If “Jewish food” and healthy sound like they don’t belong in the same sentence, let alone the same kitchen, read on: believe us, kosher cooking ain’t what it used to be – take our Rainbow Breakfast bowl recipe above for starters.
Since this is our first post, perhaps we should introduce ourselves. We’re Judi and Jackie, the Curly Cousins. Our family, The Roses, is something of a culinary dynasty. Judi’s the daughter of the legendary Jewish chef and food writer, Evelyn Rose MBE, and our dads, Eric and Myer Rose, were first cousins (which makes us second cousins.) Jackie’s a family doctor with a special interest in nutrition and healthy eating, and Judi is a cookbook writer and chef instructor. Jackie lives in North Manchester. and after 20 years in Manhattan, Judi moved back to the UK and now lives in West London where she’s also planning to running cooking courses and supper clubs.
THE PROJECT
We’re writing a book called Lokshen Horror – part cookbook, part guide to healthy eating in the kosher kitchen based on emerging research about the connections between what you eat and how you feel, with lots of info about ingredients and what they can do for – and to your health. Why the title? Well lohshen horeh is a phrase from the Hebrew bible that literally means “the evil tongue.” And of course lokshen is a traditional Jewish noodle pudding – heavy, loaded with fat and sugar, not exactly what you’d call health food. In fact from a nutritional point of view, it’s pretty horrifying.
FROM FRESH TO FRESH
Like many unhealthy foods, however, lokshen is also delicious. Could we update it to something delicious and health-giving? In fact could we do the same thing with other classic Ashkenazi recipes, not to mention dishes from Israeli and Jewish communities around the world too? Could we take Jewish cooking and our readers-to-be on a delicious journey from fress to fresh?
Evelyn Rose was beloved by her fans because her recipes always work. That’s because she made every one of them over and over, testing, tweaking, adjusting until she was satisfied they were fail-proof. And that’s what we’re about to do with the recipes for Lokshen Horror. We’ll also post some of the latest research we’ve come across about diet and nutrition with a Jewish twist. We hope you’ll join us on our adventure.
P.S. Please note we changed the title of our book to ‘To Life! Healthy Jewish Food’ after asking the audience at Limmud which title they preferred.
Judi and Jackie
