Fast and Festive Meals for the Jewish Holidays: Complete Menus, Rituals, and Party-Planning Ideas for Every Holiday of the Year FROM OUR EDITORS
Along with history, rituals, perfect menus, and party-planning tips, this seasoned cookbook author has developed some wonderful quick meals for all of the Jewish holidays. Forgoing neither taste nor tradition, Marlene Sorosky moves the Jewish kitchen into the health- and time-conscious '90s.
FROM THE PUBLISHER
In Fast Festive Meals for the Jewish Holidays, author Marlene Sorosky takes away all the guesswork and provides the fundamentals for celebrating every Jewish holiday: An explanation of why celebrate the holiday; a list of all the essential religious items and foods you will need and, where appropriate, the primary blessings to be recited; a complete menu with kosher recipes full of flavor that keep preparation time to a minimum; and a Game Plan that clearly lays out all possibilities for advance preparation and gives you a what-to-do-now party countdown. Marlene covers all the holidays, as well as Shabbat and the celebrations of life's passages - brit milah, or baby naming, and bar or bat mitzvah. The recipes are a wonderful mix of the traditional, like haroset and how to roast an egg (for Passover), with new, lighter, easier twists on the traditional. In addition to recipes, Marlene's menus include ideas for memorable invitations and centerpieces (attach your invitation to a grager, or noisemaker, for a Purim masquerade gala; make a breadstick sukkah for the table at Sukkot); projects for the children (make an Elijah cup for Passover, a challah cover for Shabbat, or plant seeds to celebrate Tu B'Shevat, the New Year of the Trees), and interesting facts about the holidays.
SYNOPSIS
Simple, festive menus for the modern home cook who has little time but lots of enthusiasm for keeping up with Jewish traditions.
FROM THE CRITICS
Publishers Weekly
This good-natured volume from a veteran cookbook writer (Entertaining on the Run; Cooking for Entertaining, etc.) delivers just what its title promises: traditional Jewish dishes prepared for special occasions but created with a minimum of fuss. Sorosky offers relief from old favorites in the form of Salmon Gefilte Fish, Giant Potato-Carrot Pancake in place of latkes and Chocolate-Peanut Butter Hamantashen. She also excels at making expected-fare foods special with imaginative garnishes: plain Hummus is dressed up with a zucchini menorah featuring carrot candles and bell pepper flames, and a chocolate cake is decorated with a fringed marzipan tallit for a bar mitzvah dessert. Organized by holiday (including Israel Independence Day and Baby Namings), the book pays particular attention to kids and their holiday experience. Each chapter begins with a short description of the holiday, the rituals performed (prayers provided in English and transliterated Hebrew) and a section Sorosky calls "Extra Points," which includes ideas for centerpieces, clever invitations and table settings, many of which can be created by children. The chapter on Sukkot, for example, includes instructions for creating a sukkah out of breadsticks, and the one on Tu B'Shevat recommends having each child plant a seed in a small plastic cup. (Sept.)
Library Journal
Other holiday cookbooks cover some Jewish holidays, and other Jewish cookbooks include dishes for the holidays, but Sorosky provides menus for all the major holidays or holy days and some minor ones, as well as for a bar/bat mitzvah, Israel Independence Day, and other events. The author of several previous books on entertaining, she also offers decorating tips, ideas for kids' activities, and "game plans" and provides brief descriptions of the rituals involved, with appropriate blessings. Not every menu seems particularly "fast," but all the recipes include advance preparation suggestions, and many can be made well ahead. Recommended.
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