Rothfeld - Israel Eats

ISRAEL EATS

Steven Rothfeld

Introduction by Nancy Silverton

ISRAEL EATS

Digital Edition 1.0

Text 2016 Steven Rothfeld

Photographs 2016 Steven Rothfeld except author portrait as noted.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced by any means whatsoever without written permission from the publisher, except brief portions quoted for purpose of review.

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To WAZE, the navigation app that made it possible for me to find my way to the gifted, generous, and courageous Israeli farmers, cooks, chefs, and artisans who opened both their doors and their hearts to me. With the frequent variations every few kilometers in the English spellings of the towns, and the Hebrew and Arabic scripts that I cannot read, I never would have been on time to my memorable meals nor would I have had the opportunity to converse with the many remarkable people who inspired this book. Thank you, Israeli WAZE creators: Amir Shinar, Ehud Shabtai, and Uri Levine.

On a shiny, slate-colored November afternoon in 1984, I was on a train crossing northern Italy. I had just finished admiring the Pisanello princesses in Verona and was on my way to look at Giottos frescoes in Padua. I was sitting in an empty compartment and the door slid open. A man about my own age entered and sat down. We spoke about what we had seen and where we were planning to go. He had an accent that I couldnt quite place, and apropos of nothing in particularexcept maybe noticing an American Jew in his twenties, intent on experiencing the art and architecture steeped in the traditions of the Catholic Churchhe bluntly asked, So youre a Jew... Why dont you go to Israel? I realized he was Israeli and I ransacked my mind for an answer. Im not ready, I said. He glared at me impatiently. For what? he inquired, almost accusingly. Fragments of the darkening sky and moody Italian landscape flashed through the window and across my eyes. To leave this, I replied, turning my head to the view.

I was fascinated by everything European and couldnt propel myself beyond what I knew about the Jews who had lived there and their ultimate fate. It could have been me, I thought, when I studied the memorial plaques on the streets in France, lit a candle to place on the ovens at Terezin, or saw my family name etched on the marble slab of a Holocaust memorial in the center of Paris. I couldnt conjure up a modern Jewish state in my mind or fully understand why I had no desire to see Israel, yet this brief exchange on the Italian train haunted me for years.

Lunch at Goats with the Wind in Yodfat.

A quarter century after that meeting, I read Amos Ozs memoir, A Tale Of Love and Darkness, and devoured A. B. Yehoshuas novels about quirky contemporary life in Israel. I started to imagine the Israeli streets and towns with people living in them. Then in 2010, I had two weeks between assignments in Italy and decided to visit my friend Dorit in Israel. We had met as students at Art Center College of Design in the early 1980s and, like her compatriot on the train, she never could understand why I had not visited Israel.

So I left Italy behind and traveled to Israel. In the short time I spent wandering around this small country notorious for sorrow and conflict, I discovered joy, humor, celebration, endless holidays, and a vibrant cuisine. I had been so focused on the suffering of the Jews that the idea of the Israelis pursuing pleasure and eating great food never entered my mind. In markets with freshly squeezed pomegranate juice flowing wherever I turned; with mountains of marbled halvah flavored with chocolate, cilantro, coffee, and pesto; with fresh dates from farms near the Dead Sea; with steamy, flat, round and twisted breads; with dazzling displays of freshly caught Mediterranean fish and teetering stacks of cauliflower orbs, I encountered a world I had never imagined existed in Israel. People were experiencing the joy of eating well in small hummuserias, seaside restaurants, market stalls, and chic dining rooms in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. I was reminded of something I had once overheard an Italian mother say to her small child who was shoving a forkful of pasta into his mouth: Buona, eh? Che gioia di mangiare (Good, isnt it? What a joy it is to eat).

Roasted vegetables at Claro in Tel Aviv.

What I discovered on my first journey to Israel ignited a desire to explore this small country further and taste what they were cooking up on top of the layers of civilization that are still smoking. A friend told me that people under pressure are more creative. Does that explain why there are so many good things to eat in Israel?

When I taste something surprisingly delicious anywhere in the world, I often think of the chef Nancy Silverton. We have worked together on three books, and I have always marveled at how she will sample a sauce or nibble a morsel of bread and gently steer the cook or baker in the right direction. Her intuition about flavor verges on the supernatural. It was only natural, then, that when I conceived of the idea to do this book, I asked her to help me with it. A few months after I returned from my first visit to Israel, I showed her images from my trip, shared the stories of what I had seen and tasted there, and asked her to be a part of the project.

Nancy was skeptical about being involved with a book about Israeli cuisine and food culture. Her first visit to Israel had been in 1967, just months after the Six-Day War. She said her parents almost got divorced because her father wanted her to go and her mother was terrified at the idea. In the end, she did go and remembers that she was not at all impressed by the food. Shortly after she arrived in Tel Aviv, Nancy wrote home, The food here is really terrible. The first two days I didnt eat or drink anything and I almost fainted. The nurse had to give me smelling salts, so now I force myself to eat.

I remember saying to her that at thirteen years old in 1967, she likely only ate hamburgers and french fries. Nancy laughed and said that was true; the only food she remembers from that trip was from the hamburger chain Wimpy.

Still, her interest was piqued, and over the next four years I continually updated her on the travails of finding a publisher who was courageous enough to invest in a book about a place the world takes notice of only when disaster strikes.

A baker preparing manakish on the saj at Hagolan Bakery in Majdal Shams.

Nancy In 2012, I was intrigued, not only by Stevens updatescomplete with all his infectious, passionate enthusiasmbut by Yotam Ottolenghi and his book Jerusalem .

Yet I really didnt know what Israeli food was. Back in 1967, we had tasted street foodfalafel and shawarmaand I had liked some of it, but I really had no idea what I had been eating. Now, forty-eight years later, I was anxious to try what people were telling me was this exciting new cuisine of Israel.