At this Central Synagogue Lunch & Learn, we will explore how to taste chocolate especially from a social responsibility perspective. There will be plenty of delicious chocolate to help us discern the best chocolate based on our Jewish values.
choco-story
Forthcoming! On the Bread Trail: Jewish Baking Around the World — Fall, 2026
On the Bread Trail takes readers on a captivating journey to uncover the deep historical, cultural, and spiritual connections embedded in a wide spectrum of Jewish breads. In this sequel to On the Chocolate Trail, Rabbi Deborah R. Prinz explores the values that inform...
When A Rabbi Makes Ukrainian Wedding Bread
Lubow Wolynetz, Folk Art Curator at the The Ukrainian Museum in NYC, graciously welcomes a group of 20 participants into a utilitarian classroom adjacent to a small kitchen. Plastic place mats sit on the tables in front of each person. At the back of the room,...
On the Chocolate Trail in Bariloche, Argentina
In March, Mark and I finally extended our chocolate trail explorations in celebration of our special anniversary to Bariloche…via Miami, Buenos Aires, Ushuaia, Antarctica, and Buenos Aires again. There were international flights, a cruise, a couple of domestic flights...
Sunday Yeast Polemics: On the Bread Trail
Leavened bread or not? While some of us may think of Passover, the question applied to Eucharistic bread and created significant division in the early Christian Church. The leavened bread for Sunday use was often baked at home by women. Over time, preferences shifted...
Sweet Treat: Chocolate and the Making of American Jews
You may wonder: how did chocolate help define American Jews? Through chocolate, we see that Jews were part of America since its earliest days. Well, since 1701 at least, Jews in the Colonies made part of their living through chocolate. Several Sephardim, leaders of...
How About Some Uterus Challah?
When Logan Zinman Gerber felt enraged about the loss of reproductive rights in the U.S., she baked challah. Not any challah. She shaped it into a uterus. It wasn't long after the birth of her daughter that Gerber, a longtime challah baker and staff member of the...
A Manhattan synagogue explores the rich, surprising history of Jews and chocolate
I'm grateful for this story written by Rachel Ringer, published at JTA/NY Jewish Week on December 20, 2023: (New York Jewish Week) — In 2006, Rabbi Deborah Prinz was on a trip to Europe with her husband, Rabbi Mark Hurvitz, when they wandered into a chocolate...
Exhibit Opens! Sweet Treat! Chocolate & the Making of American Jews
Sweet Treat is a delicious gastronomic adventure into the history and resilience of American Jewish chocolate making. This exhibition invites you to follow the chocolate trail to America, a scrumptious journey through time and place. Chocolate gives us a lens...
Baking Prayers into High Holiday Breads
Every summer during the years I was a congregational rabbi, I pulled out my annual High Holiday checklist to help me plan for the season’s intensity. Amid the sermon writing, cue meetings, neither Mark nor I, with our respective rabbinic duties, had time for home...
Injera*
Enjoy this naturally fermented Ethiopian bread to scoop up foods or as an accompaniment to a meal. Ingredients: 4 cups/600 grams teff flour 5 cups/1135 grams water, plus more as needed Directions: Whisk the teff flour and water together in a large bowl until a smooth...
Jewish Heritage Month: Baseball & Chocolate!
When I nibbled on chocolate at the Cyclones Game in Coney Island the other day, I felt as though I had hit a triple header of Jewish life in America. Not only was it Jewish Heritage Night at Maimonides Stadium (resonant of Jewish greats like Hank Greenberg and Sandy...
Digging into Biblical Breads
Jewish breads transport us to ancient times. Major Jewish ideas about humanity and the Jewish people hinge on biblical bread stories. They define humanity and the Jewish people through bread. The first appears at the beginning of the Bible with the expulsion of Adam...
Matzah – But, the Dough Did Rise!
The Jewish “starter story” of the Book of Exodus traced Jewish salvation from slavery to freedom through matzah which is perhaps the oldest type of bread in continuous Jewish consumption. The narrative recounted Joseph’s rise to power in Egypt through themes of...
2022 Media for The “Boston Chocolate Party”
Thank you to the following for their running these reviews and interviews about The Boston Chocolate Party: *At the Sydney Taylor Shmooze, Shirley Reva Vernick recommended The Boston Chocolate Party as a "robust contender for the Sydney Taylor Book Award." She...
“Boston Chocolate Party” Q&As with Deborah Kalb
I was delighted to be interviewed by Deborah Kalb recently; she agreed that I could cross-post here: Deborah R. Prinz is the author, with Tami Lehman-Wilzig, of the new children's picture book The Boston Chocolate Party. She also has written the book On the Chocolate...
Plan a Choco-Hanukkah Party: 250th Anniversary Tea Party
Celebrate the themes of freedom represented by the coincidence of the Boston Tea Party occurring on the last night of Hanukkah in 1773. Here are some suggestions, inspired by The Boston Chocolate Party: • Design a chocolatey invitation for guests. Copy and paste...
Boston Chocolate Party
Available for Pre-Order Now!!
Good Riddance Chameitz or, The Polemics of Passover’s Leaven
Israel’s Health Minister Nitzan Horowitz recently reminded Israeli hospitals of the 2020 ruling of the High Court of Justice that permitted hospital visitors and patients to bring chameitz (leavened foods) into hospitals. In protest Idit Silman, MK from the Yamina...
Funny Faced Purim Pastries
Purim’s March madness brings funny faced yeast pastries, gifts of food, festive meals, and donations to the needy. While Hanukkah marks the survival of Judaism, Purim rejoices in the survival of the Jewish people. Built around the biblical book of Esther (Megillat...
For the Easiest Hanukah Doughnuts Ever
Wherever Jews have lived, we have enjoyed fried doughs. They popped out of our ancient frying pans and much later they ‘made aliyah’ to the Holy Land from Poland filled with red jelly. Now they are the ubiquitous soufganiyot. But other Jewish communities have...
Forthcoming! On the Bread Trail
On the Bread Trail serves up explorations of heritage Jewish breads. Puffy yeast doughs, as expansive and mysterious as the survival of the Jewish people, mix with Jewish celebrations to yield surprising and diverse treats for all seasons. Feed your family and friends...
Chocolate Chip Politics
Chocolate chip cookies are on the menu at the Biden White House, part of its recipe for governing in 2021. Visitors to the Oval Office snag chocolate chip cookies wrapped with the Presidential seal. When first lady Jill Biden stopped at the U.S. Capitol immediately...
Why Is Challah On My Matzah Box?
It happened every Passover during my decades as a congregational rabbi. A curious small-print-reading synagogue member would ask why a recently purchased, certified for Passover, matzah box said: “CHALLAH IS TAKEN.” Odd. Everyone knows (and many complain) that...
Israeli Chocolate Spread
Ingredients:1 cup unsalted butter 1 cup sugar 3 large eggs* *1 teaspoon vanilla extract 5–6 heaping tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder Instructions:Cut the butter into small pieces and put in a blender. Add the sugar, eggs, and vanilla, and blend well. Add the cocoa...
December Media Stories
There’s definitely been interest in stories about Hanukkah traditions of doughnuts and gelt this past month. Thank you to the following for disseminating ideas based on On the Chocolate Trail and the chocolatebabkaproject: For The Forward story, “A Different Doughnut...
Order Now! “The Boston Chocolate Party”
I am very excited to share that The Boston Chocolate Party, a picture book co-authored with award-winning children's book writer, Tami Lehman-Wilzig, will be on the shelves on October 4, 2022. Order now from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Target. New England,...
Jewish Bridal Breads, Instead of Cake*
Weddings this summer sure are different. Cocktail hour? Not likely. Dancing? Probably not. Friends and family? Perhaps a very few. With the pandemic limiting celebrations this year, perhaps it’s time to turn to the comforting traditions of Jewish bridal breads. Read...
Zooming for Challah
Thank you to The Jewish Week's Food and Wine for running my story, "Zooming for Challah." The internet has been popping with real-time challah baking sessions since shelter in place began. These free pre-Shabbat meet ups nourish a hunger for recipes, relief, rituals,...
Celebrate the First Shabbat After Passover with a Shlissel Challah
Hasidic communities mark the first Shabbat after Passover with a special challah as they transition back to the world of chametz. They shape the first post-Passover Shabbat challah into a key. The key, or shlissel as it is called in Yiddish, is meant to symbolize...
Atayef: Double Fried Filled Pancakes for Chanukah
Aka Ataïf, atayif, qata’if, qatayif, katayef, these pancakes may be filled with nuts or also prepared with cheese fillings for Chanukah or Shavuot. They are also popular at weddings spread with cream and rose petal jam or simply topped with pistachios or almonds. This...
Panettone for Breakfast?
While we tend to think of panettone as a Christmas bread, Jewish food writer Edda Servi Machlin shared this version of panettone from her childhood experiences in Italy of eating it for breakfast. She provides an authentic yet simpler process than most panettone...
Kaak: Recipe for Crunchy Yeast Biscuits
Eat kaak all year round or save them for special celebrations, as do many communities of the Middle East and Sephardim (Jews descended from Spain). Kaak (kahk, ka’ak) are ubiquitous, multi-faith and multi-cultural doughy treats eaten throughout the Middle East where...
Boulou: North African Orange Bread
Almost cake-like, though not a cake, this orange tinged bread enhances any holiday table. My story about diasporic High Holiday celebratory breads was published at the Jewish Week, "Beyond Challah and Honey." More will be forthcoming in On the Bread Trail. Prep time:...
Pan de Calabaza: Pumpkin Challah
This bread brings fall ingredients to your festive meals and reflects the longtime usage of pumpkin among Sephardi Jews. See the Jewish Week for my story about unusual Rosh Hashanah breads, "Beyond Challah and Honey: Rosh Hashanah Breads From Around the World." Prep...
Yemarina Yewotet Dabo: Ethiopian Honey Bread
This sweetly spiced bread maximizes honey, both inside and out. For more about this and other unusual Rosh Hashanah breads see my story at the Jewish Week "Beyond Challah and Honey: Rosh Hashanah Breads From Around the World." Prep time: 30 minutes Rising time: 2-2 ¼...
Ambasha (aka Himbasha, Hambasha) Ethiopian Wedding Bread
This stylish Ethiopian celebratory flatbread derives its unique elements from the hand styled design and sweet flavorings. It was probably initially baked over coals. While many recipes give instructions for baking it in the oven, I prefer to use the stovetop for...
Recipe for Dabo: Ethiopian Pan Cooked Shabbat Bread
Here’s another easy bread requiring no oven, no mixer and no braiding. Also, no fussy flour needed. Perfect for summer, though delicious all year long. My story about dabo and its use in Ethiopian Jewish practice may be seen at the Jewish Week, Bless This Bread....
Chocolate Chip Cookie Chronicles: Inventions & Elections
Invite an American presidential candidate spouse to submit a recipe to a cookie contest, and chocolate chips will probably be a winning ingredient. If you give a mouse a cookie, it had better be chocolate chip. If you are showing a home at an open house, put out a...
Lachuch (aka Lahoh or Lahuh): A Yemenite Flatbread for Shabbat
Yemenite Jews prepared lachuch and saluf for daily and Shabbat consumption. Several food writers claimed it took them a long time to master this bread so I have collected their tips and recipes to make it easier, for you, too, I hope. Lachuch turns out to be pretty...
Saluf (aka Salouf or Saloof): Recipe for a Yemenite Flatbread for Shabbat
Easily made without turning on the oven, using a mixer, proofing the yeast, or flipping the bread, or washing lots of dishes. All the prep happens in one bowl and one stove top pan. Simple, tasty and cool! Read my story about saluf at the Jewish Week: "Too Hot for...
What’s a Key (shlissel) Challah?
On the first Shabbat following Passover, after a week deprived of yeasty breads, hassidic custom serves up not just any challah, but a shlissel or key challah. About seven weeks or fifty days later at Shavuot, challot boast ladders and other symbols signifying...
Recipe for Fancy Shapes in Dough: Shaping Dough
I used this shaping dough for the five symbols for the Sephardi "Seven Heaven Challah" for Shavuot: The tablets of the Ten Commandments, a Jacob’s ladder to recall the ascent and descent of angels to and from heaven, a hand or hamsa recalling the five books of the...
Yeast Raised Khachapuri Recipe
Sometimes made with phyllo dough or without yeast, here is a top knotted, circular shaped, yeast-raised khachapuri. This exotic bread works for Shavuot and has been enjoyed by Georgian Jews for the festival. Read my story at the Jewish Week "Exotic Celebratory Breads...
Los Siete Cielos or Seven Heaven Challah Recipe
This stunning challah makes a great centerpiece and tastes delicious. Allow time for the shaping of the various elements of this celebratory Shavuot challah and enjoy the anise flavored liqueur in the dough. Read my story at the Jewish Week "Exotic Celebratory Breads...
Cheese Babka Recipe
This celebratory, cheesy babka belongs on a festive Shavuot table, for sure. Read my story at the Jewish Week "Exotic Celebratory Breads for Shavuot" Adapted from Beth Hensperger’s The Bread Bible: 300 Favorite Recipes Yield: One large cake DOUGH 1 tablespoon active...
Seeking A Shikker Challah
When I found this recipe for challah baked with brandy, it called out “Purim.” What could be better than a shikker challah to fulfill the Talmudic opinion of Rava: “One must drink on Purim until that person cannot distinguish between cursing Haman and blessing...
What? No Babka at Catskills Hotels? *
The borscht belt must have been a babka belt. When thinking of chocolate babka, the Catskills came to my mind given the immense quantities of meichelach treats overflowing the tables there in the 1940’s-60’s. Babka must have been ingrained in the Jewish palate then,...
What is the Chocolate Babka Project?
Admittedly, by heritage I am more a German kugelhopf than an Eastern European babka, having eaten homemade kugelhopf at family celebrations in Los Angeles. Indeed when I mentioned my interest (obsession?) with babka to my German speaking father in LA, he looked...
On the Chocolate Trail in Belize’s Jungle
Mark and I happily signed on for three distinct rainforest chocolate experiences within a 15 mile radius of our home base, the romantic Cotton Tree eco-lodge which is nestled among Mayan villages near the Caribbean in the Toledo District of Belize. Not only did Belize...
Is that coffee or chocolate?
Having just eaten my daily portion of chocolate covered coffee beans, I am primed to consider the questions I hear about coffee when I teach on the chocolate trail. How do the two foods really differ, other than taste? I think back to when the layout for On the...
A Chocolate Cake for October’s Tricks: Devil’s Food
Heading into October and its culmination in Halloween, I find myself hankering for Devil's Food Cake, despite its initially derogatory name. Supposedly in 1690 Pilgrims traveled to Plymouth Rock via Amsterdam. They stayed in a house near the city’s biggest chocolate...
How About Some Mindful Chocolate Tasting?
These days comforting chocolate seems more necessary than usual. You could just grab a bunch and stuff yourself to help (maybe?) you feel better. Of course, you could add the chocolate in to your cookies, cakes, and ice creams. Or, you could taste chocolate with a...
Celebrating Ice Cream Month with Chocolate
When needing a new word for ice cream for the revitalized Hebrew language, Eliezer Ben Yehudah turned to the Torah. Actually, he opened the Aramaic translation of the Torah by Onkelos to Exodus 16:14. There the Aramaic uses “glidah” in the passage that describes how...
Choco-Travel Tips
Choco-dar first erupted on our multi-country circuit of Europe in a VW van. That adult onset, self-diagnosed radar for chocolate experiences led us serendipitously to many wonderful chocolate discoveries and surprises. In the process I learned some chocolate travel...
Mothers and Survival by Chocolate
On the Chocolate Trail, I found amazing stories of mothers and chocolate from World War II. Immigrant Lisa Hoffman reminisced about how her mother insured she had the skills, including chocolate making, to survive. "I carried inside of me all of the lessons my mother...
![Chocolate Trail Broadens: “Semi[te] Sweet: On Jews and Chocolate” Travels](https://rabbideborahprinz.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/IMG_2409.jpg)
Chocolate Trail Broadens: “Semi[te] Sweet: On Jews and Chocolate” Travels
I am very excited that the NYCs Bernard Museum exhibit, "Semi[te] Sweet: On Jews and Chocolate" based on my book, On the Chocolate Trail, will now be forging new paths as it travels around the country. We selected On the Chocolate Trail as the book title for a number...
Talking Chocolate in February
Recent media featured projects on the chocolate trail in celebration of Valentine’s Day and “Semi[te] Sweet: On Jews and Chocolate” at the Bernard Museum, NYC. Of course, Florence Fabricant’s mention of the exhibit in the New York Times was a highlight. Now, these...
Warm Up: 3 Historical Drinking Chocolate Recipes
As temperatures drop, these three historical recipes for drinking chocolate beckon with rich warmth. Bicerin: This very unusual, rich, layered drink of chocolate, coffee and cream, a specialty of Turin, Italy, connects us with memories of the earlier days of women...
Chocolate Exhibit Hits the New York Times
I heard from Florence Fabricant at the New York Times that she would be including the “Semi{te} Sweet: On Jews and Chocolate” exhibit in her “Front Burner” column a couple of weeks prior to publication date. I rushed a few photos to her team. The fact checker followed...
Book Optioned: Museum Exhibit
Excerpted from my remarks at Opening Night at Temple Emanu-El, NYC, October 20, 2017: Some people have books optioned for movies. I am so delighted that my book, On the Chocolate Trail (2nd Edition, 2017) has become a museum exhibit... Thank you, Warren Klein, for...
Announcing Second Edition: On the Chocolate Trail
Media attention, popular culture, audience questions, growing consumer awareness, and changes in the chocolate world sparked the new material in this second edition of On the Chocolate Trail. I am happy to offer up a totally new chapter, “Gods in My Chocolate,”...
No End to Chocolate Exhibits Part III: Visits #3, 4 & 5
A stunning number of exhibits about chocolate, mostly on the East Coast, captured our attention in the last six months. Mark and I had the opportunity to visit three very different exhibits, what I call #3, 4 & 5. I reviewed the exhibit (#1) at Detroit Institute of...
Of Chocolate Exhibits There is No End: Part 2
Just as the Detroit Institute of Arts closes its wonderful Bitter|Sweet display of chocolate, coffee and tea, no need to despair. New York offers three additional exhibits. Setting aside the wondrous and elegant chocolate shops, at least three local museums currently...
Chocolate, Coffee, Tea and Me
Thank you to the Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Detroit for the invitation to speak at their event Chocolate, Coffee, and Judaism created in conjunction with the Detroit Institute of Arts exhibit “Bitter|Sweet: Coffee, Tea & Chocolate.” Not only did I have the...
Super Food Chocolate for Super Bowl Sunday: Three Recipes
Try these super-easy-to-make chocolate treats for Super Bowl Sunday. They are especially appropriate since they include the super food, cocoa nibs. Your guests and family will happily dip into these savory and sweet temptations. The recipes are easily adaptable for...
Election 2016: Winning Fudge Brigadeiros
The candidate’s wife and women supporters made these Brazilian chocolate fudge truffles to win him the campaign. He loved them. She made them. Post World War II food shortages in Brazil meant a lack of sweets. Fortunately, cocoa powder and condensed milk were...
On the Chocolate Trail in Brooklyn
Stories of New Yorkers and their chocolate abound so we followed the chocolate trail there. A long heritage of Brooklyn chocolate production and innovation precedes today’s bean-to-bar, artisanal, and industrial chocolate enterprises. All the way back in the late...
Hunting for Chocolate: Fancy Food Show, NYC, 2016
Even before Mark and I got off the F train at the Hudson Yards Station heading to the Javits Center, we spotted folks bejewelled with their red and white Fancy Food Show tags. Earlier in June when I had reviewed the list of chocolate vendors scheduled to be at the...
That Time Jews Smuggled Chocolate to France — and a Recipe for Basque Chocolate Cake
Published July 13, 2016 at The Forward I happened into a chocolate shop, L’Atelier du Chocolat de Bayonne in Paris in 2006 with my husband. As we were tasting and browsing, I randomly picked up a company brochure. In my high school French, I slowly deciphered this...
Bat Mitzvah Wants Fair Trade Israeli Chocolate
There may be many chocolate themed Bar and Bat Mitzvah parties. However, only one Bat Mitzvah girl has actually challenged the global Israeli food company Strauss Group. The Strauss Group includes the iconic, red packaged Elite brand chocolate. Ashira Abramowitz,...
Seriously Tasting Chocolate
A congenial group of chocoholic bloggers, authors and publishers slowly gathered around a farm size table as the wait staff at 2Beans lined up four wine glasses, a prosecco glass and a water glass. Within moments they also lowered plated chocolate squares and bon bons...
Chocolate Made My Lunch: Nashville
In Nashville I managed time between my five lectures on the chocolate trail scholar-in-residence to pay homage to Nashville’s homegrown confection, the Goo Goo Cluster. Developed over 100 years ago, the Goo Goo tempted sugar lovers with its innovative combination of...
Local Chocolate in the South
Finally, there is a “local” American chocolate. In Nashville, Tennessee, no less. Olive & Sinclair Chocolate, Tennessee’s only bean to bar chocolate maker, sources its beans from Ghana and the Dominican Republic. It has found a way to court and reflect a Southern...
Chocolate Expo
Mark and I had a great time at the recent Chocolate Expo in the Meadowlands and look forward to participating in several more. It was a pleasure to be able to speak three times: about Heritage Chocolate and early chocolate making; about Holiday Chocolate particularly...
Labor Day in our Chocolate
Every day is Jewish Labor Day. Jewish tradition expounds the importance of work and those who do it. Even God worked for six days and only then rested on Shabbat. Chocolate is one medium for uncovering themes of worker equity, food justice and ethical kashrut. Many...
Bringing Buckeye Candy to Experts
I only know about Buckeyes because I have family in Ohio. I love peanut butter and chocolate together so I decided to make them for the first time for a 4th of July party for local friends and family in Cincinnati, mixing in small amounts of presumption, appreciation...
Fathering Chocolate
Fathers, Dominicans that is, helped bridge the New World’s chocolate to the Old World. In 1544 Padres tantalized the Spanish court with chocolate prepared and presented by a Kekchi Maya delegation of New World natives. Fatherly faith indeed aided in spreading...
Minding Our Chocolate
How does chocolate help you? For me a piece of chocolate here and there smooths transitions from one project to another, one task to the next. At a congregational visit after the Senior Rabbi blessed the Associate on her last Shabbat, someone said, “we need chocolate...
Anschluss Launches Bartons Passover Favorites 77 Years Ago
Bartons Chocolate Pops. Bartons Almond Kisses. Do you long for these and other iconic Passover favorites made by Bartons Chocolate? They exist because of the March 12, 1938 Nazi accession of Austria (Anschluss) when Stephen Klein fled Vienna for his life. A Nazi...
Ten Teaspoons of Sugar in My Chocolate?
The recently released revisions of the Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee for the Office of Disease Prevention and Health Promotion Health bring the conversation about sugar circling ‘round the measuring cup. These warnings against more than 10 teaspoons of added...
Adventures On the Chocolate Trail: Atlanta, Portland, Seattle
In my recent travels speaking about On the Chocolate Trail, I have been able to sample some unusual chocolates and related products. Consider these: Atlanta: From Chef Brulee amazing colors make the bon bons and the matzah very appealing. *Chocoley A...
It’s Chocolate Season
Chocolate season started on November 1 for Joanne and Jerry Kryszek’s company, Chocosphere. This is the busiest time in their on-line chocolate wholesale and retail company which operates from a warehouse in a Portland suburb. I have known about the company for years...
Chocolate Signals
The Trappistine nun appeared to levitate as she welcomed us at the factory door with urgent questions about how to market chocolate for Father's Day, about aspects of kosher certification and about increasing their Chanukah sales. Sister Christa-Maria, in her Bavarian...
Can’t Live Without Chocolate?
It seems a given that many of us depend on chocolate. Everywhere I speak about On the Chocolate Trail (Jewish Lights), people confess: “I can’t live without it.” And they want reassurance that the popular headlines about chocolate’s health advantages are true....
Smiley Chocolate
We hit the mother lode. This chocolate factory came to us from Columbia, unlike the others we were fortunate to trek to in Belgium, England, France, Israel, Mexico, Spain, and Switzerland. To be precise to the David Zwirner gallery near the High Line in Chelsea. Oscar...
Saluting Military Chocolate
Memorial Day recalls the tangible and serious sacrifices made by members of the US military. Chocolate has played a part in that here, as well as in Israel and Britain. When I came across these stories as I was researching On the Chocolate Trail, I was...
Think Chocolate in Preparation for Passover’s Discussions and Eating
Several publications picked up my pieces about chocolate and Passover recently -- Huffington Post, Jewish Journal and Jewish Telegraphic Agency -- and I share them here, along with A Haggadah for a Socially Responsible Chocolate Seder and related rabbinic texts from...
Chocolate Love Lessons for Valentine’s Day
Love lessons pulsate through Denise Acabo’s chocolate shop, A l’Etoile d’Or, Montmartre, Paris. Baby-faced Denise, who may be in her 80’s, has tended to customers and chocolate for the last 40 years costumed in her braided hair and school-uniform kilt skirt. Against...
Chocolate Coated Mallomars Turns 100
Do you want to eat a 100 year old chocolate covered, cookie framed marshmallow? The iconic Mallomars turned 100 today. That calls to mind its sibling concoctions from other countries and times, such as the Krembo in Israel. Other similar classic chocolate-covered...
From Prins to Prinz: The Mysteries of the Chocolate Trail
Little did I realize when writing On the Chocolate Trail, how eerie the connections between Jews and chocolate might become. My choco-dar (internal radar for chocolate experiences) led me to a hauntingly personal story. In 2009, a very kind scholar, learning of my...
Jews Make Chocolate a Revolutionary Option: Happy July 4
Sephardi Jews contributed to the availability of drinking chocolate when that became a very popular substitute for politicized tea in North America around the time of the 1773 Boston Tea Party. The Gomez family members (NYC) and Aaron Lopez (Newport) were among the...
Louis Kwechansky and his Chocolate Factory: A Father’s Day Tribute from Alex Kwechansky
In 1939, well before I was born, my father, Louis Kwechansky was already into chocolate production in Montreal. He had patented a machine to make a product that would seal his fame. He invented a chocolate lollypop on a stick, called a “Chocolate Pop.” He hired the...
Prayers for Chocolate Work
Yes, they do, according to a story told by our colleague and friend, Rabbi Mo Salth, first recounted by radio commentator, Paul Harvey. A mother decided that her family should eat more healthfully and alerted her children that she would no longer be purchasing sugary...
“Did Jews ‘Invent’ Chocolate” Hits YouTube
"Did Jews 'Invent' Chocolate?" An Exclusive Interview with Deborah Prinz by Walter Bingam for his radio program “Walter’s World” at Israel National Radio about my book On the Chocolate Trail: A Delicious Adventure Connecting Jews, Religions, History, Travel, Rituals...
Mothering with Chocolate
In 2012 consumers in the United States spent an average of $152 dollars for Mother's Day gifts. A good portion of that was spent on slathering our mammas with chocolate treats. Earlier generations of women, some of the them childless due to their religious callings,...
A Jewish Matriarch of American Chocolate Making
If, as one of my friends has taught me, food is love, then chocolate manifests the densest, deepest and sweetest of loves. When we slather our mothers with chocolatey tributes in a few days, we will be stepping onto a chocolate trail pioneered by Jewish mothers before...
Stamping Chocolate
When fantasizing about the publication of On the Chocolate Trail, I imagined a chocolatey cover that either would include actual samples or at least might be scratch and sniff. That proved a bit too ambitious, unfortunately. I do love the look of the final cover,...
Jews Create First Easter Eggs: Really?
Surprisingly, according to some chocolate mavens, it may have been Jews in France, known as expert chocolate makers in Bayonne, France, who first developed chocolate Easter eggs. These, they say, were passed around during church services to provide morsels of...
Four Questions to Prep Chocolate for Passover
I hope that you enjoy this version of the traditional four questions at Passover. 1. How might I use chocolate to create new approaches to my Seder? You may wish to experience the ancient Seder and Passover themes through chocolate and related issues of child...
Getting Good Chocolate Gelt
Who knew that quality chocolate Chanukah gelt exists? I thought it had to be waxy and tasteless and that it best decorated a table rather than my mouth. Only recently, with the publication of Marjorie Ingall’s comprehensive piece “Gelt Without Guilt” in Tablet,...
A Great ‘Funraiser’ Happened There!
Not only was it fun to share content from On the Chocolate Trail, West End Synagogue, NYC, made an entire evening and successful fundraiser out of it. Hot chocolate, chocolate beer and peppered-chocolate bits welcomed and warmed the guests. I shared nuggets about Jews...
Author, Rabbi, Author, Rabbi
The book launch party last week for On the Chocolate Trail brought together longtime friends, chocolate lovers, food writers, and rabbinic colleagues. Spirits and calendars were understandably subdued by Superstorm Sandy and by the Israel/Gaza conflict. Those able to...
4 Years for 1 Swiss Chocolate Bar
Submitted to Chocolate Chronicles by Dr. Howard Marcus I was the youngest of four children, the only boy. I had one Father and four Mothers. We owned one large Swiss chocolate bar. When World War I broke out in 1914, my Father showed us children the bar and said you...
Ethics-Minded Confectioners Work to Keep Chocolate Sweet
This week will haunt Jewish parents with ambivalence about ghoulish begging for treats and taunt many of us with temptations of free, sugary treats. Despite my inner Halloween scrooge, my children enjoyed creative costuming and hoarding of the goodies as kids....
Hot Chocolate for Cold Sukkot Nights
This year make room for chocolate in your Sukkot celebration. Sukkot’s theme of openness symbolized by the leafy ceiling and flimsy walls tempts creative approaches to menus, decorations, and customs. Deuteronomy 16:14’s challenge “v’samachta b’chagecha" (to rejoice...
Jewish Ritual Chocolate FAQ’s
I was surprised to learn that another topic omitted from my Jewish education--all the years of religious school to seminary to the active rabbinate--I had no idea that Jewish texts discussed chocolate. It turns out that they do. In Jewish literature’s legal genre...
Milk Chocolate for Shavuot
Shavuot’s dairy customs celebrating the revelation of Torah at Mt. Sinai beckon me towards milk chocolate. As Janna Gur, Chief Editor of Israel’s Al Hashulchan–The Israeli Gastronomic Monthly explained to me in a phone conversation, Israelis love chocolate and have a...
Green Chocolate in March
On St. Patrick’s Day green chocolate took on a whole new meaning for us. Green-garbed celebrants lined up outside of Boston’s Back Bay bars in the middle of the day as Mark and I walked over the Charles River for a quick chocolate factory tour in nearby Somerville....
Chocolate Secrets
I thought mine was the only one. A supply of chocolate secreted away in a drawer at the office, just in case, just a little break, just for those moments. This other drawer was disclosed to me by chance, when I spoke to the HUC-JIR First Year students about Jewish...
Peruvian Cocoa Joins Israeli Homemade Ice Cream
Chips of 96% chocolate ground with salt and coffee beans adorned the amazing homemade chocolate ice cream we tasted the other day. It is the wonderful pairing of the ice cream making mania of foodie David Leichman and the passion for food grinding of Hilaf Menachem at...
Chocolate Charity
It all started in front of the TV on Susan Melowsky’s sick day. Chocolate featured on the Cooking Channel inspired Melowsky to dream up the first Cincinnati Chocolate Festival of 2010, which turned into a project of the Isaac M. Wise Temple Sisterhood. Others say the...
Recipe Testing
The chocolate batter splattered our studio’s microwave, the stove, and the floor as Hannah Gross energetically tested chocolate recipes constrained by my primitive and limited cooking equipment. Within two hours, this amazing sister of our wonderful daughter-in-law,...
Hurricane Chocolate
Anticipating Hurricane Irene, I reviewed my chocolate resources while most people stocked food, water, meds and other necessities. Some folks anticipated entertainment needs and laid in dvd’s and books; some kept phones charged and pulled out the crank radio. I...
Musings about Chocolate and War, July 4
Best selling author Kate Simon’s memoir, Bronx Primitive: Portraits in a Childhood, speaks to the potency of wartime chocolate. Her father preceded the family to America and she records her fantasies about his life in America and her reunion with him there. From grim...
What Makes This Chocolate Different From All Other Chocolate?
Kosher L’Pesach certification does nothing to improve the quality of the chocolate for the festival celebration and actually limits choices, increases costs, diminishes taste and undermines the powerful messages of the Chag. While Passover themed chocolate in the...
Like Chocolate for Kiddush
Our family Shabbat dinner chocolate-tasting spontaneously turned into a form of kiddush (the blessing using wine which welcomes the Sabbath). In part I was thinking about Jews in Colonial period Mexico who sometimes used drinking chocolate for kiddush when wine was...
Chocolate Kitsch in Rockport, MA
Mark and I were in Rockport, Massachusetts, for the wedding of longtime family friends. There, we enjoyed many small world family and Jewish interactions which were profound in some ways and fun as well. We: met the parents of a former boyfriend of a rabbinic...
Plan B: Swiss Chocolate for Rosh HaShanah
After trying for weeks to get confirmation for our Rosh HaShanah reservation at the Pines in Fire Island–to pray in a new setting, to be with friends, to be at the beach, to have a break–we decided we had better go to our fall back option: Switzerland! So it was...
Ten Facts about Jews and Chocolate
In response to a recent request: (fuller information in my forthcoming book Jews on the Chocolate Trail: Stories of Jews and Cacao) 1. Some people think that Jews brought chocolate to France. 2. In the eighteenth century, Jews were thought to be specialists in...
Things are seldom as they seem
“Things are seldom as they seem” from Gilbert and Sullivan’s HMS Pinafore rang true as we explored England’s chocolate in Oxford, Birmingham, the Lake District and York in March of 2009. Our search for historic and significant chocolate had us schlepping 262 miles to...
Traif Temptations or Stop Being a Hazir (pig)
Perfecting the hand to mouth wandering at the Chocolate Show in NYC in Fall of 2009, I had to catch myself before I grabbed from a pile of samples of chocolate covered bacon. I pulled back just in time to avoid the traif (unacceptable food) temptation at neighboring...
Finding your bashert through chocolate matzah! It’s a family deal for Charles Chocolate
Mark and I met Charles (Chuck) Siegel, one of the sweetest guys in the sweet business of chocolate, at the New York Chocolate Show in 2007. We then visited his store and factory in December, 2007, when he not only showed us around his expansive kitchens then in...
The Chocolate Princess: Chocolate’s Arrival in Israel
The hot chocolate I tasted in December 2009 in Israel struck me as pretty flavorless. At Nona’s lovely chocolate boutique near the King David and YMCA in Jerusalem, the melted marzipan addition compensated for the chocolate deficit. That, in a proudly French style...
And Your Favorite Is…
“So, what is the best chocolate? What is your favorite chocolate?” they ask me. True, there are so many options, each wrapped in tantalizing packaging and full of calories. I explain that I do not really have a favorite brand so much as a preferred cacao percentage. ...
Church Not Paying Cost of Chocolate, Complains Minister
Today's tough economics send many of us to sweets and chocolate to find comfort on tighter budgets. Candy satisfies us today; in the Colonial Period in North America, the daily menu often included drinking chocolate. In 1747 a minister only identified as “Your humble...
The Judge’s Sweet Tooth
In the pioneering days of chocolate in our country, pastoral ministrations using chocolate took several forms. Judge Samuel Sewall, (March 28, 1652 - January 1, 1730) a Massachusetts judge involved in the Salem witch trials, (he later apologized) recorded in his diary...
Winning Some Chocolate and Losing Some Chocolate
Martine’s We recently tagged chocolate field trips to our errands and other excursions. One weekend stroll in the neighborhood took us to Martine’s (East 82nd), a very pricy outlet (not in the discount sense) of the house chocolates molded and sold at Bloomingdale’s...
Chocolate in the South?
This past April we managed a return visit to CoCo Chocolatier, as we settled into Williamsburg, Virginia, for some research about Colonial chocolate at the Rockefeller Library. A break from the data bases of early historical newspapers and library took us to...
Family Fun Day: Gomez House, Teaneck and Chocolate
Last weekend on a stormy June day (2009), Mark and I packed our barely awake Brooklyn based adult kids into a rental car for what our 26 year old called a “family fun day,” an outing to the Gomez Mill House, the oldest extant Jewish homestead in America of 1714 built...
Chocolate in Mexico
Tired from the long flight from NYC to Mexico City, via Cancun , my energy level spiked as I meandered into a Mayordomo chocolate shop at the airport. Smelling the recently ground chocolate, marveling at the piles of cocoa beans I aimed directly for several small...
Got Gelt?
In early December of 2006, my husband Mark and I discovered the roots of chocolate Chanukah gelt. That winter we drove a rental car from Brussels to Liege, Belgium, searching for a chocolate museum in the nearby town of Eupen. As we descended the hilly road that took...
Cocoa-dar
Chocolate has entered my life at fun and surprising moments, causing me to suspect cocoa-dar. One such experience occurred as my husband Mark and I traveled in 2006 in our van from Paris south on a small road to Carpentras via the towns of Dijon, Lyons, and Avignon....
Shanah Tovah u’Metukah! But, Where’s the Chocolate?
A serious chocolate lover has to wonder why Judaism today has neither serious ritual celebrations nor customs using good chocolate, especially at Rosh Hashanah when we emphasize the sweetness we anticipate and long for in the coming New Year. On Rosh Hashanah, we...
Chocolate Travel
Wherever I travel, I seek out chocolate connections with Jews. In the last couple of years, my trips to Belgium, to the southwest of France, to Spain, to Israel, to New England and elsewhere, have revolved around my chocolate research. My interest in Jews on the...
Return to Madrid
July 13, 2007 Mancerinas in Madrid Back to Madrid, examples of beautiful mancerinas—first developed by the Marques de Mancera (1639-1648) in Peru—displayed at the Museum of Decorative Arts.
Ávila
July 10, 2007 Ávila There are great pastries here, but this hot chocolate was foul.
Burgos
July 9, 2007 Burgos In Burgos, a little restaurant recommended by The Lonely Planet and even more…
Astorga
July 8, 2007 Astorga A chocolate center in the Maragateria area, with at least five chocolate stores crowded on one block. Astorga also hosts another chocolate museum! We wanted to buy this chocolate pot set, but it was not for sale. At stores everywhere these small...
Salamanca
July 6, 2007 Salamanca In Salamanca a Valor store again, one of several all over Spain where the menu offers hot chocolate from a mancerina. Despite trying very hard to find a mancerina or a chocolate pot or both at antique stores, flea markets, other chocolate...
Sevilla
July 5, 2007 Sevilla Is it too hot here for hot chocolate?? Our Cadiz chocolate friend recommended this Sevilla store to us. We, along with others, were very disappointed that it was closed, despite the fact that the hours posted indicated it should be...
Cádiz
July 3, 2007 Cádiz Here we enjoyed the Granizado de Chocolate, chocolatey and refreshing, prepared by the owner, a Russian born Israeli, now living with her Argentinian husband in Spain.
Córdoba
June 28, 2007 Córdoba In Córdoba, almost nothing.
Granada
June 27, 2007 Granada More Goodies including chocolate con churros, which we finally tried, and found a bit too greasy for us. After searching quite a bit, we finally discovered this very lovely...
Villajoyosa
June 26, 2007 Villajoyosa Then to the Valor Chocolate Factory in Villajoyosa. The largest producer of chocolate in Spain, Valor uses very sensual and almost soft core,“adult” oriented pitches to sell the chocolate. We saw Nederland Cacao powder in the...
Altea
June 24, 2007 Altea We find chocolate everywhere:
Sueca
June 24, 2007 Sueca In Valencia Province, the outdoor Sueca city map clearly identifies the Comes Chocolate Museum. Owned by fourth generation Comes family member, Pedro Melero, 400,000 people visit the museum each year. He buys his chocolate from a co-op; they decide...
Valencia
June 22 - 23, 2007 Valencia We happened upon beautiful chocolate themed ceramics at Santa Catalina Bakery and café, where we hear they have the best chocolate cake in town—
Calatayud
June 21, 2007 Calatayud In Calatayud one store surprisingly features Belgian chocolate, and another shop offers delicious chocolate covered oranges plus other delicacies named for the local ancient ruin, Bilbilis. Poblet...
Poblet
June 20, 2007 Poblet We had read a text panel at the Barcelona Chocolate Museum explaining that chocolate arrived in Spain in 1520, one year after Cortez arrived in Mexico. A Cistercian monk, Fray Aguilar, shipped chocolate with the recipe to the Monasterio de Piedra...
Barcelona
June 18 - 19, 2007 Barcelona There’s a lot of chocolate here, partly because the 18th century port welcomed ships containing chocolate cargo. It therefore had and still does, chocolate factories and chocolate stores. Some of the chocolate factories do not have...
Girona
June 17, 2007 Returning to Spain, to Girona—shucks it's closed on Sunday: But this one's not… We missed this one also, learning about it from The Lonely Planet: Narbonne...
Narbonne
June 15, 2007 …with plenty of additional chocolate options: Carcassonne Girona
Carcassonne
June 15, 2007 Carcassonne On to Carcassonne, where these neighboring stores are on the main square: Just inside the medieval walled city, amidst the tourist attractions and souvenir shops, we happily enjoyed hot chocolate, with choies of flavorings again, in a lovely...
Toulouse
June 14, 2007 We did not expect to find chocolate at all, only friends of friends with whom to spend the night and visit. Surprisingly, while searching out the one chocolate store recommended by the local Tourist Office, we found a cluster of stores in the Quartier...
Biarritz & Bayonne
June 10, 2007 The quantity of chocolate in Bayonne more than compensated for the lack in Bilbao. We arrived on Sunday, so we found the chocolate shops closed, sadly, but we did discover an Italian brand of hot chocolate at a local creperie. We planned to hit the three...
Bilbao
June 8, 2007 More hot chocolate (or tepid pudding): as well as chcoloate, covered in the logo of the city here in the pavement: We found one chocolate-only company in Bilbao, Alma de Cacao, open since 2005, with a couple of locations, fancy chocolates and other...
Aguilar de Campóo
June 7, 2007 However, in this little town with an ancient Roman fortress, for some reason, they serve hot chocolate at limited times. Segovia Bilbao
Segovia
June 6 - 7, 2007 Here we enjoy our chocolate at a place that also serves teas, coffees and ice creams. Madrid Aguilar de Campóo
Madrid
June 4, 2007 We start our chocolate tour of Spain with Chocolateria San Ginés in Madrid, with what Steve Reeves calls the best hot chocolate in Spain. It is extremely thick, as if drinking/eating chocolate pudding, and is not served with whipped cream. I learned, as...
Chocolate Welcomes Us to Spain
Chocolate, Jews and Spain share a long history. Spanish royalty enjoyed the Aztec drink Spanish explorers discovered in the early 1500s. It became so popular in Spain of the 16th and 17th centuries that chocolate houses, like cafés, developed everywhere....
On the Trail of Belgian Chocolate Museums
As I am one of those people who can barely manage for only a few days without chocolate, I am surprised to find myself overwhelmed by the amount of chocolate in Belgium. Belgium offers a very intense chocolate experience, with over 2000 chocolate makers and outlets....
Milk and Chocolate in the Promised Land
Visitors to Israel soon discover the impossibility of seeing all the sites, museums, beaches and stores, despite the small size of the country. A typical tourist visit of a week or two just cannot cover it all . Now, in addition, it is possible to add fun chocolate...
Mixing Chocolate & Work in the East Bay
As a confirmed, and perhaps certifiable, chocaholic, I have begun to include exploration of chocolate when I travel. Most recently, on a business trip to Oakland, I enjoyed much delicious chocolate in the East Bay, all located within easy reach for quick fixes....