1,000 Jewish Recipes (241 page)
Read 1,000 Jewish Recipes Online
Authors: Faye Levy
When my mother wants to prepare a very simple Friday night meal, it still "has to feel like Shabbat"; in other words, it must be festive. Her typical menu might include a salad, roast chicken, carrots, green beans, noodle kugel with onions, and cake or baked apple for dessert.
An easy way to give the carrots and beans a lively flavor is to sprinkle them with gremolata, an Italian seasoning blend of garlic, parsley, and grated citrus rind. Classically it's used on veal shanks in tomato sauce but it's great on vegetables. You can prepare the vegetables before sundown on Friday night and keep them warm on a hot plate, as my mother does, or simply reheat them for other occasions.
1
â
2
teaspoon finely grated or finely chopped lemon rind
1 small clove garlic, pressed or very finely minced (
1
â
4
teaspoon)
2 tablespoons minced fresh Italian parsley
4 medium carrots, sliced
1
â
2
pound green beans
2 teaspoons vegetable oil
Salt and freshly ground pepper, to taste
1.
For gremolata, combine lemon rind, garlic, and parsley in a small bowl and mix thoroughly with a fork. Cover and reserve at room temperature.
2.
Put carrots in a saucepan, cover with water, and bring to a simmer. Cook 5 minutes. Add green beans and cook together about 5 more minutes or until vegetables are just tender. Drain, reserving cooking liquid.
3.
If prepared in advance, reheat vegetables in a few tablespoons of their cooking liquid and drain again. Just before serving, sprinkle vegetables with oil and 1 tablespoon cooking liquid and toss until coated. Sprinkle with salt and pepper and toss again. Sprinkle with gremolata, cover and let stand 1 or 2 minutes before serving.
Carrot kugels appear often on the holiday tables of Ashkenazic Jews. Some are sweet, dense, and rich, almost like warm carrot cakes. This one is light and delicately sweetened with orange juice and brown sugar.
1
â
2
cup almonds
4 large eggs
1
â
2
cup brown sugar
6 medium carrots, coarsely grated (about 2
1
â
2
cups grated)
1 cup bread crumbs
Pinch of salt
1
â
3
cup orange juice
1
1
â
2
teaspoons grated orange rind
1.
Preheat oven to 350°F. Oil a 6- to 7-cup baking dish. Finely grind almonds in food processor or nut grinder.
2.
Beat eggs with sugar in a large bowl with an electric mixer until thick and light. Stir in grated carrots, almonds, bread crumbs, and salt. Add orange juice and rind and mix well.
3.
Spoon carrot mixture into baking dish. Bake about 30 minutes or until firm and golden brown. Serve hot or warm.
 or
Â
Made of pureed cooked carrots, these rich-tasting kugels lend an elegant note to dinners. Serve them in their baking dishes or turn them out onto plates. They're good as a side dish with any entree that you would pair with carrots.
You can make them dairy or pareve, according to whether you use butter and milk or pareve margarine and vegetable stock.
1 pound carrots, sliced
1 tablespoon butter or pareve margarine
Salt and freshly ground pepper, to taste
1
â
2
teaspoon sugar, or to taste
3 large eggs
1
â
2
cup milk or
1
â
3
cup vegetable stock
1.
Preheat oven to 400°F. Generously grease four
2
â
3
-cup ramekins. Put carrots in a saucepan, cover with water, and add a pinch of salt. Bring to a boil, cover, and cook over medium-low heat 15 minutes or until very tender. Drain well; you can reserve cooking liquid for vegetable stock. Puree carrots in food processor until smooth.
2.
Melt butter in saucepan. Add carrot puree and cook over low heat, stirring often, about 3 minutes or until puree is fairly dry. Remove from heat. Season with salt, pepper, and sugar.
3.
Whisk eggs with milk in a medium bowl. Gradually whisk in carrot puree. Divide mixture among ramekins. Tap each to pack down mixture. Smooth top. Set ramekins in a roasting pan in oven. Add enough boiling water to pan to come halfway up sides of ramekins. Bake 35 to 40 minutes or until firm; a cake tester inserted into mixture should come out clean. During baking add hot water to pan if most of it evaporates.
4.
With a slotted metal spatula, remove molds from water. Cool 3 minutes. If you wish to turn kugels out of molds, run thin-bladed, flexible knife around edge of one mold. Set small plate atop mold and invert both. Holding them together, tap them on towel-lined counter. Gently lift up mold. Repeat with remaining kugels. Serve hot or warm.
I sometimes follow the custom in some Ashkenazic kitchens and add parsnips to my chicken soup, as I like the flavor they contribute. Slowly cooked parsnips become sweet and, like many root vegetables, are good glazed. This dish is a good choice for Rosh Hashanah, especially if you're looking for a sweet vegetable to serve but you already have carrots on the menu in another dish.
1
1
â
2
pounds parsnips
Salt, to taste
1 tablespoon sugar
1 tablespoon honey
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1.
Cut parsnips into 2-inch lengths. Quarter any wide pieces (over
3
â
4
-inch in diameter) lengthwise. Trim any woody centers from the pieces.
2.
Put parsnips in a medium sauté pan and add 2
1
â
2
cups water or enough to barely cover them. Add salt, sugar, honey, and oil. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat to medium and simmer uncovered about 30 minutes or until largest pieces are very tender; stir once or twice during first 5 minutes, but afterwards shake pan to stir.
3.
When parsnips are tender, if too much liquid remains in pan, cook over medium-low heat, shaking pan often, 3 to 5 minutes or until liquid evaporates and parsnips become coated with a light glaze. Serve hot.
If you've never tasted roasted garlic, you'll be amazed at its flavor. The garlic becomes mellow, creamy, and slightly sweet.
Roasting garlic is very easy because you don't need to peel the garlic. You can roast whole heads or individual cloves. When it's ready, you simply squeeze the garlic pulp out of the skin. You can squeeze each clove or whole or halved heads. It's important to use very fresh, firm garlic; old garlic will taste terrible. Generally you roast whole heads to keep some roasted garlic on hand. It will keep 4 or 5 days in a covered dish in the refrigerator, or the pulp can be frozen. Roast individual cloves when you need just a few for a specific recipe.
Roasted garlic pulp or individual peeled cloves makes a delicious, if unusual, topping for Hanukkah potato latkes or turkey schnitzel. For light appetizers, you can spread it on toasted pita wedges or use to make garlic-tomato toasts. It's also terrific for livening up pareve mashed potatoes.
There is plenty of flexibility on the roasting temperature of garlic. The range varies from 250°F to 450°F. Some people even use the barbecue. I usually roast garlic at 400°F while I'm baking eggplants and roasting chickens. If you're baking something at 350°F (but not a cake), you can roast garlic in the same oven for about an hour.
4 large fresh heads garlic, unpeeled, or 10 to 40 individual cloves, or as many as you need
1 to 2 teaspoons extra-virgin olive oil (optional)
1.
Preheat oven to 400°F. Remove the loose layers of garlic peel.
2.
To roast whole heads: Cut a thin slice off the top of each head of garlic, about
1
â
4
-inch thick, removing the tips of the garlic cloves.
To roast individual cloves: Separate the cloves from the garlic head.
3.
Put 2 sheets of foil in a small, heavy roasting pan. Set garlic heads or cloves on the foil in 1 layer. Sprinkle garlic with olive oil, if using. Leaving garlic in one layer, wrap it in the 2 layers of foil. Set wrapped garlic in the roasting pan. Bake individual cloves about 30 minutes and whole heads 40 to 45 minutes, or until garlic is very soft. Let cool.
4.
To serve, you can separate garlic in cloves or serve garlic heads whole; each person will squeeze out his or her own garlic. You can squeeze the garlic pulp from the whole head, or cut the head in half horizontally and squeeze each half.
