What is “Jewish” food?
Joan Nathan: I don’t think there’s Jewish food as much as there is a Jewish way of cooking. It’s the food of wandering, of finding ways to follow the dietary laws wherever you are. As Jews journeyed either as merchants or as exiles, we kept modifying and adapting the local cuisines to make them ours. And it’s still going on. If three members of a Moroccan family moved to Israel, France, and the U.S., pretty soon they’d be using different spices and taking different shortcuts and coming up with three different versions of the family recipes. Epicurious: How did you start writing about food? Joan Nathan: I’ve loved cooking since I was a kid: I even loved home economics. When I was 26 I went to Israel as the foreign press attaché for Jerusalem’s mayor, Teddy Kolleck, and was absolutely dazzled by what I tasted there, not only from Jews but also Christians and Muslims. Almost as a joke I sat down and wrote a book, The Flavor of Jerusalem. I never thought of it as a career, but it sold 25,0
It depends on if you mean “Jewish” in the sense of food that conforms to Judaism’s dietary laws, or “Jewish” in the sense of a style of cuisine. If you mean the former, the word you’re looking for is “kosher,” and kosher food is any food that is prepared in accordance with the Torah’s dietary laws, some of which are stated explicitly (and the rest alluded to) in scripture. Now, if you mean “Jewish food” as in “Jewish cuisine”… The truth is that the majority of “Jewish foods” were just regional specialties that for one reason or another became popular among Jews. Prepare them in a kosher way, and suddenly they’re Jewish food! Sometimes it’s the other way around – Jews invent a dish that catches on like wildfire in the community at large until it’s no longer thought of as a Jewish food. I think bagels were a Jewish invention, but they’re no longer thought of as inherently Jewish. Proof of this, I think, is the invention of the ham and cheese bagel sandwich. 🙂 Let’s take a VERY Jewish
