Kefir - Not Your Mamma's Yogurt

Kefir Starter Grains

Last week I told you how my mom's friend, Liz, taught her to make kombucha. Today I'll tell you haw my mom made kefir, a fermented milk* beverage. You can probably find kefir in the dairy section of your local health food store. But why buy it when it's so easy to make?

*Kefir can be made from animal (cow, goat, buffalo) milk, as well as coconut water and other vegan 'milk' (soy, rice, almond, etc.).

Add milk.

Compared with kombucha, kefir is incredibly fast to make, and kefir starter grains are comparably easier to acquire than a kombucha 'mother'. But unlike kombucha, we don't recommend you start your kefir and then go out of town for a few weeks! Dairy milk takes less than 24 hours to ferment; non-dairy liquids take closer to two days.

My mom found this kefir starter on the internet, but you can also get starter grains from any neighborly kefir maker. Liz started my mom out with some kefir starter grains in a clean glass jar. The grains look a little bit like the cauliflower or the curds in cottage cheese.

"Kohl-slaw" Kohlrabi Salad

My whole family loved this, from my 1 year old to 7.5 year old, and my gluten-free, soy-free guest. My one regret is it's so boring looking. Next time I will have to add a little shredded raw beets, bell peppers, or carrots.

• 3 Tbsp toasted sesame oil
• 2 Tbsp rice wine vinegar
• 2 tsp sea salt (or tamari sauce)
• 1-2 tsp Fresh ginger - grated
• 1.5 Tbsp natural sugar (substitute stevia, agave, or Splenda, or use less sugar for diabetics)
• optional: fresh grated garlic or garlic powder
• optional: hot water
• 2 heads/bulbs of kohlrabi
• 1-2 (preferably firm, green) apples 
• 1-2+ radishes (I used one giant one, like bigger than your average beet) (optional)
• optional: shred something with color (something edible, of course!)

A walk in Tel Aviv, lunch at Armando

I had a lovely day today with my guest. We began by heading through Shuk HaCarmel, the crowded outdoor market in the center of Tel Aviv. Next door to the shuk is an area packed with fabric, notions, and trimmings stores, were there is a large arts and crafts fair held every Tuesday and Friday. When our tummies got bored of fabric and crafts, we headed down Allenby Street and made a right on the Tayelet, the promenade along the beach. It was worth the walk!

I'm a sucker for all you can eat salad spreads. At Armando, included in the price of an entree are 16 salads, bread, and a surprise bowl of fruit for dessert. Yes, I said sixteen!

Upon our waiter's recommendation, I ordered the European Sea Bass baked in rock salt (no, it's not salty!) and my friend got grilled Seabream. Both fish were delicious, fresh, moist, and tasty. However, the "architecture" of my baked bass was easier to navigate. It can take a little practice to navigate a whole fish. (For a tour, watch five and a half minutes into the first video on Fish: Dress, Bake, Eat.) Or take me out to lunch and I'll take out the bones for you; but I might use my fingers!

I'm glad we sat at a table for four, or we never could have fit all that food. The waiter placed the potatoes right on top of the other salads!

Below: Clockwise from top left, spicy carrots, roasted red peppers, shredded beets, eggplant (with other veggies or something, really yummy), spicy cooked beets, and shredded carrots.

Southwest Chicken Salad

I have a special guest arriving today with multiple dietary challenges, including

• gluten free
• soy free
• egg free
• dairy free
• peanut free
• low fat

among other allergies and dietary requirements. She even has an intolerance for iodine; so she can't eat seaweed!

I wanted to make something that we could all enjoy on Shabbat, and that my guest could also eat when she comes. My husband went crazy for this. Inspired by Pressure Perfect by Lorna Sass, I created this festive low-fat chicken salad. I've done lots of gluten-free, egg-free experimenting in the last month. I hope to post some of those ideas this month, so stay tuned!

Are You My Mother?

I've been a little obsessed lately with the idea of naturally "cultured" or fermented foods and drinks, but I haven't actually made anything. I really enjoyed learning about the beer-making process; however, I think my husband would be too scared to even allow me to keep a little kimchi on the counter.

My mom, on the other hand, has been chomping on chia seeds, sprouting, and juicing her own wheat grass for some time now. We had both been reading a lot about the positive health effects of eating fermented foods that contain large numbers of probiotics. While I was piling extra sauerkraut on my falafel, my mom has been guzzling Kombucha, a fermented tea drink, and mixing her muesli with kefir, a fermented milk yogurt-type drink. (Check back next week to learn about kefir.)

My mom had been purchasing both of these products at her local health food market when her friend, Liz, offered to teach her how to make them. I sent her with strict instructions to take lots of pictures and give me the full report.

The Vegetarian's Dilemma

Do you tell your hosts you're a vegetarian? 

Many say, you don't want them to go through any trouble and you can just eat the side dishes. I say YES, YES, PLEASE TELL!

1. (Unless you are a vegetarian or vegan purely for health reasons) isn't having someone purchase meat on your behalf half as bad as eating it?

2. What's so bad about influencing your hosts menu? If you believe in the cause, wouldn't you prefer your host serves more plant-based foods?

3. Your host wants to please you. A good host plans a meal around what she hopes her guests will enjoy. A lot of thought goes into this and if you can steer your host in the right direction, it is helpful.

Rosh Hashana Menu

Beginning with Shabbat, tomorrow night, through the second day of Rosh Hashana, on Tuesday, there are six festive meals with barely one day to cook in between.  Since I'm having guests for five of those meals, I thought I might want to plan a menu. I don't want my the two young men staying with us to get hungry over the next six days and I want to make sure we have enough FRESH foods left for our big meal on Tuesday. I've had my hands quite full with my non-cooking activities, so I'll be relying on store-bought challah and dips, and uber-simple dessert.

Thankfully, most of my shopping is done, but I'm hoping to go to the shuk (market) tomorrow for fresh salmon and vegetables.

Pesto Zucchini

Here's my provisional menu:

Friday night

• Turkey with tomato sauce, red wine, mushrooms, olives, and basil
• Challah and dips
• Rice
• Lightly roasted zucchini with pesto sauce
• Dessert: Mango

Homebrewing - Part 2: The Process, Amazing Hops, Useful links

This is the second post in our series on brewing beer at home, by special guest, award winning brewer Boaz Harel.  CLICK HERE to read Part 1: Why make your own beer?

One little piece of advice before you forge forth: Looking at all this stuff can be intimidating, and it's easy to get overwhelmed or feel like this is too complicated for you to do. It's not. Making beer is easy. Primitive stone age people did it 6000 years ago with clay pots and a bonfire, it it worked fine. The only difference now is that we've got much better equipment, and many more people to help you if you get stuck.

Using Wort Extract by Jason Pratt

In the Part 1 I discussed why you should brew your own beer at home. Now, I'm going to talk about the basic process of brewing, and try to tackle some of the common questions of new homebrewers. If you are familiar with the process (or are just impatient) you can skip to the links at the bottom of the post for more concrete instructions and resources for brewing at home. 

Let’s start with the most basic question: What does brewing involve, exactly? Well, simply put, when you brew you take the sugars and flavors from malted grain, mix it with water, boil, season to taste, cool, and ferment. See? It's simple! Now go brew!

Ok, so maybe it's not as simple as it sounds. To get the sugar out of the grain you have to rinse it out with water at specific temperatures for specific times, using the twin processes of "mashing" (soaking the grain) and "luthering" (rinsing the grain and filtering out the particles). Doing this at home means that you start with a bunch of dry grain and end up with a big pot's worth of grain-flavored sugar water, known as "wort." When you start your brewing from grain you are using "all-grain" brewing.

Argentine Family Traditions

Zeide and me drinking Mate on the back porch

Today would have been my grandfather's 81st birthday. He passed away October 19, 2011, a few days before my son was born. Pablo Hackman, my Zeide (we called him by the Yiddish word for grandfather), was born in Poland and moved to Argentina as a baby. There he married my grandmother "Lala" and they had two kids before moving the family to New York. I wanted to celebrate his birthday by reminiscing about a typical family gathering.

Our food and get-togethers were very much influenced by Argentine culture. And Argentine culture is influenced by Italian culture. We ate lots of pasta, and said "ciao," and probably did lots of other things I don't realize are more Italian that South American. I grew up in Florida, living near my grandparents and my Aunt Monica's family. We got together often to enjoy asado Argentine barbecue.

We would all meet at Lala and Zeide's house in the afternoon. We might sit outside by the pool, or inside with a soccer game on the TV. At some point, maybe in the afternoon, my grandparents would prepare mate (mah-TAY) for us to share. (I was going to make this whole post about yerba mate, but that will wait for another day.)

Quick Electrolyte Drink

It's hot outside! It is so hot that running simple errands can take a lot out of me. Do you ever feel so thirsty and exhausted, but water just isn't cutting it? When I return home from a sweaty walk, this is what I like to put in my water bottle:

• 2-3 lemon slices
• a little drizzle of agave syrup (maybe 1 teaspoon)
• TINY pinch of low-sodium salt substitute. Read the ingredients. You want something with sodium AND potassium. I use something that is half sea salt (sodium chloride) and half potassium chloride.
• ice
• water