1,000 Foods To Eat Before You Die: A Food Lover's Life List (117 page)

Makes about ⅓ cup of schmaltz plus 1 to 2 tablespoons of gribenes

2 cups diced chicken, duck, or goose fat and skin

¾ cup cold water

Salt (optional)

1.
Place the diced skin and fat in a heavy-bottomed 1-quart saucepan, add the water, and let simmer very, very slowly over low heat. When all of the water has evaporated and pure yellow fat begins to collect in the pan, about 12 minutes, pour the fat off and set it aside. The fat should be a bright butter yellow without any tint of brown. Continue cooking the pieces of skin until they form crisp, brown cracklings. Transfer the cracklings to paper towels to drain.

2.
You can use the cracklings in recipes that call for them or just sprinkle them with salt and eat them before someone else does. The schmaltz will keep tightly covered in the refrigerator for about 1 week. The cracklings should be used or eaten as soon as possible after they are made or they will become soggy.

Tip:
Save bits of fat and skin until you have a cupful and then render it all together into a homemade schmaltz that is far superior to any purchased ready-made. Store scraps in the freezer, well wrapped in foil, but do not keep more than a month, as fat never freezes completely.

The humble black radish becomes a tasty spread.

Although a radish can shine when adorned with nothing more than a curl of fresh, sweet butter (see
listing
), it also lends itself to this hefty, earthy appetizer: a lusciously fatty blend of vibrant black radish and sweet onion gentled
with rendered chicken fat (see
schmaltz
) and sprightly with salt and black pepper.

Especially popular in Europe as a winter treat, it’s a delectable spread on moist, dark pumpernickel or crisp matzo, or served as a garnish for chopped chicken livers. It starts with a muddy-looking, earth-dug black radish that is scrubbed and peeled of its tough, fibrous skin to reveal a snowy-white interior.

Makes about 2 cups

2 large black radishes

3 tablespoons kosher salt

1 small Spanish, Bermuda, or Vidalia onion

½ cup schmaltz, refrigerated

Black pepper

1.
Scrub and peel the radishes. Grate the radishes on the coarse side of a box grater; you should have about 4 cups. Toss the radishes with the salt and place them, loosely covered, in the refrigerator for about 4 hours.

2.
Transfer the radishes to a strainer and rinse them under very cold running water. Pick up handfuls of the radishes and squeeze out as much water as possible; you should have about 2 cups of compacted radishes. Peel and grate the onion and toss it with the radishes, along with the schmaltz. Season with pepper to taste.

Although the mixture can be served fresh as a salad, it attains more character when allowed to age and ripen. Packed in a glass jar or ceramic crock and stored tightly covered in the refrigerator for four days, it achieves its fully ripened promise, becoming a heady mix that lets the strong of palate triumph over the weak.

The conserve can be refrigerated for weeks.

Mail order:
For black radishes in December and January, Melissa’s Produce, tel 800-588-0151,
melissas.com
.

Date syrup drizzled over a yogurt parfait.

The bees may not have heard the buzz, but it turns out that they aren’t the only source of highly prized honey. Among other mind-opening experiences, a visit to Neot Kedumim—the inspiring biblical landscape preserve near Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion Airport—offers the chance to taste and buy
silan.
The velvety date “honey”—really a syrup—is either pressed directly from very ripe dates or extracted by cooking dates with water until a thick and viscous sauce is released.

Distinguished by a dark mahogany color and a smoky, earthy flavor, date honey is less elegantly nuanced than bee honey. Bees, of course, diversify their wares by flitting around to various deliciously scented blossoms, whereas
dates simply grow. But date honey’s heftier, almost molasses-like richness certainly has its merits, not least of which is staying power. In Deuteronomy 8:7–10, the abundance of the Holy Land is described by the presence of seven plant varieties: wheat, barley, vines, fig and olive trees, pomegranates, and honey. Bee honey is an animal by-product, so the Talmudic sages decreed that the honey in question was most likely derived from dates.

Wild bees did exist in the land of milk and honey, but none were cultivated until centuries later, making honey gathering a chancy endeavor; dates represented a far more reliable source. Although these days date honey is identified mostly with Israel, it is also favored in the Middle East and North Africa; in Libya it is known as
dibs.

Rich in minerals, date honey is an especially delectable stand-in for maple syrup on pancakes, French toast, and waffles. It also begs to be used as an addition to barbecue sauce, for earthy flavor and a golden brown glaze, or as a subtle topping for yogurt and vanilla ice cream.

Mail order:
israeliproducts.com
, tel 877-289-4772 (search galil silan).
Further information and recipes:
Nature in Our Biblical Heritage
by Nogah Hareuveni (1980);
cookstr.com
(search date honey morse).
Tip:
Date honey acts similarly to bee honey. It should be stored in a cool, dry place; if it solidifies, stand the jar in hot water to liquefy it.

A freshwater cousin of salmon (of the genus
Coregonus
), whitefish is a cold-water-loving swimmer with a silvery-greenish skin and a meaty, snowy interior. Its gentle flavor is much loved in northern and eastern Europe, in whose many lakes it thrives, and where the need for food that keeps through long winters gave birth to the ancient techniques of salt-curing and then cold-smoking fish.

Not really cooked but rather infused with long, slow-burning wood flavor accumulated at a low temperature over many hours, the fish emerges with an incredibly dewy and tender flesh and a sophisticatedly smoky patina. Whitefish prepared this way is a favorite of Jews around the world, and is consumed at nearly any occasion they can find for eating—from bar mitzvah buffets to shiva spreads.

Interestingly, whitefish also swim in the
waters of the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, where they are equally beloved but are cooked differently. Caught in the waters of the Great Lakes (generally Lake Superior), the fish are hot-smoked, skin on, over a hardwood fire at a much higher temperature. The result is drier, smokier fish that, unlike its more elegant, cold-smoked counterpart, can take stronger condiments.

In their quest not to waste a speck, frugal cooks take leftover bits and crumbles of smoked whitefish and turn them into a seductively creamy salad, ingredients for which include lemon juice, finely diced fresh onion or celery (or both), minced dill, a hard-boiled egg, and either mayonnaise or sour cream, or a combination. It’s an excellent topping on light toast or a paper-thin slice of dark pumpernickel, or as the filling for a bagel sandwich. When choosing smoked whitefish, remember that bigger really is better—a larger whitefish will have a higher proportion of edible fish to bones and skin. Choose a whole fish that is plump and fatty, or ask for a cut from a large fish if you’d like a smaller portion. Avoid any fish that has dry, crackly skin. An excellent fishmonger will fillet the fish for you, removing the small bones but leaving the skin intact to prevent drying.

Where:
In Cambridge, MA
, S&S Restaurant, tel 617-354-0777,
sandsrestaurant.com
;
in Boynton Beach, FL
, Flakowitz, tel 561-742-4144,
flakowitzofboynton.com
;
in Miami and Los Angeles
, Jerry’s Famous Deli at multiple locations,
jerrysfamousdeli.com
;
in Chicago
, NYC Bagel Deli at various locations,
nycbd.com
;
in Moran, MI
, Gustafson’s Smoked Fish, tel 906-292-5424;
in Ellison Bay, WI
, Charlie’s Smokehouse, tel 920-854-2972,
charliessmokehouse.com
;
in Houston
, Kenny & Ziggy’s New York Delicatessen, tel 713-871-8883,
kennyandziggys.com
.
Dine-in, retail, and mail order:
In New York
, Russ & Daughters, tel 212-475-4880,
russanddaughters.com
; Zabar’s, tel 212-496-1234,
zabars.com
.
Further information and recipes:
Russ & Daughters
by Mark Russ Federman (2013);
Arthur Schwartz’s Jewish Home Cooking
by Arthur Schwartz (2008);
The Artisan Jewish Deli at Home
by Nick Zukin and Michael Zusman (2013);
saveur.com
(search whitefish salad).

It is basically a form of sausage—a spicy, aromatic mix of chicken schmaltz (see
listing
), flour, garlic, onion, and plenty of paprika stuffed into a natural casing such as steer intestines (for stuffed
derma
, also called
kishke
) or the long, thin, tubular skin from a chicken or turkey neck (for
helzel
, from the German
hals
, for throat or neck). So much for the facts. This waste-not-want-not Jewish specialty is a fragrant and flavorful appetizer or delicatessen nosh. As a main course, in any form, it might be lightly poached, then roasted and set upon a bed of kasha, the golden-brown buckwheat groats best enhanced with sautéed mushrooms and onions.

True farm peasant food that uses otherwise wasted parts, derma, kishke, and helzel are the Jewish equivalents of Scottish haggis (see
listing
) or German
saumagen.
Like those, they are heavy, heady, and rich, soul-satisfying and stomach-filling—a marvelous example of traditional stick-to-your-ribs-waist-and-hips food. A presence in ancient Jewish texts, kishke has been a staple of Jewish holidays for at least
seven hundred years and counting. Even today, when such a dish is considered hopelessly outdated by many, there are Jews who believe that no
simcha
(party or festive occasion) is complete without it. Good stuffed derma is laborious to prepare. So many commercial delis and restaurants feature mass-produced convenience kishke so dry and dreary it might discourage even the most loyal mavens. Better to opt for those that are delicately homemade.

Where:
In New York
, Sammy’s Roumanian Steakhouse, tel 212-673-0330,
sammysromanian.com
;
in Houston
, Kenny & Ziggy’s New York Delicatessen, tel 713-871-8883,
kennyandziggys.com
;
in Los Angeles
, Langer’s Deli, tel 213-483-8050,
langersdeli.com
;
in San Francisco and San Rafael, CA
, Miller’s East Coast Deli,
millerseastcoastdeli.com
;
in Toronto
, Caplansky’s, tel 416-500-3852,
caplanskys.com
.
Further information and recipes:
From My Mother’s Kitchen
by Mimi Sheraton (1979);
Arthur Schwartz’s Jewish Home Cooking
by Arthur Schwartz (2008);
nytimes.com
(search kishke recipe);
joyofkosher.com.recipes/kishka
;
cookeatshare.com
(search stuffed helzel recipe);
food.com
(search stuffed kishka kosher).