20
MY
ROUSES
EVERYDAY
NOVEMBER | DECEMBER 2013
T
here are fewer joys for Jewish families across the globe than
the sights, sounds and smells of the family kitchen during
holidays. And every year, during the late fall/early winter,
that means eight wonderful nights of Hanukkah food.
Hanukkah celebrations involve a number of rituals, including
lighting the
menorah
, saying special prayers, and spinning the
dreidel
. And while Jews all over the world celebrate the holiday
with myriad recipes (in Venice, Italy, for instance, Jewish families
cook a lot of spinach during Hanukkah), maybe the best known
food during the Festival of Lights is
latkes
.
Ah, yes, the wonderful, hot, crispy, expertly fried potato latke. Better
than hash browns, superior even to the beloved french fry. It’s a
thing of wonder and beauty, and every year I can’t wait to stand in
the kitchen with my mother and cook them up to a lovely golden
brown, with that wonderfully fluffy interior. It seems like every
Jewish cook has their own particular method for making the perfect
latke, much in the way that most Louisiana cooks seem to have
their own unique way of making a roux.
Generally speaking, the starchier the potato, the crispier they’ll get
when you fry them up. Russet and Yukon Gold potatoes are both
great for latkes, and many people enjoy using sweet potatoes as well,
though you might want to steer clear of “boiling potatoes,” since
they have less starch, and no one likes a mushy latke! Once you’ve
selected your potatoes and coarsely shredded them, a good trick is
to press as much of the water out of them as possible — you can lay
them out between a pair of sheet trays lined with paper towels, and
then put your heaviest pots on top to squeeze out the moisture. The
dryer the potatoes are, the better the latkes will fry up.
After you’ve duly pressed your potatoes, you can fold in some
beaten egg to make the batter, along with a little salt and lemon
juice. I love adding in some chopped scallions, as well. Then it’s
time to hand-form them roughly into latke-sized balls and fry them
Celebrating Hanukkah
by
Scott Gold +
photos by
Denny Culbert
