OP: Love and Knishes
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The Vanguard Press, New York, 1956. Hardcover. Near Fine/Very Good.
Love and Knishes (1956) is solidly ranked among the most beloved American Jewish cookbooks and has been a frequent request from customers for decades. It is easy to see why. Bursting with all the quick-witted humor and long-suffering snark of a seasoned Jewish bubbe, Kasdan, a then 45-year-old woman from Louisville, nails the recognizable persona. It is not caricature, however, but a nostalgic homage to the people and way of life that Kasdan sought to preserve through recipes, as “Good food is to eat, not just to remember.”
While many of the dishes here will be familiar, at least in name, to those of Ashkenazi descent, the rest invite you to make them so—enticing, hearty, and comforting. You will find among them:
- Einlauf—thin noodle batter, slowly dripped directly into soups like egg drop and chicken noodle
- Stuffed cabbage, aka praakes, halishkes, galuptzi, and gevikelte kraut
- Goose liver with grebenes (chicken cracklings)
- Kishuim—summer squash and rice casserole
- Tayglech—doughballs boiled in honey, tossed, in this case, with pecans and sprinkled with bourbon water—“This recipe makes enough…for company, but not enough for a bar mitzvah.”
Wonderful writing and eating. From the dedication page: “If the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach, then knishes will get there faster…and stay longer.”
Our copy has a Near Fine book block, totally clean and crisp. The jacket is intact, though it bears a 1.5” closed tear to the front. Black and white illustrations by Louis Slobodkin.
