 1 tbsp warm water

1 large egg white (for wash)

1 tsp poppy or sesame seed (optional)

* For the kosher bakers: they also tested oil and found that it did not add much flavor.  But, you already knew that.

This yields one large loaf, which is not enough for the average Jewish household in which Shabbat is observed and one would need two whole loaves for each meal.

Methods for braiding the challah were also tested and they preferred the trompe l’oeil method (which I’d discovered on my own but has abandoned) of topping a large three-braid loaf with a smaller three-braid one.

Reviewed by Hannah, who usually makes a pareve, vegan, German-style challah for Shabbat

As I’ve noted before, being vegetarian makes it easier to keep kosher:

You don’t have to worry about whether you’re eating meat that’s certified kosher (and whether that certification meets Jewish ideals) if you’re not eating meat. You don’t have to worry about mixing meat and dairy products if you’re avoiding one or both of those categories altogether. As one vegetarian rabbi explained in a 2005 Jewish Ledger article, “We have one set of dishes (plus Passover dishes) and never have to worry about the status of leftovers in the fridge or whether a guest will mix the utensils or food items. … By not eating meat, I am much more certain to never violate, even accidentally, the Biblical and rabbinic prohibitions concerning non-kosher meat.”

As a vegan, I do inherently keep kosher in the most important ways. I avoid pork, shellfish, and other forbidden foods. I do not buy non-kosher (or any) meat. I do not mix (or consume separately) meat and dairy products. Kashrut is not just about what winds up in your mouth; it’s also about following G-d’s laws. I believe that my dietary habits are consistent with the letter of the law for kashrut and that the reasoning that guides them is consistent with the spirit of kashrut and other Jewish concepts, such as not causing animals unnecessary suffering (tsa’ar ba’alei chayim). If anything, I’d argue that being vegetarian is more consistent with Jewish ideals than supporting industrialized animal agriculture is.

Still, I do not keep kosher in the strictest sense. In my apartment, I cook with pots and pans and eat with silverware and dishes that belonged to various relatives and have not been kashered since touching non-kosher meat (and possibly meat mixed with dairy). I eat at non-kosher restaurants, and despite my efforts to the contrary, there have probably been times when I’ve inadvertently consumed lard or other non-vegan trayf ingredients. I do not look for a hechsher on packaged and processed food products, because if everything is of vegan origin, that’s good enough for me; it’s possible that this food contains natural or artificial flavors of animal origin or was manufactured on equipment that also processed animal byproducts.

The degree of my kashrut generally doesn’t pose any problems, although it does occasionally have interesting implications. This past Shabbat, I attended a dinner in a kosher and non-vegetarian home. (The meal, including a delicious seitan entrée, was very vegan-friendly.) I couldn’t contribute any food made in my officially non-kosher kitchen, so I brought wine. I took home a Tupperware container with leftovers, which I later returned to the host; I did not touch it with my silverware, and I washed it with a paper towel instead of a sponge from my kitchen.

The devil’s advocate position I’m up against is that I am vegan by choice but keep kosher only as a side effect. Perhaps the reason why I don’t consume shrimp is the best argument for saying that I genuinely do keep kosher. Although I recognize that lobsters and crabs (and possibly other invertebrate animals) feel pain and suffer, I do not conclusively think that shrimp do. For years I have avoided shrimp because I err on the side of caution with animals’ suffering and it’s nice to adhere to the label “vegetarian” consistently. (Certainly, the environmental devastation of shrimp farming and fishing is a significant ethical reason to avoid shrimp too.) In recent years, I’ve thought about going back to eating shrimp and considered that animal suffering might not be enough of a reason to avoid eating the most commonly consumed sea animal in the U.S. Yet I still refuse to eat shrimp, and the number-one reason why is because they are trayf. According to rules that matter to me, eating shrimp is forbidden. This proves that I do follow the laws of kashrut on their own, not just because they happen to be consistent with my other dietary habits.

I know quite a few Jews who keep kosher and will eat vegetarian food in non-kosher restaurants. There’s nothing at all unusual about this. In the same vein, I think it’s time once and for all to affirm that I do indeed keep kosher with a one-word, loud-and-proud “Yes!”

Of course, I probably will keep talking and use the opportunity to promote veganism anyway.

This post originally appeared on heebnvegan. Click here to read “Are You Religious?” from April 2008.

It all started with an excessive amount of cabbage.  One of my housemates wanted to make a pretty and delicious green and purple cabbage salad for a dinner party she was attending.   “Why are your cabbages so big in this country?  In South Africa we have little cabbages!”  True, even after making her salad a few times we still had a lot of cabbage left over.

Then I got cabbage in my CSA share – two heads of it.  “How do you feel about sauerkraut?”  I suggested, thinking about my own German heritage.  “Or kimchi?” was her suggestion.  Now we started getting excited. She pulled out her Ball Blue Book Guide to Preserving, which was a rather comprehensive collection of pickles (although no kimchi).  So several kimchi recipes were consulted online and we got to work.

Big canning jars were purchased along with some chili paste, fresh ginger, scallions and lots of salt. The cabbage was washed, sliced and ready to wilt.  “It says to let the salted cabbage to sit for several minutes to let it wilt, but it’s been twenty minutes and it’s not wilting.”  This was us looking at our bowl of crisp and fresh purple cabbage sparkling with salt.  About an hour later the outer edges appeared slightly limp.  The cabbage was then firmly packed down into the jar it’s salty cabbage juices covering the leaves.  We jerry-rigged a cover and some weight to press the cabbage down firmly into its own brine.  “Fermentation is usually complete in three to six weeks,” she read.  “Weeks?”  Oy this was a lot of work for a little sauerkraut.  And neither of us knew how the purple cabbage was going to work – especially since it had been so reluctant to initially to wilt.

The kimchi, on the other hand was remarkably easy.  Let the cabbage soak overnight in a water and salt mix.  Rinse then mix in a blend of chili powder (although I used paste) salt, sugar, ginger and scallions.  Instead of chopping I simply threw the spice mixture in my food processor making a nice even and smooth paste I massaged into the dry cabbage leaves (using a glove since the chili can burn your skin).  I packed the kimchi into jars and let it sit on our kitchen counter.

And a few days later, bright and shiny with flecks of red in a hot and tangy liquid, the kimchi was ready and remarkably delicious and was quickly eaten.  The purple sauerkraut continued to sit on the counter.  It smelled bad (as sauerkraut does) and overflowed its jar a few times (making a big purple mess).  Occasionally we could see some bubbles from the fermenting process, but other than that there was great skepticism in the house whether or not this was going to be successful.

More kimchi was made with the next week’s CSA cabbage.  While picking up that week’s share I traded some other veggies for more cabbage.  “What do you do with all that cabbage?” I was asked.  Good question, what does one do with lots of kimchi?  We brought out the bamboo steamers and made dumplings.  We made sushi.  Not authentic Korean foods, but delectable.  And there was more cabbage.  And beets.  I forgot to mention the beets.  There were also lots and lots of beets.  Pickling spices simmered on the stove with a stick of cinnamon in apple cider vinegar.  Cooked beets and this tangy brine were poured into more jars.  The fridge was starting to get full.

Shabbat dinners began featuring our pickled goods.  Kimchi on a Shabbat table?  Why not.  We brought jars of beets as gifts to dinner parties.  Then the sauerkraut was ready.  It didn’t taste anything like the mushy stuff that my mom would cook on New Year’s Day with pork loin.  I never liked sauerkraut.  It was offensive I couldn’t imagine putting it in my mouth and dripped its rancid liquid everywhere.  But our purple sauerkraut was still crisp, had very little liquid and very little smell.  It gleamed like strips of scarlet silk on our Shabbat table.  The beets were like deep rubies and the kimchi was just fun and exotic.

I love cooking.  I love cooking for other people.  Being unemployed gives more time than I would have if I were working.  So I feel like I can try new things.  Although pickling is a way of preserving fresh foods, it has also been preserving my sanity as I have tried to find a new job.

“Half a loaf,” they say, “is better than none.”  But it’s hard for me to cheer when I have half a challah left after Shabbat, doomed to sit on the counter, uneaten until it’s inedible, or tossed into the back of a freezer and forgotten until the pre-Passover clean up and then burned with the chametz.

We’ve been trying especially hard, recently, not to waste food – but when it comes to leftover challah, the challenge is twofold: For one thing, there are four people in my family and 15 slices in the average bakery loaf; you do the math. For another, halakha (Jewish law) requires that two full, un-sliced loaves appear at both the Friday night meal and again on Saturday as a reminder of the double portion of manna that fell from heaven before Shabbat when the Israelites were wandering in the desert. A lovely tradition – but it means the bread left over from supper can’t just be used up at the next day’s lunch.

That’s just one of the many reasons I bake my own challah: I can shape each loaf to the exact size I’ll actually need on a given Shabbat, depending on whether we’re expecting guests. And when I’m too tired/hot/lazy/cranky to bake, I now buy small challah rolls at the bakery, rather than full braids. Yeah, the little round breads look kind of lonely on the big challah board, but honestly, one slice of challah is really enough for each of us.

But even those anti-waste measures aren’t fail-safe – and there are many folks, I know, for whom it just isn’t Shabbos dinner without large, glossy loaves poking their noses out from under a silken challah cover. For all of us, then, I’ve been thinking about delicious ways to use up leftover challah.

Of course, there’s always French toast (and if you think it’s good plain, just try slicing the bread only half as thick as you normally do, making a sandwich of two slices with a nice spackling of Nutella, and then dipping THAT into the milk-and-egg mixture before placing it in the frying pan. There IS a God!)

But when brunch company comes, whoever’s stuck alone in the kitchen flipping the French toast misses all the best jokes and juiciest gossip, so on those Sunday mornings, I like to do a savory bread strata instead. My latest favorite is an adaptation of a recipe that recently ran in House Beautiful. Check out the recipe recipe here. I use 2 cups of sliced mushrooms and 2 cups of minced baby spinach leaves, both sautéed with the caramelized onions, for the vegetable component, along with 5-7 ounces (depending on package size) of crumbled soft goat cheese.

If there’s just a slice or two of challah left, strata’s not an option – but that’s okay, too, if you sandwich creatively. Because of its eggy texture and sweet-ish flavor, challah’s not right for every sandwich, but try it with brie and apricot preserves, or roast turkey with pumpkin butter (which is not butter at all, but fruit spread, and is pareve). Or, do what I did for breakfast this morning: just toast the challah and spread thinly with goat’s milk butter (available at health-food and gourmet stores and absolutely marvelous). With a drizzle of the rich, dark buckwheat honey I get from Andrew at the greenmarket in New York’s Union Square… well, it’s like manna from heaven.

The other night I had eggs for dinner. Two of them fried over easy, slipped onto a slice of toast and plopped next to some sautéed zucchini with garlic. My total cooking time clocked in somewhere around 12 minutes — about as much energy as I had on a muggy summer evening after a day spent prostrating myself in front of a laptop. There was nothing gourmet about what I ate, except perhaps the pinch of za’atar that I sprinkled over the eggs en route to the table. But according to a recent New York Times Magazine article by Michael Pollan (author of “In Defense of Food” and “The Omnivore’s Dilemma”), my dinner practically qualified for a James Beard award, the food world’s most prestigious prize.

Why? Because, as unfussy as my meal was, I cooked it. From scratch.

According to Pollan’s article, “Out of the Kitchen, Onto the Couch,” the average American today spends very little time preparing food — just shy of half an hour a day. When we do find ourselves in the kitchen, he says, chances are it is to heat up a can of soup or microwave a few frozen burritos rather than to assemble a dish from raw ingredients. The country’s collective shift toward convenience foods and processed snacks comes with some unfortunate consequences. Pollan writes:

A 2003 study by a group of Harvard economists… found that the rise of food preparation outside of the home could explain most of the increase in obesity in America…. As the amount of time Americans spend cooking has dropped by about half, the number of meals Americans eat in a day has climbed: Since 1977, we’ve added approximately half a meal to our daily intake.

My first reaction to the article was one of satisfied smugness. I figured that Jews must be an exception to this trend. As a people, we are practically hardwired to crave a good homemade meal. The dinner table plays a sacred part of Sabbath observance (as the symbolic representation of the sacrificial altar), and food is an integral aspect of nearly every holiday celebration. It is almost as if Jewish tradition specifically developed reinforcements to remind us that, as Pollan writes, “cooking is a defining” — and by extension, important — “human activity.”

And yet, in that same moment of personal and communal congratulations, I realized that the Jewish community has found ways to subvert its own food ideals. For every nourishing, wholesome Sabbath meal I have prepared or attended, there are many others that rely on greasy, store-bought kugels and chicken cutlets with packaged seasoning, followed by a tub of a synthetic ice cream substitute. Meanwhile, the rise in kosher-certified convenience products — from frozen blintzes to fish sticks — now ensures that Jews’ weekday “cooking” can mirror that of the rest of society. Ultimately, it seems that despite the special reverence we hold for bubbe’s cooking, the Jewish diet is not immune to the faux-food slump. “We have it in us — we know how to enjoy food,” Chana Rubin, who is a registered dietitian and the author of “Food for the Soul: Traditional Jewish Wisdom for Healthy Eating” (Geffen, 2008), told me. “Something just gets lost in translation.”

Pollan points to familiar culprits to explain Americans’ stove avoidance: busy schedules, food marketers’ ongoing attempts to seduce our consumption impulses and, most important, a simple lack of comfort and skill in the kitchen. Ironically, he says, the televised food shows on which Americans have become increasingly hooked (think Bravo’s “Top Chef,” or “Chopped” and “Iron Chef” on the Food Network) do more to intimidate and obfuscate than to encourage or instruct. How much can one really learn, he asks, from watching a “blur of flashing knives, frantic pantry raids and more sheer fire than you would ever want to see in your own kitchen?” Even the “dump-and-stir” shows, which are geared toward home cooking (for example, Rachael Ray’s “30 Minute Meals,” and Sandra Lee’s “Semi-Homemade”) “stress quick results, shortcuts and superconvenience” over true technique or the creative satisfaction that comes with pulling a successful dish from the oven.

It is on this last point that I depart from Pollan’s critique. The Food Network may not arouse culinary greatness from the average couch potato, but it has undoubtedly inspired many of its viewers to take that first, crucial step toward the stovetop. This same logic applies to Susie Fishbein of the wildly popular “Kosher by Design” cookbook series. I used to dismiss Fishbein’s recipes for relying so heavily on prepackaged ingredients (for example, frozen challah roll dough as the base for chocolate babka). Yet her books also include many simple, fresh-ingredient dishes that have motivated kosher cooks to think beyond the kugel pan. And if the ultimate goal is as Pollan writes, to “rebuild a culture of everyday cooking,” then it should not matter whether a recipe has three steps or 20, or whether it results in a soufflé or just plain old eggs.

Still, it has become clear that Americans (both Jewish and otherwise) need a serious dose of culinary literacy — an “Our Bodies, Ourselves”-style reintroduction to the kitchen and its many beautiful parts. Because while schedules will always be too busy, we make time for the things that we love. So start with the Sabbath or with a random weeknight. Sign up for a cooking class, dig out (or go purchase) a copy of “Joy of Cooking” or offer to play sous chef for a friend and learn through osmosis. And if you maintain an obsession with the Food Network, go ahead and enjoy it. Just make sure to turn off “Chopped” from time to time and get chopping.

photo credit: Digest This

Philadelphia – May, 1986. I’m walking down my college’s main thoroughfare, having just finished the very final final exam of my senior year. It’s late afternoon, and as I head toward my off-campus apartment, I come upon a street vendor selling shiny, green Granny Smith apples. I hand the man a quarter, and wipe the fruit on my pant leg. As I take my first bite, taut apple skin gives way to crunchy flesh and a delightfully fresh sweet-sour tang.

“THIS,” I tell the vendor, “is an apple that makes a person glad to be alive.”

I have eaten thousands of Granny Smith apples since then, and while few have been as life-affirming as the one I ate that May afternoon 23 years ago, many have been quite wonderful. Others have been crunchy-enough and sufficiently tasty. But every once in a while, I bite in to an apple and give it the same grade I got on that last exam: a disappointing C-minus.

And so it was, recently, when I ripped open a plastic bag of Granny Smiths I had bought at the Stop & Shop, pulled out an apple and washed it carefully (I’m a grown-up now) and bit in.

Mushy. Well, not mushy, exactly, but certainly not taut-skinned or crunchy-fleshed (which, I suppose, is what I get for buying a bag of apples flown in from God-knows-where in July when I could be enjoying local nectarines and strawberries.) But mushy-ish, in any case, which raised the issue of what to do with the rest of bag.

Throwing the remaining apples out was simply not an option; it’s a shame, not to mention a breach of Jewish law, to waste food just because it isn’t up to gourmet standards. And while I suppose I could have soldiered on and just eaten an apple a day (to keep the HMO away), I believe, more and more these days, that eating food without enjoying it is almost as wasteful as throwing it in the garbage can. And so, I looked for ways to use the apples in dishes where their lack of tartness would be less noticeable and their lack of crunch unimportant.

First up: an apple-cheddar omelet. I peeled one of the Granny Smith apples and diced it fine (the pieces need to be small so that they heat through and soften a bit inside the omelet without having to cook it so long that the eggs toughen up), mixed in a hefty handful of grated cheddar cheese and melted some butter in my frying pan, added two well-beaten eggs and the filling. A few minutes later, I had a dish worthy of a chic brunch eaterie.

The next day, with only one egg in the fridge, I put some apples and cheese into a honey-wheat tortilla and heated it in a dry pan. Ya vez! A quesadilla’s second cousin twice removed. And it was tasty, too – but at the rate I was going, it’d take me a week of lunches and a year’s cholesterol-allotment of cheese to make my way through the rest of the apples, and I was eager to be done with them.

Pie? Too Thanksgiving-y for the sunny July weather we earned with this year’s awful, rainy June. And an apple sorbet made with bland apples surely would not have been worth the time or trouble.

And then I remembered about my sister’s apple kugel, a recipe that has circulated in her husband’s extended family for years. It’s easy, it’s always well-received, and fortuitously, my sister told me when I asked for the recipe that it really only works well with Granny Smiths.

In minutes, I mixed the batter up with a fork, (the pinch of salt is my addition; I like the more balanced flavor it creates), added the six peeled, cored and sliced apples and stuck the pan in the oven. An hour later, the kugel was ready, and when I served it – warm on Friday night and at room temperature on Shabbat day – everyone at the table asked for more.

And my fruit bin? Emptied of the disappointing apples, there’s now room for the kind of summer peaches that make a person glad to be alive.

Apple Kugel:

Preheat oven to 350.

Peel, core and slice 6 Granny Smith apples.

In a large bowl, mix together:

4 large eggs

1 Cup flour

1 Cup sugar

½ Cup canola oil

1 tsp. baking powder

1 tsp. vanilla extract

pinch of salt

Mix the apples into the batter. Transfer to a 9 x13” baking dish and bake for about 1 hour, until kugel is set.  Serve warm or at room temperature.