Thursday, February 21, 2013

Purim is Almost Here: Ultimate Hamantaschen from Joan Nathan


According to an article by Joan Nathan in Tablet, the online magazine, hamantaschen, Purim’s traditional triangular cookies, are relatively new to the Jewish gastronomic scene. They most likely originated in Bohemia, in what is now the Czech Republic, just two or three centuries ago. 
Nathan, author of ten cookbooks and a regular contributor to The New York Times, Food Arts Magazine, and Tablet Magazine, writes:
The earliest American recipe I could find for mohn maultaschen (poppy seed tartlets, which we would recognize as hamantaschen) was in 1889’s “Aunt Babette’s” Cookbook: Foreign and Domestic Receipts for the Household—published by Edward Bloch, who was from the Bohemian village of Grafenried.
There aren’t that many ingredients, but that doesn’t stop bakers from having intense preferences; you’ll hear about mine in the video. However you make them, though, there’s one rule to follow: Save a few for yourself.
Editor’s note: The recipe calls for 1 teaspoon of baking powder, not 1 tablespoon as indicated in the text of the video.


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