Rhapsody In Schmaltz

Author : Michael Wex
Publisher : Macmillan
ISBN 13 : 1250071518
Total Pages : 318 pages
Book Rating : 4.14/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Rhapsody in Schmaltz written by Michael Wex and published by Macmillan. This book was released on 2016-04-12 with total page 318 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Bagels, deli sandwiches and gefilte fish are only a few of the Jewish foods to have crossed into American culture and onto American plates. Rhapsody in Schmaltz traces the history and social impact of the cuisine that Yiddish-speaking Jews from Central and Eastern Europe brought to the U.S. and that their American descendants developed and refined. The book looks at how and where these dishes came to be, how they varied from region to region, the role they played in Jewish culture in Europe, and the role that they play in Jewish and more general American culture and foodways today. Rhapsody in Schmaltz traces the pathways of Jewish food from the Bible and Talmud, to Eastern Europe, to its popular landing pads in North America today. With an eye for detail and a healthy dose of humor, Michael Wex also examines how these impact modern culture, from temple to television. He looks at Diane Keaton's pastrami sandwich in Annie Hall, Andy Kaufman's stint as Latke on Taxi and Larry David's Passover seder on Curb Your Enthusiasm, shedding light on how Jewish food permeates our modern imaginations. Rhapsody in Schmaltz is a journey into the sociology, humor, history, and traditions of food and Judaism.

Author : Roger Horowitz
Publisher : Columbia University Press
ISBN 13 : 0231540930
Total Pages : 436 pages
Book Rating : 4.33/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Kosher USA written by Roger Horowitz and published by Columbia University Press. This book was released on 2016-04-12 with total page 436 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Kosher USA follows the fascinating journey of kosher food through the modern industrial food system. It recounts how iconic products such as Coca-Cola and Jell-O tried to become kosher; the contentious debates among rabbis over the incorporation of modern science into Jewish law; how Manischewitz wine became the first kosher product to win over non-Jewish consumers (principally African Americans); the techniques used by Orthodox rabbinical organizations to embed kosher requirements into food manufacturing; and the difficulties encountered by kosher meat and other kosher foods that fell outside the American culinary consensus. Kosher USA is filled with big personalities, rare archival finds, and surprising influences: the Atlanta rabbi Tobias Geffen, who made Coke kosher; the lay chemist and kosher-certification pioneer Abraham Goldstein; the kosher-meat magnate Harry Kassel; and the animal-rights advocate Temple Grandin, a strong supporter of shechita, or Jewish slaughtering practice. By exploring the complex encounter between ancient religious principles and modern industrial methods, Kosher USA adds a significant chapter to the story of Judaism's interaction with non-Jewish cultures and the history of modern Jewish American life as well as American foodways.

Author : Michael Wex
Publisher : Macmillan + ORM
ISBN 13 : 1429909900
Total Pages : 320 pages
Book Rating : 4.07/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Born to Kvetch written by Michael Wex and published by Macmillan + ORM. This book was released on 2007-04-01 with total page 320 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: As the main spoken language of the Jews for more than a thousand years, Yiddish has had plenty to lament, plenty to conceal. Its phrases, idioms, and expressions paint a comprehensive picture of the mind-set that enabled the Jews of Europe to survive a millennium of unrelenting persecution: they never stopped kvetching---about God, gentiles, children, food, and everything (and anything) else. They even learned how to smile through their kvetching and express satisfaction in the form of complaint. In Born to Kvetch, Michael Wex looks at the ingredients that went into this buffet of disenchantment and examines how they were mixed together to produce an almost limitless supply of striking idioms and withering curses (which get a chapter all to themselves). Born to Kvetch includes a wealth of material that's never appeared in English before. You'll find information on the Yiddish relationship to food, nature, divinity, and humanity. There's even a chapter about sex. This is no bobe mayse (cock-and-bull story) from a khokhem be-layle (idiot, literally a "sage at night" when no one's looking), but a serious yet fun and funny look at a language that both shaped and was shaped by those who spoke it. From tukhes to goy,meshugener to kvetch, Yiddish words have permeated and transformed English as well. Through the idioms, phrases, metaphors, and fascinating history of this kvetch-full tongue, Michael Wex gives us a moving and inspiring portrait of a people, and a language, in exile.

Author : Michael Wex
Publisher : St. Martin's Press
ISBN 13 : 1429919728
Total Pages : 332 pages
Book Rating : 4.22/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Just Say Nu written by Michael Wex and published by St. Martin's Press. This book was released on 2007-10-16 with total page 332 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A cross between Henry Beard's Latin for All Occasions and Ben Schott's Schott's Original Miscellany, JUST SAY NU is a practical guide to using Yiddish words and expressions in day-to-day situations. Along with enough grammar to enable readers to put together a comprehensible sentence and avoid embarrassing mistakes, Wex also explains the five most useful Yiddish words–shoyn, nu, epes, takeh,and nebakh–what they mean, how and when to use them, and how they can be used to conduct an entire conversation without anybody ever suspecting that the reader doesn't have the vaguest idea of what anyone is actually saying. Readers will learn how to shmooze their way through such activities as meeting and greeting; eating and drinking; praising and finding fault; maintaining personal hygiene; going to the doctor; driving; parenting; getting horoscopes; committing crimes; going to singles bars; having sex; talking politics and talking trash. Now that Stephen Colbert, a Catholic from South Carolina and host of the "Colbert Report," is using Yiddish to wish viewers a bright and happy Chanukah, people have finally started to realize that there's nothing in the world that can't be improved by translating it into Yiddish. Wex's JUST SAY NU is the book that's going to show them how.

Author : Nancy Kalikow Maxwell
Publisher : U of Nebraska Press
ISBN 13 : 0827617941
Total Pages : 344 pages
Book Rating : 4.40/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Typically Jewish written by Nancy Kalikow Maxwell and published by U of Nebraska Press. This book was released on 2019-03-01 with total page 344 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Is laughter essential to Jewish identity? Do Jews possess special radar for recognizing members of the tribe? Since Jews live longer and make love more often, why don’t more people join the tribe? “More deli than deity” writer Nancy Kalikow Maxwell poses many such questions in eight chapters—“Worrying,” “Kvelling,” “Dying,” “Noshing,” “Laughing,” “Detecting,” “Dwelling,” and “Joining”—exploring what it means to be “typically Jewish.” While unearthing answers from rabbis, researchers, and her assembled Jury on Jewishness (Jewish friends she roped into conversation), she—and we—make a variety of discoveries. For example: Jews worry about continuity, even though Rabbi Mordechai of Lechovitz prohibited even that: “All worrying is forbidden, except to worry that one is worried.” Kvell-worthy fact: About 75 percent of American Jews give to charity versus 63 percent of Americans as a whole. Since reciting Kaddish brought secular Jews to synagogue, the rabbis, aware of their captive audience, moved the prayer to the end of the service. Who’s Jewish? About a quarter of Nobel Prize winners, an estimated 80 percent of comedians at one point, and the winner of Nazi Germany’s Most Perfect Aryan Child Contest. Readers will enjoy learning about how Jews feel, think, act, love, and live. They’ll also schmooze as they use the book’s “Typically Jewish, Atypically Fun” discussion guide.

Author : Michael Wex
Publisher : Knopf Canada
ISBN 13 : 0307373185
Total Pages : 226 pages
Book Rating : 4.82/5 ( download)

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Download or read book How to Be a Mentsh (And Not a Shmuck) written by Michael Wex and published by Knopf Canada. This book was released on 2009-09-08 with total page 226 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Wise and hilarious, this is a book about happiness, your own and that of others. The principles outlined here will work for anyone, Jewish or not, who makes the effort to put them into practice. Drawing on the “wisdom of the ages,” bestselling author Michael Wex shows readers how to figure out the right thing to do in any situation. First he describes the two words “mentsh” and “shmuck.” The former refers most often to an adult who has learned to think of others first; the latter refers to someone who thinks he or she is someone special. In this book, you will learn how to keep yourself from believing you are someone special. You will learn how not to be a shmuck.

Author : Aaron S. Gross
Publisher : NYU Press
ISBN 13 : 1479827797
Total Pages : 400 pages
Book Rating : 4.94/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Feasting and Fasting written by Aaron S. Gross and published by NYU Press. This book was released on 2020-01-07 with total page 400 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How Judaism and food are intertwined Judaism is a religion that is enthusiastic about food. Jewish holidays are inevitably celebrated through eating particular foods, or around fasting and then eating particular foods. Through fasting, feasting, dining, and noshing, food infuses the rich traditions of Judaism into daily life. What do the complicated laws of kosher food mean to Jews? How does food in Jewish bellies shape the hearts and minds of Jews? What does the Jewish relationship with food teach us about Christianity, Islam, and religion itself? Can food shape the future of Judaism? Feasting and Fasting explores questions like these to offer an expansive look at how Judaism and food have been intertwined, both historically and today. It also grapples with the charged ethical debates about how food choices reflect competing Jewish values about community, animals, the natural world and the very meaning of being human. Encompassing historical, ethnographic, and theoretical viewpoints, and including contributions dedicated to the religious dimensions of foods including garlic, Crisco, peanut oil, and wine, the volume advances the state of both Jewish studies and religious studies scholarship on food. Bookended with a foreword by the Jewish historian Hasia Diner and an epilogue by the novelist and food activist Jonathan Safran Foer, Feasting and Fasting provides a resource for anyone who hungers to understand how food and religion intersect.

Author : Arthur R. Schwartz
Publisher : Random House Digital, Inc.
ISBN 13 : 1580088988
Total Pages : 290 pages
Book Rating : 4.85/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Arthur Schwartz's Jewish Home Cooking written by Arthur R. Schwartz and published by Random House Digital, Inc.. This book was released on 2008 with total page 290 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Presents a collection of recipes for authentic Jewish dishes, including appetizers, soups, side dishes, main dishes, Passover dishes, breads, and desserts.

Author : Michael Wex
Publisher : St. Martin's Press
ISBN 13 : 1466856211
Total Pages : 224 pages
Book Rating : 4.19/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Shlepping the Exile written by Michael Wex and published by St. Martin's Press. This book was released on 2014-02-18 with total page 224 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Svelte and supple as unleavened bread, Shlepping the Exile rends the shmaltz from Jewish fiction and replaces it with a pound of real flesh. It's the story of Yoine Levkes, a hassidic boy of the Canadian prairies, his refugee parents, and the Jewish community of Coalbanks, Alberta in the late 1950s. Confronted with dying people, an ailing culture, the perils of near-orphanhood and the allures of Sabina Mandelbroit, whose family doesn't keep the Sabbath, Yoine can no longer tell whether he's a human being or a loot-bag of conflicting traditions. He's too religious to be 'normal,' too 'normal' not to realize this, and too much of a kid to be able to make any sense of it. Shlepping the Exile is Michael Wex's inside portrait of orthodox, post-Holocaust Judaism in a place that it never expected to be.

Author : Jeffrey Yoskowitz
Publisher : Macmillan
ISBN 13 : 1250071380
Total Pages : 354 pages
Book Rating : 4.85/5 ( download)

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Download or read book The Gefilte Manifesto written by Jeffrey Yoskowitz and published by Macmillan. This book was released on 2016-09-13 with total page 354 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Jeffrey Yoskowitz and Liz Alpern are two of the leaders of the movement to revolutionise Ashkenazi cuisine. Together, they co-founded The Gefilteria in 2012, a Brooklyn-grown business that sets out to reimagine Jewish classics while championing Old World slow food techniques. Here in their first-ever cookbook including 100-plus recipes pulled deep from the culinary histories of Eastern Europe and the diaspora community of North America, they draw inspiration from the legacies of Jewish pickle shops, bakeries, appetising shops, dairy restaurants, delicatessens, and holiday kitchens. Tapping into the zeitgeist of rediscovering Old World food traditions like pickling, fermenting, and baking, at the heart of which are the values of resourcefulness and seasonality, The Gefilte Manifesto encourages anyone and everyone to incorporate healthy and vital Ashkenazi recipes into their everyday repertoire.