h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Just some minor things:

(1)
I haven't looked at the Chabad site Dmitri linked to, and I supposed it might be useful, but I do not endorse it on matters of principle. Chabad are one of the worst ultra-orthodox sects out there, in my opinion (and not just the nutty sub-sect, the ones that insist their latest Lubavitcher Rebbe was the Messiah, and he's not actually dead [he's just resting... okay, no Python quotes]). They represent one of the more extremely fundamentalist sides of Judaism, they proselytise like mad, and they have practically taken over some of the Jewish communities abroad (my mum has seen it in Brasil), instilling their Ashkenazi, Hassidic, extremist version of Judaism in place of whatever the community had before.
I'd rather refer people to That Other Guide (Wikipedia) for more info, instead of sending them to Chabad. And I'll try finding some secular Jewish resources as well.

On a lighter note:
(2)
In case you've been wondering what the letters on the dreidl _actually_ stand for - before they were given the 'Nes Gadol' explanation - they are part of the gambling game, and stand for the following Yiddish words (Dmitri, I hope I got the transliteration okay, I tried looking online but I'm not sure I found the right sources):
N = Nicht (nothing) = No loss, no gain.
G = Gut (good) = Win everything
H = Halb (half) = Win half (obvious, innit? )
SH = Schlecht (bad) = Lose everything

(3)
I think my note abbout the Maccabees vs. Greeks match is a bit clumsy; what I meant is that often, there's such a match arranged around Hannukah. Or it might have been a coincidence (I'm not an avid follower of sports, you see), but when it's around the holiday, everyone always brings up the Hannukah thing.
The Maccabees don't always win, though. *shrug*

That's the only decent secular resource I could find in English do far: http://www.culturaljudaism.org/ccj/jlc/C1/8

Wiki might be your best bet, even if it isn't the real Guide...

Hey, Lady P.

I'm sorry I offended your sensibilities with that Chabad site. I'll go back and find another source for next week. Obviously, I'm not beating the drum for Ultra-Orthodox sects. My best friends have always been from Reform temples for obvious reasons. Like they don't think I have cooties. (How's that for a translation of 'sheygets'?)

While I have you on the line......

I've got the songs for next week, but I need a jelly doughnut recipe from you for week 3. Maybe with commentary? A Talmud on jelly doughnuts?

I'll do the latkes. I can actually do latkes.I have actually had latkes for Hanukkah...

Thanks for the dreydl translation. Watch the 'Writing Right' column next week for a story excerpt from Scholem Aleichem on that very subject.

Or even a non-jelly doughnut. (Thinking of Carnival, there...)

No worries, about Chabad. Like I said, it might be a useful source, I just don't really endorse their brand of Judaism, and felt it might be a good idea to warn readers.
In the meanwhile, I found another non-ultra-orthodox source, here: http://www.interfaithfamily.com/holidays/hanukkah_and_christmas/A_Guide_to_Hanukkah_and_the_December_Dilemma_for_Interfaith_Families.shtml
They're kinda centered on the whole interfaith thing (hence the 'dilemma' in the title), and their 'historical roots' segment still focuses on the description of the holiday as celebrating escape from religious oppression, and talks about Jews being forced to eat pork or to pray to idols (I'm not sure how much current historical research supports these descriptions; personally, I tend toward thinking it was mostly a matter of local politics), but it's not bad.

As for the doughnuts, well, they aren't really my forte either (I occasionally eat some, but they tend to be _much_ too sweet; and it involves too much of a mess and deep-frying to make at home). But I do happen to have a rather wonderful cookbook of Jewish Eastern European food, called Schmaltz[], which includes a recipe for sufganiyot, or ponchkes - the Hebrew and Yiddish names (respectively) of these holiday doughnuts. In an on-the-spot free translation, the recipe (and its rather enlightening introduction) goes as follows:

>>
Ponchkes were not born as a Hannukah dish. They got this status only in Zionistic Israel[]. They are originally from Central and Eastern Europe, where they were known as... a Christmas pastry[]. Jews served swwet and savory latkes on Hanukkah. Therefore, whenever my mother would make her traditional sufganiyot on Hanukkah, Grandma Fruma would mumble 'darkey ha-goyim, darkey ha-goyim'[].

Ingredients:
4 cups flour [translator's note (at least it's not a footnote!): 1 cup = 200 ml]
40g fresh yeast
1 cup warm milk
1/3 cup sugar
2 large eggs
100g melted butter
Pinch of salt
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup strawberry jam or powidel [translator's note: a kind of plum jam)
Powdered suga]
2 litres sunflower or other vegetable oil

1. Soak the yeast in a bowl with 2 tablespoons milk, 1 teaspoon sugar and 1 tablespoon flour. Leave it for about 10 minutes to ferment and rise.
2. Put flour, yeast mixture, warm milk, sugar, eggs, melted butter, salt and vanilla in the bowl of a stand mixer and knead with a dough hook for about 15 minutes, for a soft flexible dough.
3. Cover with a towel or clingfilm and leave to rise in a warm place for about an hour, until it doubles in volume.
4. Knead the dough to let out the air. Leave it covered again to rise until it doubles.
5. Roll the dough to about 1.5 cm thickness, then cut circles out of it, about 8 cm wide (you can use a glass).
6. Put a teaspoonfull of jam on a circle, cover with another circle, pinch well to close, and then place on a tray or baking pan. Repeat. When the pan is full, cover with a towel and leave to rise until the sufganiyot double in volume.
7. Heat the oil in a large pot. When it's hot, drop in the sufganiyot and fry for about 4 minutes on each side, until they are fully browned. If they brown too quickly, reduce the heat.
8. Remove from pot with a slotted spoon and place on paper towels to absorbe the oil. Sprinkle generously with powdered sugar and serve immediately.

[Credit: Shmil Holland. And his mum, I guess.]


[] To those readers who aren't as knowledgeable as Dmitri, Schmaltz is the Yiddish name for rendered fat - usually goose or chicken fat - which is a staple of Jewish Eastern European cuisine. , if you ask me...
[] That bit might be more accurately translated 'in Eretz Yisrael of the New Yishuv period', but this is getting a bit specific and I don't feel like explaining all these terms (you can look them up); and since it basically refers to the area of Israel and to the early period of Zionism, I figured 'Zionistic Israel' should be good enough.
[] See here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pączki - although they claim it's actually more traditional on Fat Tuesday. But I'm sure they're happily eaten in Christmas, too. The name is of course basically the same as the Yiddish version; the Hebrew name is, not to go into too many linguistic notes, based on the same root as the English 'sponge', due to the fact that the dough is sponge-like and absorbes the oil. Also, it's a cute name.
[] Literally: 'Ways of the gentiles, ways of the gentiles'. Okay, I promise I'm done with these footnotes.



This is getting lengthy. I'll add the rest of what I was going to say in a new message.

Of course, there are all sorts of fried pastries that aren't 'ponchkes', as you said - the more Levantine versions are basically various forms of deep-fried dough, usually served soaked in syrup. Things like the Moroccan 'sfinj', or the more generally Middle-Eastern 'zalabieh' (or 'awameh', depending on whom you ask). You can look up recipes for those. They're okay, if you like very sweet deep-fried dough.


But also, in modern-day Israel, the sorta-traditional sufganiyot have evolved way beyond just jam. The jam-filled, powdered-sugar-covered ones are still the most common (in fact, they start appearing on markets somewhere around September), but bakeries go nuts trying to create more and more creative versions. The least of these are just getting a different filling, like chocolate or vanilla cream or dulce de leche; the slightly more advanced add some frosting, inspired by the American donuts; and then you have... well, look at this picture, first:
http://www.nrg.co.il/images/archive/300x225/1/002/189.jpg
The article it's taken from lists varieties like pistachio, banoffee (called an 'Indian sufganiyah', for some reason), Irish cream & Halva, araq-infused white chocolate ganache with white chocolate frosting, or their 'Brasilian sufganiyah', filled with chocolate ganache with coconut milk and Kahlua and frosted with chocolate and coconut flakes.

This is just madness. Indulgent, overly-sweet madness.

This is great. I'm kvelling over here.

And thanks for that link, I will work it in.

I just need to find a sung bit for the brachot.

You've gotta remember that I don't know as much Yiddish as you (and that many of the Yiddish words that made it into English did not make it into Hebrew)...
Did look up 'kvelling', though, so hey, I learnt a new thing!

So, to counter with a bit of Ladino: bendichos manos!
(Literally, 'bless your hands'; means something like 'good job'.)


[Disclaimer: This is about all the Ladino I know.]

Mine, too.

Elektra and I took a djudezmo course in Athens, at the Jewish Museum. The PhD candidate who was teaching was a Parisian-based woman from Morocco, originally.

She spoke French. We listened. When I wanted to ask her a question, it was:

'Do you speak English?' 'Non.'
'Do you speak German?' 'Non.'
'Do you speak Greek?' 'Non.'
'Do you speak Yiddish?' (Hideous face.) 'NON!'
'Okay, listen to me butcher French.'

Lovely girl. I learned a lot about the Mediterranean Sephardic community.

De-lurking...

Hi there, I'm so glad to read this, and one of these years I'd like to learn Yiddish... it transpired that my catholic grandmother from Wien was Jewish, and spoke Yiddish to my youngest uncle. Purely selfish reasons you see

It doesn't matter what your reason is - whenever you learn it, you're helping to preserve a cultural heritage.

The older folks appreciate it, too, being able to talk, to pass things on...

Elektra's the same way. She only learned that her Lithuanian Catholic grandmother was Jewish much later. Actually, *after* she started learning Yiddish with me. Just because.

Yes well it was a bit of a secret that my mother's mother was probably Jewish as well but they assimilated themselves with Polish Catholics here in the US rather than with the Lithuanian's. My Granduncle's name was Aaron and one of the cousins became a nun. I always regret that I didn't ask intelligent questions of them about the old country before they came to America. But when you are a kid you tend to be very temporarily provincial and you don't really think that a world existed before you entered it!

I was in a production of Fiddler on the Roof last year, and one or two of the cast did speak some Yiddish. We had lots of fun with it, but you feel very limited when your most used phrase is Oy gewalt... I think my favourite scene was the Shabbat prayer, lighting of candles.

I like that song, too.

That's a wonderful story, Milla. I've been tempted to learn Yiddish at some point, because it just seems like such a fun language - it has some of the most creative curses I've ever seen from example (the best one I heard of is 'May you swallow an umbrella and may it open in your stomach' , but please don't ask me for the original Yiddish of that one, because I have no idea what it is). However, there's a whole list of other languages I need to learn first, for academic reasons (French, German) or for my family (Portuguese)...
But maybe someday.

Dad says that his mum used to say "Verfluchtene Schachtel" (D*mn box) to people she got annoyed with, but I wouldn't know if it was general Wiener slang, or yiddish...

You know, I don't know. Let's ask Tavaron if it's Viennese.

A favourite expression: 'I need that oyfn kapores.'

For a chicken sacrifice...this being the most useless thing imaginable to the Jews, who a) had no temple any more, and b) never sacrificed chickens.

Now, I had some Muslim students from the Pomax region of northern Greece. Their families DID sacrifice chickens. So I thought it was funny.

The interesting thing is that the 'kapores' thing is actually an example of a scarifice that _does_ go on. The Hebrew name is 'kaparot', which means 'atonements' - and that can give you an idea of when it's done (on Yom Kippur, Atonement Day).
It's actually mostly a superstitious custom, rather than an actual religious commandment or anything, but sadly very popular in Orthodox communities. The basic idea is, you take a chicken (a hen for females, a co---err, a rooster for males), you chant some words over it, and hey presto, all your sins have been transferred to the bird. Then you kill it. This doesn't exempt you from fasting or praying, of course; it's just... I don't even know what the point is. Frankly, it looks to me like just a bit of ridiculous pagan leftovers, and I have no idea why these black-clad oddballs haven't shaken it yet (it _has_ been frowned upon by some big Rabbis, and there have been some attempts to convince the communities that giving money to charity is a valid equivalent, but the custom is still alive).

So, if it actually _is_ being sacrificed, why is the 'kapores' still the name of a worthless thing? My guess is, because you don't get to cook it. Now that's just a waste of chicken.


(Also interesting to note is that with Levantine Jews, 'kapara' is actually a term of endearment. I think the basic reasoning behind this is not 'you are like a think for kaparot', but more 'may I be your kaparot', i.e. 'you are the apple of my eye, I am willing to sacrifice myself for your wellbeing', or something like this.)

Hey, thanks for that story, Lady P.

Now, the Yiddish teacher who taught me that about the kapores was raised Orthodox. In Brooklyn. (She wore a wig, because she was a married lady. Nice wig, though.)

Now, she said nobody did that. So maybe her group didn't believe in it?

The Pomax people use the chicken sacrifice to placate mountain spirits before taking gold from the Rhodope Mountains. Or to determine the best location for a new house. You put the blood in a dish on the site. If the family pet (dog or cat) refuses to lick the blood, this is a bad omen.

this thread is an example of exactly why I wanted to be involved with h2g2 again. Fantastic stuff as was the original article. Indeed there is so much information in the thread, it is almost worth bundling it back up into another article. Tone, interest, kindness, respect, wonderful. Has made my evening. Best Robbie