Lots of Latkes

Ethnically speaking, I have no right to make latkes. I am less Jewish than ham on white bread with mayonnaise. The thing is, though...latkes are delightful. I haven't made them in forever, and frankly, I've never made good ones. (Go figure...) So tonight, we had latkes from a new recipe, which turned out [insert Yiddish word for delicious].

In my defense:

• I grew up in a community with lots of Jewish people, and most of my childhood friends were Jewish.

• I am from New Jersey and am uppity about bagels and knishes.

• I have watched both Fiddler on the Roof and Yentl.

I suspect that these mitigating factors do not outweigh the fact that I cannot bring myself to eat lox, and that I...you know, worship Jesus Christ. However, the Bible teaches that I have the amazing privilege (I'm not being glib--it's amazing) of having been grafted into Israel when I gave my life to the Jewish Messiah. By faith I'm going to assume that that privilege extends to cuisine.

So here we go. Recipe #6.

The only potato pancake recipe in my 21st-birthday-present-well-used Betty Crocker cookbook is for a giant pancake that you cook all at once and cut into wedges. Meh. There's very little opportunity for crispiness there, and it takes more skill than I can muster to make sure the middle is cooked but the outside isn't burned. Whichever side you err on: blech.

Turning to the world wide interweb tonight, however, I found a great recipe and, even better, an accompanying "tips" sheet from someone who used to work at the diner where the pancakes were made! These little gems were apparently made by someone named Bette whose husband used to eat them in Germany. No word on their religion. But I have to tell you--if I were Jewish, I wouldn't mind claiming these.

It took me a long time to get started with this, as I've never used the grating attachment for my food processor. Finding it (and subsequently learning how to make it work) almost led to a meltdown and an invocation of the Pizza Clause. (Pizza Clause: a provision in our marriage agreement that states that if a new dish is attempted and failed, or if other culinary misadventures cause extreme frustration, pizza can be ordered by any involved party without guilt.) I did manage to figure out the technology, though, and eventually these pretty little numbers made it to the table.





The recipe made just enough for the 5 of us, since the kids ate them (!!!!!!!!) but not ravenously. Not really "Lots of Latkes," I guess, but "An Adequate Number of Latkes" doesn't have quite the same ring.

I served them with warm applesauce spiced with cinnamon (which I told the kids about) and some instant mulling spice (knowledge of which would just frighten them needlessly). The batter (?) was pretty dry, though it kept puddling up with potato juice, necessitating more and more squeezing-dry of the mixture as it went in the pan. But when I followed the instructions and tips, it led to crispy-on-the-outside, soft-in-the center, salty goodness. The applesauce, bottled though it was, made it even better. I'm going to try them with homemade sauce the next time we pick apples. The only thing it was pretty seriously lacking was sour cream, which...I forgot at the store. If you're making these, remember the sour cream.

They took a little longer than I anticipated (even if you don't count the food processor debacle), but they were worth it, and now they're cleaned up and the kids are in bed and the house still smells warm and homey.

I'm a few days late for Hanukkah, but they were great anyway.

I'm going to put in a couple of hours at the piano. L'Chaim, everybody.