MY COOKBOOKS

Too Good To Passover is the first Passover cookbook specializing in traditional Sephardic, Judeo-Arabic, Mizrahi, and Central Asian recipes and customs (covering both pre- and post-Passover rituals) appealing to Sephardic, Mizrahi, and Ashkenazi individuals who are interested in incorporating something traditional yet new into their Seders. 

A compilation of more than 200 Passover recipes from 23 Jewish communities, this cookbook-memoir provides an anthropological as well as historical context to the ways in which the Jewish communities of North Africa, Asia, the Mediterranean, and Middle East observe and enjoy this beloved ancient festival. 

In addition to full Seder menus, Passover-week recipes, and at least one “break-fast” dish, each chapter opens up with the reflections of a few individuals from that region or territory. Readers can learn about the person’s memories of Passover as well as the varying customs regarding pre-Passover rituals, including cleaning the home of all hametz or “leavening,” Seder customs (such as reenacting the Israelites’ exodus from Egypt), or post-Passover celebrations, such as the Moroccan Mimouneh for marking the end of the week-long “bread fast.” These customs provide a more complete sense of the cultural variations of the holiday. 

Too Good To Passover is a versatile and inspiring reference cookbook, appealing to those who may want to do a different “theme” each Passover year, with possibly a Turkish Seder one year, or Moroccan one the next.

Too Good To Passover is currently available in paperback on Amazon in the United States, as well as Canada, France, Spain, Italy, Germany, and the U.K. Kindle/e-book booklets of the Africa, Asia, and Europe sections are available for purchase and download worldwide. 

A Fistful of Lentils is a cookbook about my family’s stories, history and cooking from Aleppo, Syria. Quotes and stories are interwoven throughout the recipes, along with line drawings. There is as much to read as there are recipes to cook from!

I embarked upon this cookbook project to record all of the delicious Syrian dishes that I had grown up with and was afraid would be lost over time. In the 1970s, my mother Annette and my Aunt Essie first decided to collect my great-grandmother Esther’s recipes. Carefully observing her in the kitchen and eking out as many Old World secrets as they could, they gathered a substantial number of recipes, resulting in a three-ring binder that provided us with many successful Syrian dinner parties. Thirty years later I picked up from where they left off, cooking alongside my own grandmother Fritzie, translating her “handfuls of this” and “pinchfuls of that” into standard measurements for others to follow. The stories that my grandmother Fritzie shared with me while cooking became as much a part of the experience as the cooking itself, culminating in my cookbook-memoire, A Fistful of Lentils. A labor of love from beginning to end, I hope that this cookbook serves as a torch holder of a remarkable culture that has clung to its origins with pride and tenacity over thousands of miles and many years, and that its recipes will continue to be preserved and appreciated by both present and future generations.

NOTE ABOUT THIS NEW EDITION:
This is a third (3rd) edition paperback of the original hardcover book that was first published in 2002 by Harvard Common Press Publishing. I obtained the rights back in 2018 from the publisher, and in 2020 self-published the cookbook so that it would still be available. I redesigned the layout and added several new photos of my family as well as of my grandmother’s artwork. I also updated many of the recipes and even added several new ones. I hope that you enjoy this new edition as much as the original!