The Baking Sisters

My aunt Jay is back in the kitchen baking today making her famous rugelach. For a little Italian lady she makes a mean Jewish pastry, even her Jewish friends agree. This time her only assistant in the kitchen will be my grandmother, no gentlemen callers today.
My grandmother will be transporting some of that rugelach back to Rochester for all of us, aren’t aunts and grandmothers’ the best!

Rugelach

1 cup of butter
1 pkg. (8 oz.) cream cheese, softened
4 cups sifted flour
1 cup sour cream
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup chopped raisins
1/2 cup finely chopped nuts
2 Teaspoons ground cinnamon

Blend butter and cream cheese until smooth. Slowly add flour and sour cream; beat until it is mixed well. Cover; refrigerate overnight. Add together sugar, raisins, nuts and cinnamon. Divide dough into 6 parts.
On a floured board, roll the balls into a 9 inch circle then slice into 10 wedges. Place a heaping teaspoon of sugar mixture in center of each wedge. Roll each wedge. Place on baking sheet and bake at 400 degrees for approximately 25 minutes.

Makes about 5 dozen.

A Truly Wonderful Cookbook and So Much More.....

I recently had the pleasure of reviewing a cookbook written by Judy Bart Kanigor. The book is called; “Cooking Jewish”. This book contains 532 recipes mixed with family stories and traditions that span the generations of the Rabinowitz family. The publishers and Judy herself felt that Noshtalgia shared the same sentiment when it came to the major role food plays in bringing people of all walks of life together.
While reading, I came to the realization that even though this book was based on the Rabinowitz family it could easily be speaking to the history of many families in many parts of the world. Cooking Jewish is a cookbook to be enjoyed like a fine novel while sitting in a comfortable chair, sipping a hot cup of tea, unlike most cookbooks that tend to be flip through. Even though I was drawn to so many of the recipes in this book there was one in particular that sparked many childhood memories. The recipe was for “Kichel” which in Yiddish literally means cookie. My mother loved Kichels so much that it became a ritual to purchase some almost every weekend from one of our local Jewish Deli's. My mother was a wonderful cook but could never master the art of baking, so each weekend we would go to the deli to buy some noodle kugel, chopped liver, pickled herring and a box of kichels. They were so light and sweet with the rich taste of eggs.
I encourage all to read this wonderful book, the perfect gift for family and friends.

Here is the recipe for “Egg Kichel” from Bunny Lauer
Featured in Cooking Jewish by Judy Bart Kanigor

1 ½ cups of all-purpose flour
3 large eggs
½ cup of vegetable oil
2 teaspoons of sugar
½ teaspoon of baking powder
½ cup cinnamon sugar for sprinkling (stir 2 tablespoons of ground cinnamon into 1 cup of granulated sugar blend well).

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees; line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
Blend the flour, eggs, oil, sugar and baking powder with an electric mixer, preferably with the paddle attached, on medium speed for 5 minutes. Drop the dough by the ½ teaspoon, 2 inches apart onto the prepared baking sheet. Sprinkle the cookies liberally with cinnamon-sugar.
Bake on the center oven rack for 10 minutes. Then reduce the heat to 300 degrees and bake until the cookies are puffed and brown, 15 minutes more.
Let the cookies cool on the baking sheet set on a wire rack.
Raise the heat to 400 degrees and repeat with the remaining dough. These are best eaten the day they are baked.