Just wanted to thank everyone who checked out my blog in 2007. The common era year went out with a bang– the blog got a record 550+ hits in the month of December alone.
And now, a toast:
Filed under: adventures, jews, malden | Tags: agudas achim, bread of life, christmas, david kudan, ezrath israel, knaidlach, project ezra, soup kitchen, st. paul's church, synagogue council of massachusetts
While it is a de facto tradition for many American Jews to spend Christmas eating Chinese food and going to the movies, my family, for the last twenty years, has had its own tradition. So I went to Boston.
above: The train from New York to Boston winds its way through Queens and the Bronx as it heads north.
Almost every Christmas since I was eleven, I have gone with my family to St. Paul’s Church in my hometown of Malden, Massachusetts, to work at a feeding program for economically disadvantaged and homeless people. The program is called Project Ezra, and in Malden it’s a partnership between the Synagogue Council of Massachusetts and Bread of Life (the latter of which operates the feeding program at St. Paul’s year-round). It’s a day for Jews from local synagogues to pitch in at a time when church-going volunteers might want to be home with their family.
Exterior of St. Paul’s. It was a “white Christmas” in Boston…
Hundreds of people are served here at Christmas; hundreds of to-go meals are delivered earlier in the day to the homebound and elderly.
Towards the end of our time there, I gravitated toward the piano and had a chance to entertain some of the kids with some Christmas carols and other songs. They, in turn, entertained me with some music stylings of their own.
I was happy to meet our congregation‘s new rabbi, David Kudan and his family at St. Paul’s that day. Formerly at the Harvard Hillel and a graduate of Hampshire College, Rabbi Kudan seems like a really forward-thinking and personable guy. I’m really glad he’s at our temple and I look forward to getting to know him more.
Later that night we all had dinner, and the following morning it was back to Brooklyn for me.
That’s my mom, Harriet. Knaidlach on Christmas?? Why not!
* * *
Bread of Life offers warmth in a cold season
Filed under: Bands, music, myspace | Tags: blowin kisses, broken electric records, jewish legend, marnie stern, niagara falls, pussy, urban barnyard
Every now and then I muster the strength to go through the human- and cyborg-generated friend requests that have accumulated on my myspace page. It takes way too much time but, however few, the music delights I discover are often worth the tribulations. Last weekend’s cleaning:
Pussy *
Big pagan feast day coming up… everyone enjoy! (I know I will…)
* Actually pointed out to me by friend Taylor Bergren-Chrisman. Check out their friends– endless bands of this ilk… Amazing.
Filed under: food, manhattan | Tags: 2nd avenue deli, deli, derma, dr. brown's, gary lambert, gribenes, hashgacha, jeremy lebewohl, kishke, kosher, steve silberman
photo from savethedeli.com
****
How psyched are we, brother and sister, gentile and Jew, that the 2nd Avenue Deli reclaimed its existence in Murray Hill this past Monday? The blogosphere certainly is:
eater.com – “The people do love their pastrami.”
gawker.com – “And this, the best food-related sentence we’ve read in a while: ‘There are two things that I love but my mother always told me not to eat. I love kishke, you know, derma. And I love gribenes.'” [Quoting owner Jeremy Lebewohl]
kosherblog.net – “To avoid the apparently inevitable ‘my hashgacha [i.e., divine providence] can beat up your hashgacha’ conversation, I remind you that Kosher Blog recommends that you check with your local rabbi regarding any questions about appropriate kashrut.”
News of the reopening came to me via fellow muncher Steve Silberman who forwarded me a post on the Well by his friend Gary Lambert:
“Perfect, perfect and perfect. The Dr. Brown’s seemed like an especially
good vintage… a ’98, perhaps? The matzo balls their old
supernaturally fluffy selves, the broth just right, with that little
hint of dill. And the pastrami, with that great peppery outer rim, was
better than any I’d had at the old location in its final years — an
encouraging sign that Jeremy Lebewohl intends to make good on his pledge
to not simply reopen the deli, but to reverse any slippage that occurred
after Uncle Abe’s death and restore the family business to its glorious
peak.”
Jeremy Lebewohl: Birth of a Deli Man
Hebrew School 