Happy weekend! Shabbat shalom! And happy Purim!
Purim is a Jewish holiday and starts tonight, and goes into Sunday. Esther is the central hero of the story due to her strength of character, determination, and expert political lobbying. The root of her name means “hiddenness,” and it isn’t even her birth name. To save herself and her people, she sheds her name, Hadas, and becomes disguised as Esther. The whole story is one of hidden miracles – God doesn’t appear in the story with lightning strikes and thunder claps, but miracles happen through the hard work, risk, and bravery of good people. Oh, and a little bit of luck!
In times like these of political turmoil and bombastic shows of force, it is easy to overlook the quiet, hidden, human miracles. The safeguarding of knowledge in the face of violence and ignorance. The rebuilding of what was broken and defiled. Unity in the face of vile discord. Resistance through love for the stranger.
But how does this apply to insanely rich vegan hamantaschen cookies? Dang, just get to the recipe already!
For the last two weeks I have bombarded you with glamor shots of hamantaschen. The best vegan poppy seed-stuffed ones! VERY not-vegan tender, flaky, butter ones! Here’s another one to make you drool! These are 100% vegan, just like my previously published recipe for poppy seed-stuffed ones, and are stuffed with decadent chocolate-sesame paste! Check out the recipe over on Food52, and enjoy the roundup below!
- I still haven’t conquered gluten-free hamantaschen, but Alice Medrich has! And she stuffed them with brownie batter (I’ve done this before, and loved it!).
- One of the commandments of Purim to give to charity, another is to feast, yet another is to give gifts of food to friends. Feel like doing all three simultaneously? Social stealth philanthropy!
- Budget Bites is such a great blog – delicious and affordable, and I love this piece on food security and the role of responsible food media.
- #immigrantfoodstories have been so inspirational, so I was glad to see Claudia Roden‘s unofficial addition. I was given one of her cookbooks for my bat mitzvah and still use it today!
- I’ve been trying to plan my meals ahead of time, and this piece from SeriousEats is so helpful!
- Norman Rockwell’s paintings of Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s Four Freedoms are iconic Americana (that famous Thanksgiving table? It represents Freedom from Want!). The Norman Rockwell Museum is looking for artists to reinterpret the Four Freedoms for today, and hopefully we will see a reclamation of their original progressive message. What would they look like to you?
- One of the best and most inspirational chefs in my neck of the wood, Preeti Mistry, about prejudice, race, gender, and unnecessary garnishes: “The perception is that the food is devalued because the people cooking it don’t look like a ‘real’ chef,” she says, “which is, like, a big White guy in a chef jacket.”
- Rihanna’s private chef, Debbie Solomon‘s approach to food: “Solomon’s own approach to food is all about pleasure. She advises eating everything rich and delicious— in moderation, of course. ‘There shouldn’t be shame in eating food,’ she says. ‘I won’t waste my calories on bullshit.'”
- The architectural structural integrity of famous desserts.
