Milk Halwa for Rosh Hashanah
How A Mumbai Cook Prepares For Rosh Hashanah
Copyright ©ShulieMadnick |
How A Mumbai Cook Prepares For Rosh Hashanah
On the morning of Rosh Hashanah Eve 2016, I met Sharona Hayeems, a local Indian Jewish caterer, at her home in Dadar, a neighborhood in Mumbai where some of the remaining 4,500 Indian Jews in India still live. I was there to spend some time watching her cook for Rosh Hashanah.
I was introduced to Hayeems, a Bene Israel (Sons of Israel) Indian Jew, by the inimitable Elijah Jacob, the India executive director of the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (AJDC). Hayeems prepares kosher meals for Meals on Wheels, a program subsidized by the AJDC and Indian Joint Trust, which feeds the less fortunate in the Jewish community throughout the year, according to David Kumar, India AJDC welfare manager.
Lamb Biryani for An Indian Passover ( & Rosh HaShanah)
Chasing Challah in Mumbai
Copyright ©ShulieMadnick |
You can read How A Mumbai Cook Prepares For Rosh Hashanah from the Rosh HaShanah and High Holidays series.
Chasing Challah in Mumbai
It was the break of dawn on a Thursday, as the monsoon waned in late October that we descended from the skies over the slum rooftops and landed at Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport in Mumbai. My travel companion and I were then whisked off by our lovely Indian Jewish tour guide, Hanna Shapurkar, to Om Creations.
Om Creations is a nonprofit center where Down syndrome and autistic adults are taught arts and crafts and some culinary skills. The crafts and food are, in turn, sold as a means of support and income for the participants.
While still back home in the United States, planning my Jewish-Indian heritage discovery trip to India — my first trip to my parents' homeland — little did I know that I would be visiting Om Creations. What sparked my interest was an inconspicuous mention in an email correspondence from Elijah Jacob, India executive director of the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (JDC), about delivering challahs to the Indian-Jewish community in Mumbai. I was so intrigued that chasing challahs became the end-all and be-all of my trip to India.
Flavors of an Indian-Israeli Rosh Hashanah
Magen Hassidim Synagogue, Mumbai, India Copyright ©ShulieMadnick |
You can read How A Mumbai Cook Prepares For Rosh Hashanah and Chasing Challah in Mumbai from the Rosh HaShanah and High Holidays series. Recipes for both biryani and halwa will be published in separate posts.
Photography during the holidays is forbidden so I am sharing a snapshot of Magen Hassidim (above), my mom's synagogue in Mumbai, where I spent the 2016 High Holidays. This image, among others, is archived on The Museum of Jewish People's (בית התפוצות) library archives in Tel Aviv, Israel.
Flavors of an Indian-Israeli Rosh Hashanah
The first inkling that Rosh Hashanah was approaching when I was growing up was when my mom would come home to our fourth-floor walk-up apartment in Ashdod with Lily Pulitzer-like floral fabrics. I dreaded the frocks and matching hair bows that an Indian seamstress would sew us from the textiles. I would walk in the intense heat with my mom and my sister, who is a year younger than I, to the seamstress' home a few neighborhoods over for the measuring and fitting, and again for a second fitting and minor tweaks. My mom would definitively proclaim that the scraps and leftover fabrics "were enough" for my two youngest sisters' Rosh Hashanah gowns.
Marzipan Almond Challah Crown
Honey Challah
Honey Challah photography © ShulieMadnick |
Quince Challah Knots
Quince Challah Knots ©Shutterstock |
Date, Walnut, Silan and Sesame Challah
The Date, Walnut, Silan and Sesame Challah recipe originally appeared in Bonnie Benwick's "How to make your challah lovelier and sweeter for the Jewish New Year," published in The Washington Post on September 8, 2015. I am republishing the Date, Walnut, Silan and Sesame Challah recipe, with some edits, just in time for Rosh HaShanah 2021 falling on the eve of September 6 this year.
In the Marzipan Almond Challah Crown recipe and post I published recently, I shared some feel-good quotes and testimonials written by Bonnie in the article above. Here I would like to share some of the heartwarming feedback on the Date, Walnut, Silan, and Sesame Challah recipe shared by a reader who baked it:
In 2015:
"The Eastern Shore is a fancy food desert. I had no hope of finding silan out here, so I substituted golden raisins and walnuts. The bread came out great, and I also thank you for teaching me a new braiding technique. I usually do the long four-strand braid.
Tonight, I happen to be in Nashville, and there's a Middle Eastern market less than a mile from my hotel. So I went in there, showed the proprietor a picture of the product, and he took me to...a display of strawberry jam. Is it possible a Middle Easterner doesn't know what silan is? If someone here knows where in Maryland to get this stuff, maybe Wegmans, I'm all (virtual) ears. Nashville's Whole Foods didn't have it, either, which I was surprised at."
Quince Jam
Copyright ©ShulieMandick |