September 8, 2007
Family Table: Recipes from our families to yours
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1/4 cup French dressing1 packet onion soup mix
Mix jelly, French dressing and soup mix. Brush marinade on chicken covering each piece completely. Cover and marinate in refrigerator for two to three hours.
Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
Bake, uncovered, skin side up for 45 minutes to 1 hour. Turn and baste chicken a couple of times, but not too early, as skin will burn.
Makes four servings.
Honey Drizzle Cake
by Danielle Berrin, Contributing Writer
My mother began baking chocolate chip cookies when she was in college. On their first date, my father ate an entire box of the chewy Toll House delectables that were intended as a gift for a birthday celebration they were attending. He encouraged her to parlay her talents into profit.
After "hearing" of a popular 1977 adult film, Sheryl and Larry Berrin found the perfect name for their new business: Hot Cookies. For the next 30 years, Hot Cookies would become a homegrown bakery business in South Miami, Fla., continuously fueled by my mother's culinary efforts and my father's taste buds.
Each year on Rosh Hashanah, we receive hundreds of orders for this sweet, nutty honeycake that sits in a pool of sticky sauce. My siblings and I love to flip it over and eat from the bottom with our fingers, which Mom also loves. I can still hear her admonish, "Be a lady, Danielle! Use a fork." My mom always says she is drawn to recipes with unique ingredients, and the clincher on this one was the vanilla wafer. It is the honey cake of choice at our synagogue, Temple Beth Am in Pinecrest, Fla. And with each bite, the New Year truly becomes sweeter and happier -- but not necessarily healthier.
Cake
5 eggs
3/4 cup sugar (1/2 cup sugar and 1/4 cup sugar)
1/8 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups finely chopped pecans
1 1/2 cups finely chopped vanilla wafers
1 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Lightly grease an 8-inch square glass pan.
Separate eggs. In large bowl of electric mixer, beat egg whites at high speed until foamy. Gradually beat in 1/4 cup sugar and salt. Continue beating until soft peaks form. Set aside.
In another bowl, beat egg yolks with 1/2 cup sugar and vanilla extract at high speed until thick and creamy (at least 3 minutes).
In another large bowl, combine pecans, vanilla wafer crumbs, baking powder and cinnamon.
Gently pour egg yolk mixture over egg whites. Fold in with a light hand until blended.
Add pecan/crumb mixture gently until well combined.
Pour batter into glass pan.
Bake at 350 degrees for 40 minutes or until tester comes out clean.
Makes eight to 10 servings.
Honey sauce
1 1/2 cups sugar
2/3 cup honey
1 1/2 cups water
Combine all ingredients in medium saucepan. Place over low-medium heat, stirring until sugar dissolves. Continue cooking until first boil bubbles form. Remove from heat.
While cake is still warm, prick with a fork throughout and then pour honey sauce all over cake so that it seeps into the holes.
Taiglach
by Amy Klein, Religion Editor
Although it is a tradition not to eat nuts on the High Holy Days, my father always had Taiglach on Rosh Hashanah.
The Ashkenazi custom not to eat nuts -- either on the first night or the entire holiday -- is because of gematria (Hebrew numerology): The numeric value of the Hebrew word for nuts, egoz, is 17, and the word for sin is 17 or 18 (plus or minus one is OK in gematria), and people would like to avoid any affiliation with sin on the High Holy Days.
Taiglach, which means little pieces, features bits of fried dough dipped in honey. The dessert is served on Rosh Hashanah because of its sweetness, but all variations of Taiglach also include nuts -- mostly hazelnuts and almonds.
So if it is a tradition not to eat nuts because of gematria, why Taiglach specifically on Rosh Hashanah? Maybe because the word egoz, which often refers to all nuts, really means walnuts.
My father has a different explanation: the gematria of egoz, although the same as sin, is also the same numerical value of chai: living.
Recipe from recipecottage.com.
2 eggs
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 1/2 cup flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
3/4 teaspoon baking powder
1 cup honey
2 cups sugar
2 teaspoons ground ginger
1 cup nuts, coarsely broken
Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
Beat eggs lightly, then add the oil and mix. Sift the flour, salt and baking powder together. Stir in the egg and oil mixture to make a soft, but not sticky, dough. Add more flour if necessary.
Place the dough on a board lightly sprinkled with flour, and twist the dough into a rope shape about 1/3 inch think. Dip a knife into flour and cut the rope of dough into small pieces about 1/3 inch long.
Place the pieces on a well-greased, shallow pan and bake in a moderately hot oven, 375 degrees, for about 10 minutes, or until lightly browned. Shake the pan occasionally to keep the pieces separated and evenly browned.
Prepare the honey syrup by mixing the honey, sugar and ginger in a saucepan. Stir until the sugar is completely melted, then cook gently, stirring constantly so the honey does not burn. Add the baked pieces of dough and the nuts. Stir gently with a wooden spoon over low heat until the pieces are well coated with syrup.
Pour onto a wooden board that has been wet with cold water. Use a wooden spoon to separate the pieces and break up large clumps.
Cool.
To store, wrap in wax paper.
Makes 36-48 pieces.
