My Happy Hamentashen

My Happy Hamentashen is the delicious sequel to the childhood favorite, My Mushy Matzah Ball. An endearing book featuring more traditional Jewish foods filled with adorable babies and plenty of heart. My Happy Hamentashen can stand alone or be read in concert with My Mushy Matzah Ball and is ideal for ages 0-3.

During the fall leading up to her bat mitzvah, Tara (Hindi for “star”) Feinstein has a lot more than her Torah portion on her mind. Between Hebrew school and study sessions with the rabbi, there doesn’t seem to be enough time to hang out with her best friend Ben-O—who might also be her boyfriend—and her other best friend, Rebecca, who’s getting a little too cozy with the snotty Sheila Rosenberg. Not to mention working on her robotics project with the class clown Ryan Berger, or figuring out what to do with a priceless heirloom sari that she accidentally ruined. Amid all this drama, Tara considers how to balance her Indian and Jewish identities and what it means to have a bat mitzvah while questioning her faith. With the cross-cultural charm of Bend It Like Beckham, this delightful debut novel is a classic coming-of-age story and young romance with universal appeal. Praise for My Basmati Bat Mitzvah "In my opinion, My Basmati Bat Mitzvah shows that everyone is different in their own way and some get the advantage of being culturally diverse. I rate the book 5 stars!" —Shivani Desai, age 13 STARRED REVIEW "The latest spunky heroine of South Asian–Jewish heritage to grace middle-grade fiction, Tara Feinstein, 12, charms readers from the get-go in this strong, funny debut." —Kirkus Reviews, starred review "Tara’s inquisitiveness, openness, and determination to chart her own path stand out in this warm story of family, faith and the ways people are unique yet intertwined." —Publishers Weekly "With a conversational and authentic tween voice, Tara invites readers into her world as she explores the larger issues of faith, compassion, and tradition while confronting the awkwardness that is puberty—her questions regarding God are poignant and relatable while her opinions on training bras are simply spot-on..." —The Bulletin of The Center for Children’s Books "Authors often mention but then shrink from exploring in depth their characters’ mixed religious heritage; it’s a sensitive subject that demands close scrutiny. Freedman bucks that trend, avoiding didacticism by portraying broader issues through Tara’s personality and unique circumstances. As Tara learns in this skillful exploration, an important source of her special strengths—questioning spirit, empathy and strong ethical compass—is her mixed heritage." —The Jewish Daily Forward "This story will have resonance for many children of many faiths at the cusp of religious adulthood." —Booklist "As she makes her way through these challenges, she learns a great deal about friendship, family, and heritage. Freedman handles the ethnic and religious diversity of Tara’s family and friends with a light touch, but doesn’t shrink from exploring some of the complexities of a dual heritage." —School Library Journal "This book’s well-drawn characters bring two colorful cultures to vibrant life. The contemporary urban setting, cast with touches of humor and romance, frame mature ideas of peer and self-acceptance in a familiar, lighthearted world. Middle grade girls will readily befriend Tara and pick up new cultural understanding." —Library Media Connection

The updated edition of a kitchen classic, now with 30 new recipes for favorite savory holiday dishesKeep age-old holiday traditions alive and start delicious new ones withA Treasury of Jewish Holiday Baking, nominated for a Julia Child Cookbook Award. Professional pastry chef and BetterBaking.com creator, Marcy Goldman has lovingly assembled a comprehensive collection of easy-to-follow, time-tested recipes from one of the world's great baking traditions, from sweet raisin challah for Rosh Hashanah to apricot-filled Hamantaschen for Purim and velvety Shabbat marble cake. Now bring the warmth of the holidays into your own home with hundreds of easy-to-follow, time-tested recipes, certain to bring back old memories and create new ones.

Festive desserts and snacks for Passover, Purim, and more: “Great recipes, tons of practical information . . . and picture-perfect photographs.” —Susie Fishbein, author of Kosher by Design Paula Shoyer offers a thoroughly modern approach to Jewish holiday baking that includes both contemporary and traditional recipes, including 45 that have been skillfully adapted for Passover. Even less-observant Jews will enjoy celebrating the holidays with these innovative and delectable desserts, including an exquisite Raspberry and Rose Macaron Cake—plus dozens of low-sugar, gluten-free, and nut-free treats to enjoy all year. This comprehensive collection of delicious, fail-proof baked goods, both dairy and parve, revolutionizes holiday desserts for the High Holy Days, Shavuot, Purim, Sukkot, Chanukah, and Passover. Praise for The Kosher Baker “Outstanding . . . a can’t-miss collection.” —Publishers Weekly (starred review)

My Mushy Matzah Ball is a delicious picture book that connects families through Jewish comfort foods & love. With endearing words and vibrant illustrations, this children's book is sure to be an instant favorite!As a special treat, this 2nd edition features Yaya's popular Matzah Ball Soup recipe.

You've met the latkes, you've met the matzah...now it's time to meet the hamantaschen in this zany Purim story! There's a problem with Purim! The Purim play is about to start, but the megillah is missing! Without the scroll that recounts the Purim story, how can the show go on? Never fear: three determined hamantaschen— DETECTIVES! Right. Three determined DETECTIVES are on the case. With the help of a mysterious stranger and a few disguises, the detectives uncover the facts so the true story of Purim can be told. In this companion to Meet the Latkes and Meet the Matzah, holiday mistellings have never been so fun.

Named one of the Best Cookbooks of the Year by Food & Wine, The Boston Globe, The Los Angeles Times, The New York Times, The San Francisco Chronicle, USA Today, The Washington Post, and more Israeli baking encompasses the influences of so many regions—Morocco, Yemen, Germany, and Georgia, to name a few—and master baker Uri Scheft seamlessly marries all of these in his incredible baked goods at his Breads Bakery in New York City and Lehamim Bakery in Tel Aviv. Nutella-filled babkas, potato and shakshuka focaccia, and chocolate rugelach are pulled out of the ovens several times an hour for waiting crowds. In Breaking Breads, Scheft takes the combined influences of his Scandinavian heritage, his European pastry training, and his Israeli and New York City homes to provide sweet and savory baking recipes that cover European, Israeli, and Middle Eastern favorites. Scheft sheds new light on classics like challah, babka, and ciabatta—and provides his creative twists on them as well, showing how bakers can do the same at home—and introduces his take on Middle Eastern daily breads like kubaneh and jachnun. The instructions are detailed and the photos explanatory so that anyone can make Scheft’s Poppy Seed Hamantaschen, Cheese Bourekas, and Jerusalem Bagels, among other recipes. With several key dough recipes and hundreds of Israeli-, Middle Eastern–, Eastern European–, Scandinavian-, and Mediterranean-influenced recipes, this is truly a global baking bible.

The former owner/proprietor of the beloved appetizing store on Manhattan’s Lower East Side tells the delightful, mouthwatering story of an immigrant family’s journey from a pushcart in 1907 to “New York’s most hallowed shrine to the miracle of caviar, smoked salmon, ethereal herring, and silken chopped liver” (The New York Times Magazine). When Joel Russ started peddling herring from a barrel shortly after his arrival in America from Poland, he could not have imagined that he was giving birth to a gastronomic legend. Here is the story of this “Louvre of lox” (The Sunday Times, London): its humble beginnings, the struggle to keep it going during the Great Depression, the food rationing of World War II, the passing of the torch to the next generation as the flight from the Lower East Side was beginning, the heartbreaking years of neighborhood blight, and the almost miraculous renaissance of an area from which hundreds of other family-owned stores had fled. Filled with delightful anecdotes about how a ferociously hardworking family turned a passion for selling perfectly smoked and pickled fish into an institution with a devoted national clientele, Mark Russ Federman’s reminiscences combine a heartwarming and triumphant immigrant saga with a panoramic history of twentieth-century New York, a meditation on the creation and selling of gourmet food by a family that has mastered this art, and an enchanting behind-the-scenes look at four generations of people who are just a little bit crazy on the subject of fish. Color photographs © Matthew Hranek