My recipe is the one my mother and now I have been making for years. I mean years and years. It came from one of my mom’s best friends Roz Katz. Mom and Roz met as co-op nursery school mothers. The Katzs still grate the potatoes by hand using the old fashioned grater that is like a grid. I’m in a hurry so I use a food processor.
– Evan Kleiman
Melanie Chartoff’s Mother’s Mother’s Latkes
Almost Traditional Potato Pancakes
The Hanukkah crown, to be worn by the person most representing the spirit of the holiday, this year would have to go to Leah Adler, the proprietor of the Milky Way, famous for being the best upscale kosher restaurant in Beverly Hills, and because it’s owner, Leah Adler, also happens to be Steven Spielberg’s mom.
Opened over 30 years ago, the Milky Way is in its second location, neatly tucked away in the Jewish strip of Pico Blvd., and is charming and inviting from the get go. The dining room is fitted with comfy red leather booths, the tables are set with white tablecloths and oversized well-framed posters of her son’s movies hang everywhere. Looking up from a yummy cheese blintz one can see a picture of ET riding in the bicycle basket or Liam Neeson as Oskar Schindler. Even without several dozen family photos crammed on top of the bar, (in this case many with smiling celebrities and politicians) the place would feel like you were visiting your favorite Jewish aunt’s house for dinner.
One is awed by the life force of Leah Adler. She stands no more than five feet tall, if that, and at ninety-three is as alert as her radiant eyes are blue. She has worn her hair shorter than Mia Farrow’s ever was, forever. Short and still buttercup yellow, it frames the face of this beautiful leprechaun. Beaming her eyes directly into yours, she welcomes one to her restaurant the way she has for years, stopping at every booth to bestow a smile, she flashes her headlights and greets her guests.
From the LA Times
As a child in Hebrew school, I was taught the story of the Hanukkah miracle: When the Jews in the land of Israel defeated the foreigners, the priests seeking to rekindle the temple's eternal light found enough ritually pure oil for only one day. Miraculously that oil lasted for eight days.
Since then, Jews have been celebrating Hanukkah every year by lighting candles every day for eight days. Children in Israel play with dreidels inscribed with the first Hebrew letters of the phrase "a big miracle happened here"; in Washington, D.C., my birthplace, our dreidels had the first letters of "a big miracle happened there."
Until I lived in Israel, I associated the holiday with latkes, or potato pancakes. But when I moved there I discovered that for many Israelis, sufganiyot, or jelly doughnuts, are the favorite Hanukkah treat. I also realized that the connection of such foods to Hanukkah is the oil in which they are fried.
What we hadn't learned in Hebrew school was that the oil of the Hanukkah miracle was olive oil. In ancient Israel, olive oil was used for lighting lamps, for religious rituals and for cooking. Based on archaeological evidence, the land of Israel was an olive oil production center.
I was recently given a gift of an out of print cookbook called The Molly Goldberg Cookbook. When I first saw it I was amused and when I opened it up, I immediately saw a cabbage recipe I wanted to make. Score! Here was a cookbook that had that “Through The Looking Glass” aspect to it. These were recipes long forgotten, mysterious in their 1950-ness, soon to be resurrected by me!
I had a faint notion of who Molly Goldberg was; however, despite the constant ‘jokes’ in my house about my age I was actually too young to have seen The Goldbergs on TV. It still amazes me that I saw Amos n’ Andy. The premise of this prototype for all subsequent sit-coms was the lives of Jewish immigrants, usually featuring a solvable family or friend-related problem. Molly, in her infinite “Jewish Mama” wisdom would involve herself in these neighborhood and family dramas dispensing invaluable advice.
Upon closer inspection of the book, three things struck me. One, the book was arranged almost like a ‘wraparound’. That’s a reference to a strip show on TV that had interstitials. Molly had her ‘bits’ that introduced the story behind some of the recipes. These bits represented a microcosm of cultural idioms and the social challenges and changes that arose from the Diaspora. The other thing I noticed was that many of the recipes were ‘from hunger’. An expression meaning, well, lacking in taste or desirability. The third thing, which reminded me of something my dad said about brisket: that it killed more Jews than bullets. Some of the recipes were so BAD for you, its no wonder high cholesterol and constipation plagued my people.
I don’t make a lot of kugels. I don’t make them because my kids don’t really eat them and as much as I want to eat the whole tray, it would take me a month to work off the calories. My grandma used to make them all the time. What I loved most about her kugels were the left overs.
The following day, for breakfast, she would cut off a slice, put some butter in a saute pan and literally pan fry the slice of kugel. Like the kugel really needs anymore butter than it already has. Yet, it is a childhood memory that is rests comfortably on my tastes buds.
My sister-in-law, Tammy is the official kugel creator in our family. She makes them all time and her 3 kids devour it. Tonight, my kids experienced kugel for one of the first times (in the past, they have turned their noses up at it). They are kugel converts. This kugel would make anyone a convert!
I am guilty of eating seconds. It is that good!
