Jonathan Gold on eating your entire city
The first question I asked Jonathan Gold after watching “City of Gold,” the new documentary about his life, was basically this: Did you set out to change Los Angeles, or just to find the best tacos? In the film about the Los Angeles Times food critic, the food Gold has spent a lifetime uncovering gets […]
Kombucha lessons
Over the winter holiday, I got really good at making kombucha. I did my online research, copied and pasted a basic recipe from a website called thekitchn.com, then began riffing on my own flavors. Ginger-honey, pear-lime, pomegranate, verbena-kalamansi. I picked most of the fruits from trees in our yard — they don’t call it homebrew […]
There Will Be (lamb's) Blood
The night before the slaughter, the goat appeared in my dreams, crying. I awoke, startled, at 3 a.m., then tried to go back to sleep. But when I closed my eyes, I saw the damn goat. This time it was curled up, asleep in its barn, unaware that in just a few hours, a rabbi […]
There will be blood
Eat more cholent
My resolution for the New Year is to make more cholent. Cholent is the traditional Sabbath stew, assembled and put in the oven (or on the stove, or in a crock pot) on Friday before the Sabbath, then cooked at a low temperature until Sabbath lunch. I made one this past Shabbat. We’ve been exiled […]
Katsuji Tanabe takes 'Chopped!'
Katsuji Tanabe is the onion of kosher chefs– every time you think you've figured him out, you find there;'s a whole other layer. Tonight Katsuji held a party at the Mexican Consulate near downtown Los Angeles to screen the episode of the Food Network show, “Chopped!” on which he appears as a contestant. I first […]
Lenny's Deli steps in to fill the Juniors void
Last night after seeing a movie at what seems to be the cultural center of West Los Angeles Jewish life — the Landmark Theatres at the Westside Pavilion — we walked over to the new Lenny's Deli. Lenny's filled the void left by Juniors — and I'm talking about a literal void. Juniors was 11,000 […]
The Word of the Day Is Knaidel
How do you spell knaidel? M-a-t-z-o-h B-a-l-l. The word that 13 year-old Arvind Mahankali from Queens, NY spelled to clinch the 2013 Scripps National Spelling Bee championship last night is German for a small mass of dough. But its most common meaning in America is matzo ball. Normally the word, which is German and Yiddish, […]
7 Rules for Perfect Hummus
When was the last time you opened a tub of hummus and swooned? When was the last time a restaurant put a plate of hummus in front of you, and you said, “Oh my God.” Most of the hummus recipes you come across on web sites, in print, on YouTube—they’re just wrong. Most of the […]
Israel à la Tarte Tatin
Restaurants have souls. It comes across as much in the food as in the feeling you get from being there. You don’t find it out from the advertising. Otherwise every time you ate in an Applebee’s you’d feel comfy and at home, instead of bored and dissatisfied. You don’t discover it in the marketing. Otherwise […]