It is that time of year when New England comes alive with the smell of hot buttered rum, mulled wine and mulled cider. We grew up in New England, and we find the smell of mulled cider to be an instant trip to nostalgia land.

From the Spice Hunter comes KSA certified HOT BUTTERED RUM MIX and MULLING SPICES FOR CIDER AND WINE. With these two products, you, too, will be able to fill your home with an intoxicating odor sure to bring out the best in everyone while they argue over who’s winning at dreidyl. Oh, and the taste is great, too!

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We grew up in an Italian/Jewish neighborhood. Pasta sauce was something that was the pride of both Jewish and Italian homes. No one would admit to even occasionally buying store made sauce! In fact, in our home we would laugh at those unfortunate folks who thought spaghetti with ketchup was a meal. (We still shudder at even the thought of that one!)

We had some super close friends who were “old world” Italians, and they made fresh “gravy” every Sunday. Maybe they rubbed off on our mom, because over the years her own sauces grew more adventurous and more complex. We eventually learned that are many different kinds of sauce:

MARINARA Highly seasoned tomato based sauce made with onions, garlic, basil and oregano.

TOMATO BASIL Take out the garlic, add extra basil and there you go. Our mom used to put in chunks of tomato and onion.

FRA DIAVOLO The devil’s sauce is loaded with red pepper.

ARRABBIATA The “angry” sauce is spicy but not especially hot.

PUTTANESCA This one is often called Mediterranean sauce and is a favorite of Southern Italians. This sauce often includes capers, olives, onions, garlic and whatever else you can find in the fridge.

VODKA As it says. This one was not found in our home when we were growing up. Then again, it is a relatively new one!

BOLOGNESE This is, quite simply, a thick sauce with chopped meat added to it.

So, there you have it- a short course in sauce. Study the list. Memorize it. There will be a test!
(RJR)

For at least ten years now, we have spent every Thanksgiving celebrating with dear friends at the home of Mollie B. Mollie B grew up in Washington DC back when it was considered a back-water, Southern town. Long time readers of the Kosher Nexus Newsletter know that Mollie B’s preferred language is Yinglish (a mixture of Yiddish and English) spoken with a mild Southern accent. Mollie B is a natural raconteur, a phenomenal cook who seems to have passed the cooking gene to her children (and apparently some of the grandchildren, too), and a serious hostess of the famed Southern style of entertaining.

It all began with an innocuous call from Mollie on Wednesday morning: “You better save yourself. Ah’m talking, you better save yourself and stop eating today so you can be ready for tomorrow!”

Twenty or so people gathered at Mollie B’s this year(it’s hard to tell because people tend to show up and leave only to be replaced by others who show up and leave and others….) On top of that, the whole neighborhood calls Mollie “Bubby,” and the neighborhood kids tend to wander in and out, too.

The food goes on at 2:00 and it never stops coming out of the kitchen for the next several hours. This year, the feast was only enough to feed a small starving nation! Turkey, stuffing(in Mollie B’s home, it is never called stuffing- it’s “gefilliks”) made in the bird, stuffing made in a pan (for the veggies), General Tzo’s veggies, a chicken dish, a whole minute steak roast with horseradish sauce and mustard, a brisket, a veal roast (the “other” white meat as someone kept saying), chopped liver, veggie chopped liver, tofurky Italian style sausage served with a bruschetta, cinnamon meatballs, yam and cranberry mix, cranberry relish, squash kugel, marinated string beans, white and green asperagus in a vinaigrette sauce, salad, another salad, home baked muffins, and a few other side dishes that we somehow never got to. The trick is to take a little bit of each of the succesive waves of food that comes out of the kitchen and eat a ten course meal.

You want to know about dessert? Dessert was essentially your basic Viennese table! Blueberry pie, coconut custard pie (sugar free and amazingly pareve!!), pumpkin pie, cookies, birthday cake, dried fruit, fresh fruit, candy for the kids, and the piece de resistance: Chocolate Mud and Praline Pie (also sugar free). That last one was to die for!!

We were embarassed- we brought a store bought pie- everything else, and we mean everything else- was made at home by either Mollie B or one of her incredibly kitchen talented kids.

What can we say? We shoulda growed up in da south! Better still, we shoulda growed up in Mollie B’s home!

Mollie B- we love you, we love your family. Sh’hashem yishmor aleychem! Coming up next: corned beef and cabbage day chez Mollie B. And the KN will be there, too! Hope your turkey day was as fulfilling as was ours.
(RJR)

In our house, the Thanksgiving scene in the movie AVALON never ceases to inspire peals of hearty laughter. Lou Jacobi plays the uncle who arrives late on Thanksgiving to discover that the family- all gathered around a tightly packed table- has not waited for him. Sin of all sins, they sliced the turkey without him!! The best line in all of moviedom follows: “Vat? You carved the turkey? Vat kind of family doesn’t vait for the honcle to carve the turkey?”

Growing up in New England, Thanksgiving was a sacred day! Our shul had a special Thanksgiving “service” early in the day so that people could leave shul and go home to the bird. Back in the sixties, there was hot competition over who would get the black church to come for an ecumenical service. The winning church or synagogue could claim the civil rights crown for the year!!

Back at the house, the feast was nothing short of wretched excess. First the soup. Then the chopped liver. Then two salads. The pepper kugel. The sweet kugel. Two turkeys with different stuffings in each. Brisket. Chicken for those who didn’t eat turkey. Mashed potatoes. Baked potatoes. Baked sweet potatoes. Sweet potatoes with maple syrup and marshmallows. Sweet potato pie. Home baked rolls. Sweet and sour meat balls. The Ko-Jel mold with fruit cocktail in it. (Why did someone always bring it in LIME??)

After all of that, came dessert: pecan pie, Devil’s Food cake, pudding pie, pumpkin pie, ambrosia (hard to make pareve in those days), brownies, Mun cookies (ie, poppy seed cookies), apple pie, and tea. Our mom would wave one tea bag over a gallon pot of water and serve lightly colored, flavorless tea. She would say to one and all: “I don’t like dark tea.” Someone would yell back, “I don’t like colored water,” and the battle began. Until then, everyone had been on his/her best behavior, but that one comment would suffice to open the flood gates of vituperation. And so it began. By the time the men dropped off into a L-tryptophane induced sleep and the women were off in the kitchen preparing the buffet that would be put out for the rest of the day, the war would be over, and we kids could go back to watching Channel Nine (in the greater Metro NYC area) and all the monkey movies that they showed all day: Kong, Son of Kong, Bride of Kong, Kong and the Jews, Kong Converts, etc……..

What a day it was! As my zeyda would say: such much to be “tenkful” for.

The whole staff of the UTJ and the Kosher Nexus wishes you a wonderful thanksgiving.
(RJR)

This week’s issue of KOSHER TODAY had this article about cholent:

Observant Jews who used to consume cholent for the Shabbos meal once a week, are now expanding its use. According to many retailers cholent has become a popular food throughout the week, but namely Thursday and Fridays.

In Monsey, Jews line up in a Shell gas station for the coveted cholent as do Boro Parkers in a Rio gas station and at dozens of other delis, take-out stores and restaurants. The phenomenon is also prevalent in London, Antwerp and Jerusalem. This led one cholent expert to dub the Jewish equivalent to Chili as ?the comeback food of the century.?
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People buy the stuff at GAS stations??? Gives new meaning to the phrase: Eat here, get gas!
(RJR)