skygiants

For the past week I've been making my way slowly through Matzoh Ball Gumbo: Culinary Tales of the Jewish South (courtesy of agonistes), which is a cultural/historical study of Jewish foodways in Atlanta, Charleston, New Orleans, the Mississippi Delta, and ... at least one more region I'm forgetting!

Jewish Southern culture is not something I'm super familiar with at all (though I did read one mediocre romance novel about it!) so this was an interesting learning experience for me! It's a very sideways mirror of my own family history but also contains some things that are extremely relatable; my family has not, for example, officially articulated 'meat kosher, milk kosher, and shrimp kosher' or made any personal rules like 'we only eat shellfish in months that end in R!' but, you know, every Jewish community learns how to elide its rules in its own particular way (or doesn't, depending on where you are.)

Food-wise, the book DEFINITELY contain some culture shock in the way that happens when very familiar foods are suddenly made unfamiliar -- I had to stop and put my book down for a minute to process the notion of 'buttered matzoh balls served as a side dish,' what??? NO STOP THAT SELF ALL FOODWAYS ARE VALID -- but also some recipes that sounded extremely good (I am very pro the notion of praline kugel, for example).

The book also takes its time in examining how "soul food" made its way into Jewish food culture (and vice versa) via the long history of slavery and racial disparity that meant that Jewish families, aspiring to Southern whiteness, were often being fed by African-American women; and, on the flip side, new Jewish immigrants were opening grocery stores to cater to African-American clientele; and how that looked different in different communities, and for different families. There's a lot that goes into food history; it's worth reading.

Also, I really want matzoh ball soup now even though I am not actually likely to eat any for another four months.

I had folks over for Purim festivities! After we'd efficiently knocked out about five batches of traditional-ish hamantaschen -- crowdsourced fillings included raspberry, blueberry, lingonberry, mixed-berry, and rhubarb jams, apple butter, lemon curd, nutella, speculoos, ginger preserves, and every combination of the above, occasionally with unsweetened dark chocolate mixed in -- we decided to get experimental and try something I had always wanted to attempt: SAVORY HAMANTASCHEN.

I suspected there was at least a 50% chance this would turn out to be a terrible idea but in fact it was an AMAZING idea, which I'm documenting in case anyone else wants to attempt it.

We started with standard hamantaschen dough, cut out about 2/3 of the sugar and the vanilla and orange juice, and added about a cup of shredded cheddar cheese, a dollop of olive oil, and a slew of herbs including rosemary, oregano, turmeric, paprika, and dry mustard. We also added extra flour and water on a guesstimation basis until the proportions/stiffness seemed approximately right.

For fillings, we started out by playing around with the apple butter, rhubarb jam, and a jar of onion jam I had lying around; then we got bolder and tried tomato sauce, cheddar cheese, mustard, and sriracha combos. Here's some of the pizzataschen, as documented by genarti:



And here's one of the many plates of sweet hamantaschen:



As we folded many tiny circles into tiny triangles, I subjected my guests to the worst Purim films we could find streaming: Purim: The Lot,, a surprisingly gory animated movie narrated by Esther's slave girl(??) which inexplicably detours in the middle to the story of Samson(???), and Esther and the King, in which Esther is played by JOAN COLLINS and caught in a LOVE TRIANGLE between AHASUEROS and SIMON THE NICE JEWISH BOY, neither of whom wear pants ever at all. To be fair, I'm pretty sure 'good Purim movies' are not a thing that currently exist.

While I'm talking about Jewish stuff: my Yiddish classes have started up again! I mention this because last week we watched this music video in class, after learning the original 1930s Yiddish song on which it was based, and I've now watched it like 10 times since:



Apparently Daniel Kahn and the Painted Bird are a RADICAL KLEZMER CABARET PUNK BAND and I'm ... really into it ...... (Daniel Kahn is also the guy who did the Yiddish version of Hallelujah, which was making the rounds a little while back.)

(Also, have I mentioned here yet how much I love my Yiddish classes and the adorable leftie socialist Jewish organization that hosts them? They are having a "radical Purim extravaganza" tonight and the only reason I'm not there is because I already ate enough home-baked hamantaschen to sink a freighter. HAPPY ONCOMING PURIM TO ALL.)