Quick & Kosher Cooking

Enhance your Yom Tov meal without spending all day in the kitchen.

Passover is known to old-timers as a “Kitchen Yuntif,” but that doesn’t mean we must be chained to our stoves for a whole week. Slavery, my friends, is over — gone forever since the exodus! Our Festival of Freedom is no time to enslave ourselves, even if we’re scheduled to serve up 10 banquets in eight days, not to mention K for P lunches and snacks.

I’m one of those rare birds who looks forward to Pesach, and I want you to anticipate it with joy too. And I mean it. These glorious recipes will help you cook food that everyone actually will want to eat, and none of them will prevent you from getting out of the kitchen to enjoy the holiday with your family. Even if you’re known for patchke-ing in your neighborhood, you surely don’t want every meal to involve a long, fussy prep — because there’s more to Pesach than cooking.

And that’s where I come in, ’cause I was born to cook quick. I’ve designed these easy, 15-minute prep entrees and sides just for you — and they’re elegant enough to serve at a yuntif meal. Use these versatile recipes to round out your meals and keep them on hand for a quick Chol Hamoed lunch or dinner.

For your Seder, choose a main that is light and appetizing, such as my poached chicken or chicken meatball stew. Both are scrumptious and comply with the custom of not eating roasted meat at the Seder. If you want something more substantial, try my pomegranate braised brisket. Each of these recipes looks and tastes like you slaved over it all day, only you didn’t. Slavery is so yesterday.

MAINS

Stuffed Turkey Breast 

White Wine Poached Chicken with Dill 

Pomegranate Braised Brisket 

Chicken Meatball Stew 

SIDES

Caramelized Onion Mashed Potatoes 

Zucchini & Red Bell Pepper Sauté 

Vegetable Egg Crepes 

Sweet Potato and Carrot Bake 

I can’t believe it.

Really I am in total denial.  Although I did tell my 2 year old — who doesn’t listen much anyway — not to run around the house with a slice of bread in his hand.

But yes, I know it, you know it, we all know… it’s a-coming!

Pesach.

I ease my worried soul by thinking about the food, not the cleaning.  (That’s it.  I will not say another word about it this entire post.  Not a one.  After this one: AHHHH!!!!).

This major momentous occasion commemorates and celebrates our freedom from slavery and our salvation as a nation.  We are to truly believe that if not for G-d who took us out of Egypt we would all still be slaves today.  I think this awesome birth of a nation event calls for a greatest hits, top 10, best of – call it what you will – favorite recipe compilation list.

This is what I cook over and over and over again.  Year after year since I started making Pesach 5 years ago (at the young age of 20 — wink wink!).

Un-Stuffed Cabbage Soup
From my first book Quick & Kosher Recipes From the Bride Who Knew Nothing.  Not a Pesach goes by without it.  All my neighbors love it and make it too.  Well at least one of them, Sharon who tells me her parents go crazy for it and that she has shared the recipe with her married nieces.  I asked her to instead by them the book .  Love Sharon!

Fish
My favorite fish recipes include a pretty in pink gefilte and a recipe I developed for last year’s Pesach issue of the magazine that I now use year round when I want to impress the guests – Salmon Cakes with Tropical Fruit Salsa.

Potato Kugel Cups
Really year round I double it and make it in a 9×13, only when I am feeling lazy, which is most of the time.  But for the honor of Passover and Hubby- cups it is!

Accordion Potatoes
Became a tradition last year when I developed them for the first issue of the magazine.

Brisket and Brisket and More Brisket.

Roasted Apple Brisket 
Brisket in Wine Sauce 
Pomegranate Braised Brisket

Because of the custom not to eat roasted meats on seder night I double or triple the sauces so that the meat is totally submerged in liquid.

Zucchini Ribbons
Just a vision of beauty and taste.

Salads Galore

Warm Salmon Salad
Israeli Salad
Israeli Cabbage Salad
Italian Tomato Salad 
Sweet Carrot Salad 
Turkish Salad
Baby Spinach and Portobello Mushroom Salad
Spinach Walnut Salad

Dessert

And to tell you the truth, when it comes to dessert I love chocolate covered matzoh.

And meringues.

Not macaroons so much but Hubby does.

Oh and one last greatest hit — my Aunt Zahava’s Egg Noodles.
I add water to the egg crepe recipe and spend a DAY making about 100 paper thin almost see-through crepes which I then stack and cut into long luckshen.  I have to make that many because I eat half while sitting on the stool I pulled up to my stovetop during cooking.  Can you blame me?

Chag Kasher V’Sameyach!!

We like themes.

The men, have rebelled though, and won, for the past few years.

There are 4 or 5 families in the neighborhood that we get together with every Purim and we the women always wanted to do a themed menu like Mexican or Italian you know.

This year Aliza, my Boston Cream Pie friend and hostess said we finally win – we get our theme.  But she rightfully decided our men are more cowboy than south of the border and thus our menu was born.

I am making a recipe for pulled bbq beef short rib sandwiches from my new book.  Until it comes out enjoy these fab pulled party sliders.  Dirty mashed potatoes, which only means I’m keeping the skins on (but scrub ‘em  well because we don’t really want these potatoes to be dirty), topped with a Costco-sized bag of fried onions and Southwestern Steak Salad — cause it’s kinda cowboy.  We’re also doing Fried Chicken, wings and some fruit pies or cobblers for dessert.  Actual dessert baking and selection I leave to Aliza –  she is the queen when it comes to the sweet endings.  Oh and I almost forgot – CHILI!!! It wouldn’t be a party at the ranch without it.

What are you making?

Freilichin Purim and YEEEHAWWW!

At most events I do, inevitably a woman comes up to me with a story.

She speaks of inheriting her grandmother’s gefilte fish recipe or some other such occurrence that leads her to following the directions of an old time version with the first instruction being:

“Take the fish out of the bathtub…”

So now you, like me, are wondering — what was her frozen loaf doing in the tub? If you are not like me and know that there once was a time, way back when, in a land far far away, people who actually made their own gefilte fish from scratch (ahhhh!). My grandmother did in fact make hers from scratch. But it wasn’t in fact authentic gefilte fish. We called it Falsha Fish meaning “fake fish” in Yiddish because hers was actually fleish (meat!). She made a sweet white croquette from ground chicken breast with a jellied broth and sliced carrots. Looked like gefilte, tasted like gefilte but thankfully didn’t begin with a chicken in the tub.

Gefilte is one of those things you are into or you’re not. Even though its technically pareve (unless of course you are making falsha fish) it’s kinda hard to be pareve on the subject. We are pretty die-hard in our house. Hubby likes, no let me clarify, loves the jarred version. Can you believe it? Any others like him out there? Speak now or forever hold it! It’s because, of course, he grew up eating it, even though his step-mom was a crazy good cook, that’s what she served. I’ll eat the jellied broth from the jar because it reminds me of my Ma (my Grandmother) but that’s about it. I, on the other hand, really do love the frozen loaf. Don’t you just love this. Finally hubby and I agree on food. “Yes” gefilte fish. But “No”! G-d forbid we like the same kind.

So at least he keeps it easy for me and I go creative all twisty and turny on what to do with the frozen loaf. I’ve got an awesome dress up your gefilte fish recipe that I’m hard at work on for my new book but since that won’t be out for 2 years…. I leave you with this little bit of history and then a few cool creative Jok.com gefilte recipes.

Gefilte fish, “the” Jewish food for Shabbos and holiday festivities, was invented by some ingenious Jewish women many generations ago to help diners avoid tangling with bones while they ate. The word itself means “filled” in Yiddish, referring to the original practice of filling the fish’s skin with ground fish. From the fish in your bathtub of course.

If you’ve got your own special gefilte fish recipe, homemade or even semi homemade or something super quick prep (for me!) please submit it here and help us, help you, help us build the most comprehensive gefilte fish database on the web. Now who knew there was a market for that?

Here are some gefilte fish recipes:

I feel like Amy and I are friends. Yes, we both do share a really good friend, Judy, who turned me onto Amy in the first place. But when you read her stuff and get the warm and fuzzies from her beautiful creations I think you’ll also feel like you’re friends with Amy. Amy’s first book is now available for pre order (it’s at the top of every list B&N, Amazon etc…) and I can’t wait to get my copy.

Sweet Designs, just like her Sweet Site will inspire you to no end. She’s actually a Sweets Stylist (to the stars) — is that the coolest thing ever? Now the question is how does she stay so skinny? While the book is not kosher per se, from following Amy I know there are so many recipes that are inherently kosher (Amy does keep a kosher home) and recipes that are easily adaptable so we can go ahead and recreate these in our kitchens. The book, her site, the picts will all make you smile.

Have you guys heard of her? Lawyer turned Baker! Will you be buying the book? Let me know in the comments.

Shout out and Mazel Tov to you, Amy. I am so excited for you!

I have a little love affair with brisket. It’s been so good to me over the years. Save for one terrible, terrible (I mean tears kinda terrible) incident which to this day I can’t quite figure out exactly what went wrong (I’ll write about all the sordid details in my new book). That one bad episode aside (hey, even Seinfeld can have a bad episode or two and still be one of the greatest sitcoms to have ever graced the airwaves), brisket is most probably my best friend, my meat soul-mate, if you will. It’s so forgiving, it’s so tender (when sliced against the grain ), it’s so easy to work with (try searing it on the stove top first. No time? Then just throw it in the oven or even the slow cooker. Also try it shredded on a sandwich.) and lends itself to any and every possible preparation under the great big bright sun (sweet or savory, Asian or Argentinian inspired, with coffee or beer or wine and more).

So how did it become classic Jewish food? If I had to venture a guess (since I am too busy (read lazy) to look this up right now it’s most probably because it can be prepped ahead and lends itself perfectly to reheating (in fact is better when prepped ahead and reheated) which all coincide nicely with the prohibitions associated with cooking and rewarming foods on Shabbos and prepping in advance for a ton of company for 2 and 3-day holidays. If you are a bulk cooker and freezer, brisket is your friend too! Here go a few of my live-by-these-for-perfect-brisket rules.

1. Choose a 1st or 2nd cut kosher brisket (2nd cut has more marbling, is less expensive and preferred by most chefs in the know) with nice marbling distributed throughout as opposed to just in one area.
2. Ideally you should slow cook your kosher brisket for optimum flavor and tenderness. Slow cooking brisket will also ensure the least amount of shrinkage.
3. After following your recipe of choice allow your brisket to cool at least 15 minutes before thinly slicing against the grain. If it’s not sliced against the grain it will be tough instead of tender.
4. Brisket is best prepared in advance. Ideally make it at least one day before serving for the best taste. After cooling and slicing against the grain submerge in gravy/sauce and refrigerate overnight or freeze for up to one month. Remove from the fridge (or thaw completely if frozen) and bring to room temperature before rewarming and serving.

Here are some of my favorite brisket recipes and other highlights from our kosher community recipe inventory:

Beer Braised Brisket
Garlic Honey Brisket
Mexican Brisket
Brisket in Wine Sauce
Pomegranate Braised Brisket

Click for more Brisket Recipes!

Do you have any tried and true kosher brisket tips, tricks or favorite prep ideas? Please leave them in the comments below.

Have a great brisket recipe? Submit it here.

My grandparents, both sets, made the best chicken soup. Same like yours, I imagine. My father’s side of the family made a deep dark richly flavored broth with spaghetti noodles. My mother’s parents a light bright broth with square luckshen (noodles) and alphabets for us kids in the later years.

Yes, it’s Jewish penicilin.

Yes, it’s been known to heal a broken heart or two.

Yes, it’s pretty much one of the best foods on this planet.

There is something intuitive and all too personal about making a chicken soup. Like cholent, no two are alike. Quite like a fingerprint each chef whether following a recipe with exacting accuracy or adding a little of this and a little of that still imparts their chicken soup with something special. That something is called “love”. I am not some over the top touchy-feely mood effects your food type – but chicken soup is one of those add a little love recipes and it becomes your own. Something your kids will beg you for, something your husband will request every Friday night, something you end up making 30 quarts of at a time because it’s that popular. OK that last part is probably just me — I get crazy with bulk cooking sometimes, I can’t help it.

I am using my chicken soup recipe and a few variations on the comfort classic to kick off our month of traditional Jewish foods. We all try to be such inventive creative kosher cooks that sometimes we forget about the building blocks of our culinary heritage. Let’s go old school, heimishe, back to the basics or whatever you call it, and pull out those family recipes that can only be salvaged if we salvage them. I missed getting my grandparents’ recipes but please join us this month in our effort to claim the classics and save them here on JoK.com. I’ll love you for it. You can submit your own recipes here.

Enjoy these chicken soup recipes:

Classic Chicken Soup
Chicken Gumbo Soup
Spiced Chicken and Lentil Soup
Curried Chicken and Rice Soup
Chicken and White Bean Soup
Thai Coconut Chicken Soup

We have some really great news for you – Jamie Geller’s Quick & Kosher online cooking show is now on television! JLTV is showing Jamie Geller’s Quick and Kosher show on Monday nights at 9pm ET & PT!

In tonight’s episode Jamie shows you how to:

-Cut a Melon
-Cut an Avocado
-Cut a Mango
-Make a Baby Carriage
-Make Guacamole

For viewing info in your area please click here.

We hope you tune in!!

It’s cold out. Well kinda cold out. Not exactly bone chilling yet here in NY but I’ve got my coat on and that little chill that comes with a whisper of winter. This all means it’s time to warm the tummy, yours and your kiddies’ with special hot drinks. There are few things that say “I love you”, “I made this special for you” and give people that warm and fuzzy feeling –  a cup of homemade hot cocoa does just that. In this case it’s triple chocolate hot cocoa so that must mean you really, really, really love the beneficiary of this treat (ehm, yourself). A hot spiced apple cider is a slightly more sophisticated way to say “you mean something to me” unless of course your special somebody (ehm, Hubby) would prefer that hot cocoa. I love you all so here from my heart to yours some special warm winter recipes to fill your mugs.

• Pumpkin Steamer
• Spiced Orange Green Tea
• Orange Hot Chocolate
• Spicy Hot Cocoa with Kahlua
• Thick and Rich Drinking Chocolate
• Coffee Chococcino

The dietician in Tamar wouldn’t let her run this contest. We showed her, didn’t we?! Fried desserts – hey it might be a small category but it’s a goodie. We tested 4 finalists and it came down to these two. One easy schmeazy Thai Fried Banana Dessert – hey it’s fruit! And one not so easy Eggnog Cranberry Rice Fritters, ok a total patchke, but beyond worth the time, effort and calories.

Throw out your scale and raise your glass to frying dessert by voting for your favorite.

In order to vote, click on the recipe highlighted above and find the thumbs up sign and click. The recipe with the most thumbs up signs by 9 am EST Dec 30th 2011 is the winner. Click here for original contest details and prizes.

Good Luck!

So I am not at all embarrassed to admit that I love fried foods. After all I am not the official dietician on our site — I leave the uber healthy stuff to Tamar. When we were deciding what to do for the 8 nights of Chanukah – since the 8 nights of latkes concept felt so played out – (and in fact we have over 50 recipes for latkes) I said to Tamar “I’ve got it! 8 nights of Fried Desserts!” She was like “What? No way!” The professional in her couldn’t let go. But I did my duty and convinced her our readers and the world will love this. It’s Chanukah – it’s practically a mitzvah to fry. So since I covered Savory Fried Treats in the Nov/Dec issue of JoK magazine we are focusing on sweet crispy delights on Jok.com. So 8 nights, 8 treats from me and all our “professional” Jok.com friends, like Jeff Nathan, Alessandra Rovati, Chef Laura and more!! You may hate me for it, but after you taste my Nutella Banana Egg Rolls I do think you will be thanking me!

Don’t miss out on the rest of the recipes -

Venetian Fried Custard

Delicious Donuts

Churros

Orange Scented Beignets

Easy Cannoli

Creme Anglaise and Basil Filled Donuts

Lemon Donuts

I wanted to share what we in the “industry” call a sizzle reel. Translation - a 2 minute clip of the pilot we shot for PBS. We actually shot this before Rosh Hashanah. My neighbors got a kick out of all the menorahs in the window in the middle of September and my kiddies loved opening their presents early. I was obviously uber-pregnant (could barely reach the counter) and collapsed at the end of the 14 hour shoot (feet throbbing, head aching, back burning kinda collapse). We are editing together the full half hour episode now, I am so excited.

The food star of this episode, my Caprese latke tower – cover of this month’s JoK mag and my new favorite way to dress up a latke. Tell me what you think? Of the latke and the sizzle. Don’t you just LOVE this song from the Moshav Band? I cried like a baby the first time I heard it and not just because I was an emotional pregnant mess. Every time Hubby plays it my oldest goes “oh is Mommy going to cry again?”

Happy Chanukah!

Oh Chanukah, Oh Chanukah! SO SO SO excited it’s finally here. Although, in all honesty I have been celebrating Chanukah since August, no joke. Between preparing for the Chanukah issue of the magazine and shooting a Chanukah themed pilot for PBS, before the first candle I have already made latkes 3 times, fried donuts twice, baked Chanukah cookies with the kiddies once, lit the menorah as a family, wrapped presents, and washed my clothes and sheital to rid them of the smell of fried oil that is the holiday. Now that it’s finally here, for real, I almost need someone to pinch me to prove it – although I’ll settle for opening some presents.

As is customary for the holiday we do dairy every night. Why you ask? I told you last year. You don’t remember? Read here. So to update my repertoire I’ve got some new dishes for your Chanukah parties.

Zucchini Latkes with a Tzatziki Sauce: Fried but super low carb!
Pumpkin Baked Penne: Because I love pumpkin, because I can’t help myself and because I have a bunch of leftover cans in the cupboard from Thanksgiving.
Lemon and White Wine Broiled Sole: A light delicate dish to balance all else at this meal
Greek Salad with Feta, Garlic Croutons and Lemon Oregano Dressing: Because I think about the Greeks over this holiday and although we defeated them no reason to ignore their wonderful contributions to the culinary world, hence the salad and Tzatziki sauce above.
Maple Roasted Carrots with Goat Cheese and Chives: Sweet and savory and so simple! I really do love this recipe. .
Nutella Banana Egg Rolls: Cause I am sick of donuts and nutella is divine and I saw a similar idea in the Rachael Ray magazine and I thought “MUST HAVE THIS NOW!”

Hope you agree!

Happy Chanukah!

Creamy, tangy feta, salty olives, crisp lettuce, and crunchy croutons, all wrapped up in a light and spicy lemon oregano dressing… ah, the Greek Salad! Could be a meal, could also be a side – perfect for a Chanukah feast (we do have to remember the Greeks this time of year).

Greek salad is one of my faves on Chanukah and post-baby. I have a friend who gorges on Godiva after she has a baby – it’s her “Thank you, G-d, and I deserve a treat” snack. Mine is Greek Salad. When my friend Anita comes to visit and asks what she can bring, I always say – “Can you pick up a Greek Salad on the way?” So random, but hey, it’s true. This super-easy salad is perfect for your Chanukah party because you want something you can toss together quickly when you have a ton of latkes to fry.