It started with a
"V” Vegetarian Sandwich Bar 1259 Park Avenue (between 97th and 98th), New York, NY 10029 Tel: (212)
Darna Restaurant 600 Columbus Ave. (corner 89th Street) New York Tel.: (212) 721-9123; http://www.darnanyc.com Open: Sun.-Thurs.: lunch, 11:30
Milk Street Cafe 50 Milk Street, Boston (Also at Norman B. Leventhal Park, at Post Office Square) 617-542-FOOD (3663) http://www.milkstreetcafe.com Kosher Open: 7am-3pm Walk through Boston’s financial district on a hot
379 Whalley Avenue New Haven, Connecticut Tel.: (203)
Taam Tov 41 West 47th Street, New York Tel. (212)
2026 Irving Street, San Francisco, Tel: (415) 731-2548, Open:
Jelly Belly Visitor Center and Factory Tour One Jelly Belly Lane Fairfield, California Tel.: 800-JB-BEANS Tour info: 800-953-5592 Free
2608 Broadway between 98th and 99th Streets, NY Tel.: (212) 865- 7334; http://www.la-creperie.com Open: Sun-Thurs: 11am-11pm Fri: 11am-2pm Sat: one hour after
Mendy’s Grand Central Station (Lower Level Dining Concourse), NY Mendy’s Dairy and Appetizers: 7am-5:45pm, Sunday 7:30am- 3pm Mendy’s Kosher Deli: 10:30am- 8:45pm, Sundays till 6pm Closed on Shabbat Tel: (212)
Streit’s Matzos Factory Store, 150 Rivington Street, New York, Tel: (212) 677-0876, http://www.matzofiles.org, Hours:
At 6am on a recent Sunday morning, a group of us grabbed mountain bikes, helmets and water bottles and set out from Palmer, Massachusetts for Quabbin Reservoir, 10 miles northwest of us. We rode past the local airport, through the town of Belchertown, alongside Doug’s Taxidermy and Archery shop and… Read more...
921 Reisterstown Road, Baltimore, Maryland Tel: (410) 580-1400; http://www.cafe921.com Open: Sun.-Thurs.: 11am - 9pm, Fri.: 11am- 1:30pm in winter; 11am-2:30pm in summer; Saturday: 1 hour after Shabbat; kosher Baltimore natives fondly remember 921 Reisterstown Road as home of the… Read more...
This Jewish year, with its two Adars, affords aficionados of hamentaschen (Haman’s pocket, in Yiddish; in Hebrew, the goodies are called oznei Haman, or Haman’s ears) an extra month to contemplate and seek out the perfect
In honor of George Washington’s birthday on February 22, I ran an Internet search on the relationship between the first president and the Jews, and found some interesting results. For a good overview of Washington’s life, including the apocryphal “I cannot tell a lie” cherry tree story, it is… Read more...
When I was a kid, Tu Bishvat meant putting money in the Jewish National Fund pushke, singing “Hashkediah Porahat” (The Almond Tree Is Blooming) and eating almonds from Israel, or trying to avoid breaking teeth on dried carobs. The Internet has widened the options for observing the New Year of the… Read more...
In spite of the romanticized nature of his images, or perhaps because of it, it is David Roberts’s
69-66 Main Street, Flushing, New York Tel: (718)
153 East 53rd Street, corner of Lexington Avenue, at the sunken plaza of Citigroup Center, Manhattan. “Which building do you work in?” asks Avraham Matayav, the friendly,
Why do Israelis call the night of December 31, which most of us call New Year’s Eve, Sylvester? If you don’t know, you’re not alone. Rabbi Jeremy Rosen didn’t either. Rosen confesses his ignorance at http://www.somethingjewish.co.uk “Having been brought up in… Read more...
I have always been intrigued by the idea of pirsumei nisa, or “publicizing the miracle,” on Hanukkah. During my college year of study in Israel, I loved walking through the Jewish Quarter of Jerusalem, where every window ledge was occupied by a flickering Hanukkah menorah, usually oil-burning, at… Read more...
The number 350 is all the rage among North American Jews these days, as the community observes it 350th anniversary. The first U.S. Jews, as most of us know, were New Yorkers, who arrived in what was then New Amsterdam from Recife, Brazil, in 1654. The main clearinghouse for anniversary events… Read more...
In my Baltimore grade school, we learned the mnemonic “In fourteen hundred and ninety-two, Columbus sailed the ocean blue.” In Hebrew school, we learned that was the year the Jews were expelled from Spain. Nobody then, however, told us about an ongoing discussion over the years on the connection… Read more...
Members of the Israeli Olympic team and their fans who make the trip to Athens can use the Internet to find a synagogue if they deem it necessary to pray before events and give thanks for the outcome, or to locate some traditional Greek kosher cuisine in Athens. Probably the best place to start is… Read more...
Outside of Israel, it is nearly impossible to be 100 percent
Asking most Jews about fast days will produce mentions of Yom Kippur, and perhaps Tisha Be’av as well. Not so many know about 17 Tammuz (July 6 this year), which traditionally marks the anniversary of many Jewish calamities. An easy-to-find register of those historical horrors, at… Read more...
Once upon a time, “You’ve got mail” meant that the postman actually delivered a letter to your home mailbox. I remember the excitement when someone actually sent a letter from a foreign country! Once, my bubbeh gave me an envelope from a distant cousin in Argentina, and a postcard from an aunt from… Read more...
Pongal 110 Lexington Ave., Manhattan, (212)
Anne Frank would have been 75 this year, had she survived. When I put her name into a search at http://www.google.com I got exactly 4,930,000 hits. Mining this abundance of material on her and her diary is an appropriate way, for Internet freaks and others, to mark Holocaust Memorial Day which… Read more...
ACCORDING TO A MIDRASH, THE JEWS WERE redeemed from bondage in Egypt because they retained their Hebrew names. These days, Jewish kids outside Israel aren’t given Hebrew names in addition to their Bradleys or Brittneys as a matter of course, as they were once - unless, of course, they’re called… Read more...
Ask an American Jew in his 40s or older to name his most memorable Jewish experience, and there’s a good chance he’ll say Sandy Koufax sitting out the first game of the 1965 World Series on Yom Kippur. Ask the same man how many Jews have ever played Major League baseball and he’ll have a hard time… Read more...
Maccabiah sports competitions were a highlight for many of us in our Jewish summer camp days. Some of those camp athletes went on to compete against others in the Maccabiah Games, and most Israelis root for Maccabi Tel Aviv, one of Europe’s top basketball teams. The association of the Maccabee… Read more...
In these troubles times, with
Relentless Israeli tennis player Anna Pistolesi, nee Smashnova, is racking up the wins, mostly Howard Blas New Haven Just before the U.S. Open in Flushing Meadows in late August, Anna Pistolesi faced the world’s No. 14 player, Vera Zvonereva of Russia, in the second round of the Pilot Pen… Read more...
Madonna is not the fist singer to write a children’s book but she’s probably the first to name a character “Bina” - “understanding” in Hebrew. In “The English Roses,” the four other main characters are jealous of the
It’s the Wednesday afternoon before the Shabbat of my student’s bar mitzvah. Jake has been working hard for the past hour and a half, quietly reading his sermon and loudly belting out songs as Cantor Lisa Hest accompanies him on the guitar. Jake is a young man with a range of special needs, and… Read more...
The only time my Bubbeh ever took a break from preparing heavy fleishig (meat) holiday food was on Shavuot. Admittedly, some Jews (mainly Sephardim) do eat meat that day, as they would on any other holiday, since dairy is not considered very festive. Others, to satisfy all opinions, eat a dairy… Read more...
Our small group of campers from the Tikvah ("Hope”) Program of Camp Ramah in New England had planned a
When it comes to our children’s education, most of us accept the sad fact that what we get is what we get. But once in a while, we have an opportunity to step back and assess what our children actually know. As was the case when many kids stayed home during the Scud missile threat in Israel, or… Read more...
When I was growing up, the only connection Jews had with China was through food; a Chinese restaurant was the perfect place for Jews to go on Christmas Day and just after Pesah, when the holiday dishes still hadn’t been put away. Today Jews can learn about China - - and even plan a trip there --… Read more...
It took two great Zionist thinkers, pioneering farmers, brave soldiers and wads of cash to put the modern State of Israel on the map. But a few pranksters were able to take it off. I’m referring to a recent
Sarajevo: Dating from
515 Amsterdam between 84th and 85th Streets (kosher) Tel.: (212) 787-6008, http://www.alibabany.com Yemenit Israeli Moshe Harizy came to New York 19 years ago, opened a stationery store, and started an Upper West Side
’Buy Israeli’ fairs, for shoppers who won’t make the trip to Jerusalem or Tel Aviv this year, are sweeping America New York — Merchants from Jerusalem’s
Entering a New York City taxi cab, more information than one might want awaits the astute fare. With one breath, you can tell if the driver smokes; with one ear, you can tell if he’s a traffic-and- weather junkie, a Christian radio devotee or a jazz maven. The first thing I look for is the name of… Read more...
Muslims account for about a fifth of the kosher food sales in the United States. But while Jewish dietary laws are similar to Islamic halal - there are some obstacles to
Teacha! Stories from a Yeshiva By Gery Albarelli Glad Day Books 104pp.; $10.95, Strange Bedfellows: An
The
Putting a mezuzah on the doll’s house is just one of many ways to turn your home into ‘Jewish space’ Maybe you can’t judge a book by its cover, or even by its title, but that didn’t stop fellow riders on several Manhattan buses and subways from offering their comments about Anita Diamant’s new… Read more...