To commemorate the miracle of Hanuka, throughout the 8 days of the festival, Jewish families eat latkes (fried potato pancakes) and sufganiot (filled donuts). But who said we have to eat only this? Try something different this Hanukah. Go Japanese! Dip delicate vegetables into a Tempura batter and deep fry until golden.
Eat banana fritters anytime but, in keeping with the tradition of eating fried food on Hanukkah, you might want to try this really simple yet appealing desert. Your guests will be delighted, after all, who does not like bananas? In keeping with kosher dietary laws, these banana fritters can be made either parev or dairy. For the dairy version use milk and for the parev version use water. If you use a milk substitute like soya milk, almond or rice milk, you can expect a slightly different flavour result and you may need to increase or reduce the amount salt or sugar according to your taste.
Into a small bowl sift flour, sugar, baking powder and salt. In another small bowl, beat eggs, milk and oil together with a rotary beater or whisk.
Combine liquid ingredients with dry ingredients; stir until all flour is moistened.
Slice bananas in half lengthwise; with your fingers, dip the bananas into the batter. Drain any excess batter. Drop bananas into at least 2 inches hot oil in a deep -skillet or deep-fat fryer. Fry a few at a time, turning once, 2 to 3 minutes or until golden brown.
Drain on paper towels. Serve immediately, sprinkled with confectioners’ sugar.
Chef’s Tips
Great served with vanilla ice-cream and caramel sauce too!
Melted ‘Mars Bars’ make a delicious chocolate and caramel sauce
Hanukkah (or anytime) Sweetcorn fritters to sink your teeth into.
Hebrew: לביבות תירס מטוגן
Originating in Native American cuisine, sweetcorn fritters are a traditional sweet and savory snack made from ground corn.
Corn fritters are also a staple in Indonesian cuisine where they are savory and not sweet. They have a more granulated texture, as the corn kernels are not ground and so they retain their kernel shapes. The Indonesian fritter is made from fresh corn kernels, wheat flour, rice flour, celery, scallion, eggs, shallots, garlic, salt and pepper, and deep fried in coconut oil. They are a popular snack and are often served as an appetizer.
Our recipe for sweetcorn fritters uses whole corn kernels and not ground.
75ml oz milk or milk substitute or water to make a parev version
350g sweetcorn kernels (if using tinned, drain well)
6 finely chopped spring onions (optional)
125-150ml vegetable oil, for frying (not olive)
Preparation
Mix the flour, baking powder, salt and freshly ground black pepper, paprika and sugar together in a bowl.
In a separate bowl, beat the eggs and milk/water together. Gradually add the egg and milk/water mixture to the dry ingredients and combine to form a batter.
Place the sweetcorn kernels and spring onions into a separate bowl and add just enough batter to the mix to bind them.
Heat the oil in a frying pan, and drop in a tablespoonful of the mix. Cook for two minutes on each side, drain on kitchen paper and keep warm until ready to serve.
Chef’s Tip
Served with a salad, sweetcorn fritters make a nice, light, nutritious lunch for the kids when they come back from school. They’re also fun to serve on Hanukkah as an alternative to traditional potato latkes.
Simply delicious, these sweet potato fritters will wow your guests. Enjoy them all year round, and especially at Hanukkah, as an accompaniment to soups or even with your favorite roast.
Mix together the potatoes, onions, flour, eggs, salt, and pepper.
Heat oil in a deep 12-inch nonstick skillet over moderately high heat until hot but not smoking.
Working in small batches, spoon a heaped tablespoon of the mixture into the hot oil, flatten the latke, with a fork, so that is around 3 inches in diameter.
Reduce heat to moderate and cook until golden, about 1 1/2 minutes on each side.
Transfer the latkes with a slotted spoon to paper towels so that the excess oil is drained.
Chef’s Tip
Serve with a plain yogurt flavored, apple sauce or cinnamon and sugar
Recipe easy zucchini fritters which make for a light summer meal. You can also use this recipe during Hanukah as an alternative to potato latkes and other fried foods traditionally eaten during the festival.
Zucchini fritters ideal for a light summer meal or on Hanukkah
Ingredients
2 large zucchini
1 cup ground flax seeds
1 medium onion
2 eggs
Salt and black pepper to taste
1 inch oil in a skillet or frying pan
Directions
1. Peel the zucchini and grate it into a bowl.
2. Once you have grated the zucchini, squeeze out the liquid as well as you can (you can put a cloth over it and squeeze, though I personally like to squeeze it in my hands and put it into a separate bowl once it’s been squeezed. The more you can squeeze, the better the mixture will be).
3. Grate the onion into the bowl with the zucchini. Add the eggs, flax seed and salt and pepper. Mix thoroughly.
4. Heat the oil in the frying pan. Spoon a small amount of the mixture into the oil. Continue to do so until all are gone (I make 10 latkes from this).
5. Flip the latkes to the other side. When it seems firm, remove and drain on paper towels.
Chefs Tips
Squeeze the water out of the zucchini as it has an extremely high in water content. The flax seeds aid in absorbing the excess liquid. The latkes can be served with sour cream, apple sauce or smooth white cheese
To make apple sauce:– Peel and core several apples, slice them up and put them in boiling water for around half an hour to an hour (test them to see how soft they are). Drain the excess liquid and then put them through a blender. There is no need to add sweetener, but if you want you can add sugar, honey, silan or an artificial sweetener for a lo-calorie alternative. If you don’t have time for this you can buy ready-made applesauce in the supermarket and then just adjust the flavor to your liking.
Do not over-mash the cauliflower. Leave some of it chunky
Use matzo meal to make this recipe during Pesach
Add a little chopped parsley and green onion to the mixture for variation
Add a little garam masala and ground turmeric for Indian Cauliflower fritters
For a Mediterranean version, Yotam Ottolenghi suggests adding a little cumin, turmeric and cinnamon served yoghurt to which lemon or lime zest have been added.
Honey Cake – A Traditional Favorite for Rosh Hashanah
Hebrew: עוגת דבש
I like honey cake to be moist and remain so even a few days after baking — it should only last that long! I love the aromas emanating from the oven during baking, and even more so, I love a slice of honey cake with my early morning coffee topped with a layer of soft butter.
For an added dimension of flavor, I add 5 ml of ground ginger and nutmeg to the batter.
Make two cake loaves and freeze one of them for breaking the fast on Yom Kippur
Julia Child’s recipes gained popularity after the movie Julie & Julia. From her book “Mastering the Art of French Cooking – comes this recipe for Pouding Alsacien (Gratin of Sautéed Apples). Some recipes in her cookbook are complicated, but this one is easy to follow and quite delicious.
You can make a Parev version of this recipe by swapping the butter with Parev margarine.
Ingredients 7 cups cored and peel apple slices 4 – 5 tablespoons butter to sauté the apples (or parev margarine) ¾ cup plum jam (forced through a sieve) 2 tablespoons rum 4 tablespoons butter (parev margarine) ½ cup sugar 3 egg yolks 1 tablespoon flour ½ tsp. cinnamon 1 cup bread crumbs 2 egg whites Pinch of salt ½ tablespoon sugar Powdered sugar
Directions 1. Preheat the oven to 325C degrees F/160. Lightly butter a 9×9 baking dish 2. Melt 4 – 5 tablespoons butter/margarine in a skillet. Sauté the apples, one layer at a time, in the hot butter until they are very lightly browned on both sides and tender, but retain their shape. As they are done, place them in the baking dish. 3. Melt the plum jam in the skillet with the rum. Delicately fold into the apples, and smooth the apples in the dish. 4. Cream the butter and sugar together in a mixing bowl until light and fluffy. Beat in the egg yolks, then the flour and cinnamon, then the bread crumbs. 5. Beat the egg whites and salt until soft peaks form. Sprinkle in the sugar and beat until stiff peaks are formed. Fold the egg whites into the bread-crumb mixture and spread evenly over the apples. 6. Bake for 20 – 25 minutes or until the top has puffed slightly and has just begun to color. 7. Sprinkle liberally with powdered sugar and continue baking another 20 – 25 minutes. The top should be golden brown under the sugar. 8. Allow to cool.
Chef’s Tip Serve the dessert with whipped cream or vanilla ice-cream
Cream or ice-cream with this apple crumble recipe.
We all love Jamie Oliver. He makes everything look so quick and easy. This recipe is as easy as pie (no pun intended) and there is very little washing up afterwards. He uses oats for the crumble which makes a healthy change.
This classic apple dessert is served warm. It serves 2 so remember to double or triple quantities if you need more.
35 g rolled oats (commonly referred to as ‘Kvaker’ in Hebrew)
35 g whole meal flour (plain flour works too)
20 g caster sugar (powdered sugar that has no added cornstarch)
35 g butter or parev margarine
For the filling you’ll need
400 g of cooking apples cut into even-sized cubes (green Granny Smiths are great).
50 g caster sugar
Directions
Preheat the oven to 190°C/375°F. Peel and core the apples, quarter and cut in to chunks.
Put the apples into a pan with the sugar and water. Cook over a low heat for 5 minutes and place in a small ovenproof dish.
Place the flour and oats in a bowl and mix well. Cut the margarine or butter into small cubes and add this to the oats and flour. Mix with your fingertips until it resembles an even crumb texture. Add the sugar and mix through.
Cover the fruit with the crumble mixture. Bake for approximately 20 minutes until the crumble is golden and the apple hot.
Chef’s Tip
For a more complex flavor add a dash of cinnamon. You can also add one tsp of lemon zest to the apples while they are cooking.
For individual servings, place the apples and crumble mixture in ovenproof ramekins
Serve with cream, vanilla ice-cream or parev cream-whip
While sorting through some stuff in my pre-aliyah downsize, I came across one of first recipe books my mother bought as a young bride – “The Jewish Cook Book – International Cooking According to the Dietary Laws” by Mildred Grosberg-Bellin, published in 1958. The recipes are quite old fashioned, but if you sort through them, there are some timeless favorites. Twenty pages of this book are devoted to kashrut laws, cooking techniques, suggestions and tips. Most of the recipes in this book are basic and not difficult to prepare.
In the Rosh Hashanah dessert section of the recipe book, the apple fritters looked quite do-able for the average cook and not very time consuming.
2 eggs, well beaten
1 cup milk (or water, or milk substitute for a parev version)
1/2 cups sifted all purpose flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1 tbsp sugar
Oil for frying
Directions
Mix egg and milk/water.
Sift flour, baking powder, salt and sugar together. Slowly add to the egg mixture. Do not over stir.
Peel and core 4 large, tart apples (Granny Smith’s are great!). Cut into 1/2 inch slices and coat each slice completely with the batter.
Fry a few at a time in deep, hot oil until they are deep brown in color. Drain well.
Serve with sifted confectioner’s sugar, honey or silan (date syrup).
Chef’s Tip
For added flavor, first soak the fruit in a mixture of 1/2 cup of sherry and 2 tbsp sugar. Drain well before dipping into the batter.
To commemorate the miracle of Hanuka, throughout the 8 days of the festival, Jewish families eat latkes (fried potato pancakes) and sufganiot (filled donuts). But who said we have to eat only this? Try something different this Hanukah. Go Japanese! Dip delicate vegetables into a Tempura batter and deep fry until golden.
