Bat Mitzvah blintzes

01 Aug 2010 7 Comments

by Being Jewish in Hawaii in Food Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

When I showed  our almost 13-year-old daughter the menu I’d planned for the Kiddush lunch scheduled after her Bat Mitzvah and she asked me, “What’s a blintz?” I was shocked.

“You’ve never had a blintz?” I asked her. Impossible. What kind of Jewish mother has raised a child so close to becoming a Bat Mitzvah who has never tasted or even heard of a blintz? “Oy Vei!” The shame! The guilt! Especially since it was a favorite of her late grandfather, Theodore L. Gershun.

This is when I realized that there was some major culturalizing to be done. Never heard of a blintz????

I am proud to say that even in this Island culture where pork is the main dish at every luau and the Asian influence is more  mainstream than  influence, my children are no strangers to  Jewish foods.

There is Challah on the Kiddush table after services every Friday night.

They make Hamantashen at Sunday school.

We’ve been to Jewish delis in both L.A. and New York, so they know a good corned beef sandwich and an authentic kosher pickle when they taste them.

I’m a huge fan of falafel and humus and pita, so the Middle Eastern influence has been served up right at our dinner table.

And there’s plenty of holiday cooking in this house. We have not been remiss in that department.

She’s just never had a blintz.

When I was planning the menu for that particular meal, I had several goals in mind. First of all, I wanted it to be what we call a dairy meal, which translates to no meat in any of the dishes. Fish is okay, but beef or lamb or chicken are not. Certainly not pork or shellfish.

In the kosher style, we do not mix milk and meat.

I also wanted it to be what I consider kind of traditional.

While Mainlanders might get tired of another buffet with bagels and cream cheese and tuna and egg salad, that doesn’t happen around here very often. I miss it.

What I am tired of is a meal that consists of toss (omit the ed,) salad, macaroni salad, rice, fried noodles, teriyaki chicken and Mahi Mahi. That’s pretty much the mainstay of most catered meals I consume around here.

That’s why I chose bagels  and cream cheese and humus and pita and veggies and…….blintzes.

A few months before the big event I was in California for a reunion. I also got to celebrate my childhood friend Kathy’s 4?th birthday. We enjoyed a Sunday brunch buffet on the Queen Mary in Long Beach.

To my extreme excitement, among the other 173 choices, there were blintzes. I immediately got out my phone. Took a picture and texted it to my daughter who was at home in Hawaii. While her response of “K” seemed a bit nonplussed, I was consoled at the opportunity to give her a digital heads up that these things really do exist.

Her grandfather loved them  and they even serve them on the QUEEN MARY.  Her Royal Highness had my back.

The other thing I realized when I was going over the menu for this incredibly important celebration in our family life was that perhaps I should let the Bat Mitzvah girl have a bit of input in our choices.

This was, after all, HER rite of passage. While I was not inclined to remove the blintzes from the menu, I was certainly happy to include a request or two from her. They turned out to be reasonable: lox and cake. She loves lox and really wanted cake for dessert.

Considering the hours of studying she was putting in each day, the hours of driving back and forth to the Temple we were both traveling for her study sessions with the Cantor and Rabbi and the not so delicious meals we were consuming in transit, lox and cake seemed a fair reward for a job well done.

Not to mention the incredible satisfaction and connection and pride and all the other delicious feelings that go with this special moment.

And it  was a special moment,  a celebration, sharing our culture’s food as a symbol of our joy. My father’s blintzes, the Bat Mitzvah girl’s cake and a Jewish Mother’s love and pride in a daughter, and a menu,  carefully prepared for such an important day in our family and community’s lives.

Maui Woweeeeee…

30 Jul 2010 3 Comments

by Being Jewish in Hawaii in Travel Tags: , , , , ,

One of the best things about being Jewish in Hawaii is the fact that the beautiful natural landscape of Hawaii is the backdrop for our lives-both secular and religious.

A weekend getaway can mean a trip to an outer island. That’s exactly what we did last weekend. We went to Maui.

My husband decided in June to finally plan some much needed vacation time for July when both kids go to the mainland to attend summer camp.

Usually when the kids are away we stay home and call it our staycation; we go out to eat at a restaurant or two,  see an R rated movie, explore beaches on other parts of the island –and I do a lot less laundry.

It does the trick, finding us a bit more relaxed, a lot more connected to each other and very cheerful when our children return home and  our family schedule resumes.

This time my husband was determined to get away, completely. Amenable wife that I am, I agreed and we planned our somewhat spontaneous trip to Maui.

It was one of those perfect vacations where everything goes smoothly. We found parking at the airport, we checked in easily for flights in both directions, the rental car office in Maui did not have a long line, our room was ready when we got to the hotel and everything else you might imagine.

We didn’t arrange a whole lot of plans ahead of time. We made reservations for air, room and car and that was about it. The rest we sort of made up  along the way, asking people for suggestions as to restaurants and local  spots of interest.

There has to be a special blessing we say when things go that well.

One of the highlights of the trip was our experience with the Pacific Whale Foundation on an Eco-tour adventure to Lana’i. We cruised out of Lahaina Harbor and headed across the channel to one of the most beautiful snorkeling spots I have ever seen. We saw a spectacular display of marine life with schools of fishes swimming around us and dolphins cruising right off the bow of the vessel.

The crew members were young and enthusiastic and friendly and particularly knowledgeable about the sea life and ocean and islands around us, including their stories.

And then there is the sunset.

At home it often comes and goes and we don’t get to enjoy it. We are busy finishing our day or making dinner or rushing off to meetings. But on vacation, watching  the sunset is an activity. And it was beautiful, every single time.

I know there is a blessing for when you see a rainbow and that Jewish holidays start and end at sunset. I just don’t know if there is a special blessing for a beautiful sunset experienced while on a weekend getaway with your husband to Maui. But there should be–and I am ready to make it up right here, right now if necessary.

Keeping it Kosher—Local Style

20 Jul 2010 4 Comments

by Being Jewish in Hawaii in Food Tags: , , , , , , , ,

My oldest daughter occasionally stays after Sunday school for a youth group event or Purim play practice or  other extracurricular activities. On the days that I am not driving for the carpool and cannot pick up lunch and bring it to her at noon like the good Jewish mother that I am, she  takes a sack lunch.

This requires a bit of forethought and planning.

Growing up in Hawaii means growing up eating the local food and in that respect she is totally  a “Local Girl.”

Lunch on the go translates to: Spam musubi, or manapua

California roll, fried noodles, Cup Noodles or maybe a Hot Pocket are also acceptable choices.

A peanut butter, or even bologna, sandwich is not the status quo.

This presents no problems on a regular school day or for the occasional field trip. I insist she add in some healthy items like fruits and vegetables and we strike a decent balance.

But when she goes to Temple, none of these are acceptable.

We are Reform Jews and choose not to keep Kosher at home. But we do respect the general Kosher style that is observed at our Synagogue: No pork, shellfish, or combination of meat and dairy foods.

When she realized that Spam musubi and manapua are filled with pork, California roll has imitation crab which seems disrespectful in my book, Cup Noodles contains dried shrimp and Hot Pockets are usually a mixture of milk and meat (at least the ones she likes,) she was shocked.

I chuckled. “This is a good lesson for you,” I told her.

The bagel and cream cheese I offered or the humus and pita she often likes at home were not deemed  reasonable substitutes (did I forget to mention that she is 13 and at that age nothing is a reasonable substitute for your first choice that you cannot have.)

We had to come up with alternatives.

Luckily, she is not completely unreasonable and I have some decent problem solving skills.

Not only Spam and fake crab meat go well with rice. You can make a tuna fish salad hand roll or a plain cucumber maki. She likes both of those. Hot rice with a package of roasted seaweed also makes the cut.

Instead of char siu in the manapua, you can buy them with chicken or vegetables. I know, it’s not the same, but it is a compromise.

Bottom line, I can’t resist telling her, “You should be happy to have food in your mouth.”

Of course, she agrees. And, in a pinch, a peanut butter sandwich will do just fine.

Jewaiian Time

11 May 2010 18 Comments

by Being Jewish in Hawaii in General Tags: , , ,

I grew up with Jewish Standard Time. That’s the way most Jewish social events don’t ever start on time. If you tell people to come at 7 pm, they show up around 7:20 and you don’t get started until after 7:30.

People have busy lives with jobs and kids and responsibilities. They try to fit in as much as they can. If  Synagogue life cannot be at the center of their lives, at least it is a part. They will get there when they get there and do what they can.

Then I moved to Hawaii. Here they call it Hawaiian Time. Same concept. Most things start late, but for slightly different reasons. Hawaii is “Laid Back.” Not in a lazy sort of way, but with grace and ease. What’s the hurry? We have plenty of time. Just as the tide rolls in, so do the people. And then they stay.

And then there’s being Jewish in Hawaii.

I recently heard the combination of  Jewish Standard Time and Hawaiian Time referred to as “Jewaiian Time”–a powerful combination–certainly in terms of scheduling.

With these two cultural idiosyncrasies working together, it is almost completely impossible for anything to start as scheduled.

Luckily, they create a compelling synergy. The laid back nature of the island culture has definitely had an effect on the local Jewish Community, softening an underlying edge that I might have felt in other places.

Some might come a bit late, programs and meetings may not begin exactly on time, but nobody minds and they certainly stay, transforming our Shul on Oahu into at true Beit Knesset, place of assembly, gathering place.

It’s this sort of “Go with the flow” kind of lifestyle that makes being Jewish in Hawaii such a unique experience, certainly one worth writing about.

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