My husband is on active duty in the US Army, and for our first holiday
season together we were living in a little town called Sierra Vista,
Arizona, which is adjacent to Fort Huachuca, where he was stationed.
Since we had only been married since the previous January and we were
just starting our life together, we couldn’t afford to go home to our
beloved California and our families for the holidays, so we were
toughing it out in Sierra Vista alone.
Being Jewish, no holiday season
was complete for me without my mom’s fabulous potato latkes, and by
Christmas Day (which also happened to be the last night of Hanukkah), I
was feeling pretty down at the prospect of the holiday season passing
without them. My husband, wanting to make me happy, suggested that we
make them for Christmas dinner. Since he is Christian and had never
had potato latkes before, I thought this would be a wonderful way to
introduce him to a delicious new food and also to merge our holiday
customs and traditions together, setting a precedent for the years of
holidays to come. I enthusiastically agreed.
Not remembering the family recipe for potato latkes, I called my mom at
home in Monterey, California. She patiently told me the quantities of
each ingredient I would need and walked me through all the steps.
Right before hanging up, she added, “Oh, and be sure to allow lots of
time to heat up the oil for frying, since it needs to be very hot.
Start up the stove and let the oil start heating while you peel
potatoes and mix all your ingredients together, so it has enough time
to get as hot as it needs to be.” I thanked her, promised we’d call
the next day, and relayed the directions to my husband. He started
pouring oil into the frying pan to heat while I set up shop on the
other side of the kitchen with a big bowl, a grater, one onion, and
seven potatoes, dreaming of delicious crispy latkes with applesauce and
sour cream.
Half an hour later, all the potatoes and onions were finally peeled,
and mixed in with them was the egg, matzo meal, salt, and pepper. It
was time for cooking. We went back to the stove, and to my surprise,
the pan with the oil was covered with a lid. Having never seen my mom
cover the pan before, I asked my husband why he had covered it, and he
said, “It gets hotter this way, and it heats up faster, so we don’t
have to wait for it to heat up and they’ll cook faster.” Having never
taken college chemistry and being a very inexperienced cook to boot, I
saw nothing wrong with this explanation and lifted up the top of the
pan to put the first round of latkes in. Smoke immediately began
billowing out, followed momentarily by a giant fireball at least three
feet around! I screamed, and my husband came running.
Being a much
more collected person than myself, he grabbed the lid of the pan and
put it back on, thus putting out the fireball, and then he turned off
the stove. By this point, the smoke alarm was blaring and I was
hysterical, envisioning our apartment going up in flames. My husband
carried the hot pan outside and set it down on our porch to cool off in
the freezing desert night air, assuring me that everything was going to
be okay and that as soon as the pan cooled down, it would be safe to
take the top off again.
I, however, had scenes from the movie
Backdraft racing through my mind and could picture tomorrow’s headline:
Entire Town Burned To The Ground By Couple Cooking Christmas Dinner.
Finally, after I made him wait about an hour as well as call his own
mother to make sure, he took the lid off the pan again….and nothing
happened, of course. Crisis averted, we took the pan back inside and
reheated it (with the lid off this time!) and enjoyed our Christmas
dinner of potato latkes, which tasted just like Mom’s, fireball and
all.
MY FAMILY’S AMAZING POTATO LATKE RECIPE
7 medium sized potatoes
1 large peeled onion
2 tablespoons Matzo Meal (for you non-Jews, Matzo Meal is a Manischewitz product and can be found at your local grocery store)
2 eggs, separated
1 tablespoon salt
1 teaspoon white pepper
Corn oil for cooking
Salt, applesauce and sour cream for eating
TIP FOR COOKING: While you are preparing the ingredients, preheat the
oil since it takes time to get to the high temperature needed for
frying! (But make sure to leave the lid off your frying pan.)
Place a strainer into a LARGE bowl, and into that grate the potatoes
and the onion (leave the skin on the potatoes, but wash them well).
Mix together. Using clean hands, press the potato and onion mixture
into the strainer to get the liquid out. Discard the liquid from the
bowl, and dump the potato and onion from the strainer into the bowl.
Add the egg yolks, Matzo Meal, salt, and pepper. Mix together. Beat
egg whites until they form hard peaks, and then fold them into the
mixture as well. Place large spoonfuls of the mixture into the hot oil
and flatten to form 2-3 inch round pancakes. Let the latkes cook until
they are crispy and brown, and then flip them over. Repeat until they
are as crispy and brown as desired on both sides. Remove from the oil
and drain on paper towels. Serve with salt, applesauce, and sour cream.
HAPPY HANUKKAH!