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Hanukkah Candle Lighting Video Night 1
Where in the world is Rabbi Baum? Check out the first of our 8 nights of candle lighting videos for Hanukkah!
Hanukkah 2009 Snuck Up On Me
Okay, I’m not ready for Hanukkah. I haven’t bought one gift, sent one card, or done as much work to get ready for the holiday as I would have liked. But, ready or not, here it comes!
Hanukkah 2009 begins on Friday evening December 11th and lasts for 8 days. Regardless of how you spell Hanukkah – Chanukah – Hanuka – we’ve got tons of stuff for you!
Each night of Hanukkah this year we’ll be posting a new video of a candle lighting. It will be – where in the world is Rabbi Baum? I’ll be lighting the menorah in lots of cool places – and hope you’ll watch the videos as you celebrate Hanukkah. We also want photos of your Hanukkah celebrations. Please upload 1 or 2 to our Facebook wall - whether you’re opening gifts, lighting the menorah, playing dreidel, eating potato pancakes – or whatever!
Speaking of Hanukkah and Facebook, we’ve got an awesome new Hanukkah gift you can send to all your Facebook friends by clicking on the “Share Us” tab on our Facebook Fan page.
For Hanukkah 101 basics, click here. For Hanukkah video podcasts covering everything from historical views to the myth of Hanukkah to edible Hanukkah treats to food, sex, and Hanukkah to many ways to light the Hanukkah candles to a new spin on Hanukkah – check them out!
For the young and young at heart, check out this page. It has menorah coloring pages and dreidel coloring pages. There are some fun Hanukkah art projects too like latke flippers, Hanukkah fortune tellers, crossword puzzles, and word searches. There’s also a fun Hanukkah children’s story called the Forgotten Hanukiyah.
Check out this healthy latke (potato pancake) recipe from Hungry Girl. Yum!
For those of you who are in the same boat as I am and haven’t bought cards to send, click here now and send a Hanukkah ecard or interfaith ecard!
Guest Blog by Andrea Marks Carneiro: Hanukkah, Food, and Flourless Latkes
Below is a guest blog, from Andrea Marks Carneiro. Enjoy!
Over the past few months of promoting my book, Jewish Cooking Boot Camp: The Modern Girl’s Guide to Cooking Like a Jewish Grandmother
For my family holidays have always been more about well…family than anything else. While the years have seen our temple attendance slow and our gatherings tend more towards toddlers than adults, we nonetheless never skip a holiday celebration—whether that means elaborate dinner, bagel break-the-fast, traditional seder or simple brisket. But for some reason all of that simplicity and kid-friendly planning goes out the window when December rolls around. In fact, for the past ten (or more…oy!) years my parents have played host to an influx of northern guests during what’s become a yearly Marks tradition: The Chanukah Party.
It all started when I was living in Manhattan and would come home for the holidays bearing gifts, wild stories, and a gaggle of girlfriends who would effectively take over my parents home. We would spend all night on South Beach and all day alternating our time between the pool, the sun and the kitchen. My mom would make a huge (HUGE) dinner of brisket, veggies, salad and more latkes (potato pancakes) than we could ever possibly consume, we would make pitchers of drinks (Cosmopolitans one year, sangria the next…) and we would all sit around my parents dining room table and talk and laugh and eat and drink. It was the best part of our vacation.
I eventually left New York to return to Miami. My friends… well they never stopped coming for Chanukah. Even today they return every year (actual Blackberry Messenger message I received this morning: “Is Roz making latkes for us?”), and every year we return to my parents’ house for brisket and latkes and drinks and fun. We’ve added husbands and boyfriends and babies, but the silliness and sharing and love never leave. Forget the material gifts, we now leave those for the babies anyway. The best gift I get every Chanukah is the time I get to spend with my best friends. And that’s why I love it.
Since my friends’ devotion to these latkes was truly what sparked the book, I’ve shared the recipe below. Happy Holidays!
Flourless Potato Pancakes
Serves: 10-12 people (or more)
Prep Time: 45 minutes
Cooking Time: 45 minutes
12 –13 medium Idaho russet potatoes
1 large onion
4 eggs
Vegetable oil
Salt
Peel potatoes .
TIP: Keep potatoes in ice cold water to keep them from turning brown.
Grate the potatoes in a Cuisinart.
Grate the onion in the Cuisinart.
Mix together and add 4 eggs.
Pour vegetable oil into a large skillet, enough to fill the pan about one-eighth of the way up the sides. Heat the oil over medium-high heat.
TIP: Splash a drop of water into the oil, if it sizzles the oil is ready!
Drop the potato mixture (one large tablespoonful per latke) into the hot oil and fry until golden brown and crisp (about 3 to 4 minutes per side). Cook 3 or 4 in a batch.
Always make sure you have enough oil in the pan. After about 2 batches you will probably need to add oil.
When browned and crisp remove the latkes and place them on a brown paper bag to drain excess oil.
Sprinkle with salt to taste and serve.
If made a little ahead of time place on cookie sheet in oven at 400-425 until ready to serve.
TIP: The ratio of eggs per potatoes is 2 eggs for every 6 or 7 potatoes. If making for smaller group use 5 or 6 potatoes, 2 eggs and ½ of a large onion or 1 small onion.
Will Chelsea Clinton Convert? A Silly Conversation
A recent article in the Daily Beast asks the question, “Will Chelsea Convert?” That would be Chelsea Clinton, of course. Chelsea is Methodist and has recently become engaged to Marc Mezvinsky, a “nice Jewish boy.”
Rabbi David Wolpe is quoted in the article saying “As a rabbi, I would be delighted to see Chelsea convert. That would be my dream scenario.” I have to wonder why the rabbi feels that way. Certainly, if Chelsea wants to convert and has good reasons for her decision, I would welcome her into the Jewish community with open arms. But to say that’s a dream scenario – I’m skeptical.
First of all, why is there any conversation that someone must convert? It seems to me that there are many happy interfaith families that have wonderful family lives and religious experiences.
And if there is such a conversation about someone needing to convert, why is the conversation focused on whether Chelsea should convert and not whether her fiancé should leave Judaism for Christianity? Is this a gender inequality issue – women are weaker or less significant so they should be the ones to change for their man? Is this no different than the expectation that women should change their name when they get married – they should now change their religion too?
Or, is it that in the eyes of a Conservative rabbi like Rabbi Wolpe, the children will only be considered Jewish if they are born to a Jewish woman? While I believe strongly that both matrilineal and patrilineal descent make someone Jewish, there are other rabbis who do not share my view. I have a hard time with that – it seems to me that having at least one Jewish parent and being raised in a Jewish home should make someone Jewish. I would hate to tell a child that they are somehow not Jewish or less Jewish because their mom never went through a formal conversion – though she has taught her child about Judaism and provided Jewish experiences.
The big questions Chelsea and Marc should be asking now are not “should she convert?” The big questions are: What are our shared values? What kind of home will we create? If we choose to have children, how will we raise them? What traditions do we want to maintain from our families of origins and which traditions are we going to create or recreate for ourselves?
If Chelsea decides to convert to Judaism, great. If she doesn’t, great. We will be happy to support Chelsea and Marc in whatever they choose. The choice is theirs – and the conversations they can have may be quite meaningful.
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