Mar 9, 2011
The SAVEUR Bookshelf: Essential Global Jewish Cookbooks
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Credit: courtesy Knopf
The Jewish community has long been
nicknamed the People of the Book — a reference to our connection to
the Torah — but I've always thought it would be just as accurate to
call us the People of the Cookbook. From
spiral-bound community collections featuring Aunt Bessie's brisket and noodle
kugel, to James Beard Award-winning tomes sharing Jewish recipes from communities
around the world, the canon of Jewish cookbooks is remarkably broad. Taken together, they paint a picture of a
diverse, diasporic people bound together by a shared love of food and feeding
the people we love. Here is the
shortlist of my favorite international Jewish cookbooks – volumes that paint a
picture of a culinary tradition that goes beyond the Ashkenazi deli fare that,
at least in America,
has taken on the mantle of "Jewish food." In these books there are Indian
curries, Middle Eastern meatballs, and, yes, a kugel or two — they're
timeless must-haves for Jewish and non-Jewish cooks alike.
See Leah's six cookbook picks in the gallery »Leah Koenig is a freelance writer and author
of the recently published Hadassah
Everyday Cookbook: Daily Meals for the Contemporary Jewish Kitchen
(Rizzoli, March 2011).
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