“Jobs must be our focus in 2010,” President Obama said last night to thunderous applause during his State of the Union address. “We can put Americans to work today to build the America of tomorrow.”

Hope oozed out of his eloquent speech. But I had spent my morning at the local Unemployment Office in the office of a pasty Career Counselor whose doughy hands gripped my resume. “So what do you do?” With ten years' worth of work experience, I’ve run successful political campaigns, helped get innocent people out of prison, helped stop gun traffickers and written scathing white papers on the pharmaceutical industry. Yet right before Rosh Hashanah, after winning a successful campaign helping people who were injured by defective products, I came into work to find my office cleaned out and a “I’m sorry, we have no more money to pay you” speech. My office had been near Wall Street so after all the months of seeing the six-figure investment bankers doing the walk of shame with their boxes filled with their personal items after being handed their walking papers, I was the one going home at 10:00am with a tiny severance package and my personal effects in a box of my own.

“People are out of work and they are hurting. I want a jobs bill on my desk right away.”

I spent the afternoon job hunting. I sent out my resume to job postings, emailed friends and acquaintances asking them for their help. And then I waited. Waited for the phone call, that interview, that job offer. But the later did not come, and still I waited. I networked. I hoped.

At least I try. But looking for a job is a vicious cycle. You have to constantly be at your best, but you get rejection at every turn. That job you would be perfect for, that you’ve labored over the cover letter, contacted everyone you know who knows people who can help you get that job, and maybe you even had an interview. But the job goes to someone else. I am one of 25 interviewees out of a pool of 250 candidates, but someone else will start working and I will be back to sending out resumes. It starts to wear you down, all that rejection, the overwhelming feeling of hopelessness.

When you are job-hunting people ask you, “What do you want to do? What are your dreams?” I don’t know. My dream job would be to cook for people. Shop at the farmer’s market, bring home the freshest and best produce and cook up healthy and delicious meals for someone who will pay me a living wage and give me health care. But who is going to hire me as their personal chef? I may love cooking, but I never went to culinary school and people with the money to hire chefs probably want more credentials. And my credentials say that I should be a community organizer, an advocate for good causes, someone fighting for tikkun olam.

A couple of years ago when I was employed, I had decided I wanted to advance my career (the organization I was working for did not have any room for advancement). I decided that I wanted to be a Jewish professional, in part because I saw some really great organizations doing amazing social justice work. But I didn’t grow up Jewish, so I didn’t have the summer camp connections or the Hillel friends to network with. So I started getting involved, volunteering and through grit and determination my resume began to fill up with things that said, “she’s really involved with the Jewish community.” But the economy tanked, and the non-profit world didn’t have a lot of room for career moves. I would get interviews, but the people they were hiring had a lot more experience than I did. Then my job disappeared and the hope I was feeling that I was making my career going somewhere faded.

The civil servant assigned by the Department of Labor to give me career advice continued to be baffled by my resume. “How did you get these jobs before?” I smiled. Dumb luck really. A friend of mine ran into an old friend of his on a subway platform. While catching up the old acquaintance talked about his new job and my friend said, “I’ve got the perfect girl for you, she just finished winning a campaign and is looking for work.” Another time a friend of mine asked me, “Have you ever considered being a private investigator?” Yes, I know how I got those jobs, being at the right place at the right time. It wasn’t a great epiphany that I needed to network myself into the right situation.

That is where job hunting is so much like dating. You might be the prettiest girl with the most charming stories, but the guy sitting across the table from you is looking to settle down with a girl who reminds him of his mother and have a lot of babies. You might both be terrific people, but just looking for different things. I had a phone interview for a job I was completely perfect for the other day. But the Executive Director on the other side of the line, who clearly didn’t have the time to be doing interviews asked me, “so what is organizing exactly?” I tried my best to explain what I do and how great I would be for his organization, but I didn’t get a call back. I didn’t give him the answers he was looking for, even though I know I would have done a really kick-ass job at their organization.

So I wait for my phone to ring. I jump on every opportunity I can find even when it annoys friends and acquaintances. On Martin Luther King Day I was in the bodega near my house. I overheard a delivery guy saying to the clerk, "MLK? Only people that get today off are white. I've still got to work." Looking around the tiny shop at who was shopping and who was working he might have had a point, but I wanted to turn to him and say, "but at least you have a job!" Some days I don’t want to get out of bed and spend the day in duckie pajamas watching Hulu overcome with depression and embarrassment that I still don’t have a job. Obama’s speech last night didn’t give me a lot of hope. It might be said to a room full of applause that jobs are a high priority, but my email box is still empty, my phone isn’t ringing and my only hope from Congress is that they will extend my Unemployment benefits to give me more time to keep looking, keep hoping someone will realize that out of the pool of candidates they have in front of them, I am the best and that they should hire me.

The first time I tried it, I was in a group.  The second time, it was with a married man.  The last time, I was alone and loved every minute of it.  It had started while I was doing my shift at my local food co-op when the seasoned staffer asked for a volunteer to stock the meat cooler.  I figured I could handle meat, so I jumped right in.  As the burly bearded man told me what we had to put out, he got an excited twinkle in his when he breathed, “oh, and we have duck bacon today.”

Sure, I had heard of turkey bacon, beef bacon, and even lamb bacon but never duck bacon.  “Is it any good?”  I asked my curiosity piqued by his tone while the slim rectangular packages were placed into the cooler.  After my shift was over I did a little shopping and found myself back at the meat cooler.  I thought of a friend who loves duck, so why not try this?

So we arranged a brunch.  A few friends over on a sunny winter weekend to sample a tasty new treat.  We cooked up a batch of the duck bacon and placed tiny pieces on crackers.  I had even bought a duck liver pate (pork-free) that we smeared on tiny wedges of toast.  There were many other delicacies that afternoon, but for the meat eaters of the group all anyone remembers was that taste.  Squares of thin sliced smoked duck meat fried in duck fat – all that salty, smoky soaked in silky tender duck fat.  What flavor!  Bursting from each cracker.  Why aren’t more things cooked in duck fat?

A few days after the brunch, a friend was home sick with a cold.  And what’s that saying? “Feed a cold, starve a fever.”  And what clears a stuffy head better than duck?  There was some left over after the brunch.  I brought a loaf of fresh bread and we soaked up the duck fat and sprinkled the bread with garlic powder.  And to make things even more treyf my friend had some leftover macaroni and cheese.  It was the most decadent meal I think I have ever cooked.

By the end of the week, I was hungry and alone.  My boyfriend was at work and there was little in the house to eat.  A few potatoes, onions and the rest of the duck bacon.  I didn’t know if could top the ecstasy of the last time I had eaten the duck, but I roasted the potatoes and cooked the onions in with the bacon and tossed in the potatoes until they were coasted in the silky duck.  I was glad I was alone, because sometimes it's just better when you are alone with duck juices dribbling down your chin.

I don’t know if there is a food more naughty to kosher keeping Jews than pork – although technically it is no more a sin than any other prohibited food.  Yet, bacon gets many Jews really riled up (read the comments).  So all this talk of bacon feels a little scandalous even if duck bacon can be kosher (okay, not eaten with mac n’ cheese).  But the really naughty here is how amazing duck bacon really is.  To paraphrase Stephen Colbert, “Was that bacon, or did an angel just give birth in my mouth?”

Oh yes, I will be looking for duck bacon again.

Barely before the Thanksgiving leftovers are in the fridge and that last dish is washed, Christmas invades the New York City like the traditional consumerism orgy that it has become.  Stores decorate garishly in glitter, tinsel and twinkly lights, people begging for money on the trains deliberately remind you “it's the season for giving,” and various street corners become miniature pine forests populated by burley Canadians with their fragrant evergreens available for ready money.

If you’ve ever been to New York in December, you’ve probably walked through one of these random street corners lined with trees wrapped in large hair nets and strings of bulbish lights precariously dangling from red wooden stakes.  Tucked within the trees is almost always a shabby little shack cobbled out of bits and pieces with perhaps a bit of heat to protect and provide comfort from the elements to these sentinel street vendors who indefatigably hock their wares.

Walking through these temporary showrooms can be a briefly transformative experience.  The street noise dampens slightly, the scent of pine sap gently assails your nostrils, and for a moment you don’t feel you are in a loud bustling city of eight million people.  Perhaps it was this feeling that sparked the romance.

Several years ago I had an ecologically conscientious roommate.   She cared about the environment so much that she never flushed the toilet.  Purportedly this omission of common courtesy was an effort to save water, but it only really resulted in pissing off her roommate who - with my own standards of sanitation - would flush twice.  That and her other earth-saving tricks made me conclude that she really would be much happier in life living in a cabin in the woods.  This conclusion was reinforced by her December fling – our Christmas Tree Guy.

Our neighborhood Christmas tree stand was only about a hundred yards from our apartment and directly in the path to our closest subway stop.  So it wasn’t uncommon to walk through the trees several times a day.  First it was, “oh, I’m just bringing the Christmas Tree Guy some coffee,” she’d giggle as she ran out the door with a travel mug in hand.  Then there was a dinner date.  Not too long after came the late night moans and the ecstatic rhythmic thuds of Christmas Tree Guy sex.

The next morning my walk to the subway was a vicarious walk of shame.  “Oh hi,” I bashfully managed, “you know, the walls in our apartment are really thin.”  But the Christmas Tree Guy turned out to be very sweet.  He was a forest ranger by trade, but during the winter makes good money by selling Christmas trees.  When we wasn’t on duty, he shared a tiny apartment with about 15 other guys.  He said people were generally friendly and welcoming, bringing him coffee and snacks, but even so I suspected my roommate was the only one providing carnal comforts.  The local street gang had dubbed him “Tree Guy” and helped protect his trees from petty theft.  The only trouble he said that he was having was with the bank at the street corner where his trees were set up.  They would argue about where he could place his wares and hassled the vendors until the Christmas Tree Guy posted a sign that said “***** Bank Hates Christmas.”  Christmas eventually won.

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It all started with an excessive amount of cabbage. One of my housemates wanted to make a pretty and delicious green and purple cabbage salad for a dinner party she was attending. “Why are your cabbages so big in this country? In South Africa we have little cabbages!” True, even after making her salad a few times we still had a lot of cabbage left over.

Then I got cabbage in my CSA share – two heads of it. “How do you feel about sauerkraut?” I suggested, thinking about my own German heritage. “Or kimchi?” was her suggestion. Now we started getting excited. She pulled out her Ball Blue Book Guide to Preserving, which was a rather comprehensive collection of pickles (although no kimchi). So several kimchi recipes were consulted online and we got to work.

Big canning jars were purchased along with some chili paste, fresh ginger, scallions and lots of salt. The cabbage was washed, sliced and ready to wilt. “It says to let the salted cabbage to sit for several minutes to let it wilt, but it’s been twenty minutes and it’s not wilting.” This was us looking at our bowl of crisp and fresh purple cabbage sparkling with salt. About an hour later the outer edges appeared slightly limp. The cabbage was then firmly packed down into the jar it’s salty cabbage juices covering the leaves. We jerry-rigged a cover and some weight to press the cabbage down firmly into its own brine. “Fermentation is usually complete in three to six weeks,” she read. “Weeks?” Oy this was a lot of work for a little sauerkraut. And neither of us knew how the purple cabbage was going to work – especially since it had been so reluctant to initially to wilt.

The kimchi, on the other hand was remarkably easy. Let the cabbage soak overnight in a water and salt mix. Rinse then mix in a blend of chili powder (although I used paste) salt, sugar, ginger and scallions. Instead of chopping I simply threw the spice mixture in my food processor making a nice even and smooth paste I massaged into the dry cabbage leaves (using a glove since the chili can burn your skin). I packed the kimchi into jars and let it sit on our kitchen counter.

And a few days later, bright and shiny with flecks of red in a hot and tangy liquid, the kimchi was ready and remarkably delicious and was quickly eaten. The purple sauerkraut continued to sit on the counter. It smelled bad (as sauerkraut does) and overflowed its jar a few times (making a big purple mess). Occasionally we could see some bubbles from the fermenting process, but other than that there was great skepticism in the house whether or not this was going to be successful.

More kimchi was made with the next week’s CSA cabbage. While picking up that week’s share I traded some other veggies for more cabbage. “What do you do with all that cabbage?” I was asked. Good question, what does one do with lots of kimchi? We brought out the bamboo steamers and made dumplings. We made sushi. Not authentic Korean foods, but delectable. And there was more cabbage. And beets. I forgot to mention the beets. There were also lots and lots of beets. Pickling spices simmered on the stove with a stick of cinnamon in apple cider vinegar. Cooked beets and this tangy brine were poured into more jars. The fridge was starting to get full.

Shabbat dinners began featuring our pickled goods. Kimchi on a Shabbat table? Why not. We brought jars of beets as gifts to dinner parties. Then the sauerkraut was ready. It didn’t taste anything like the mushy stuff that my mom would cook on New Year’s Day with pork loin. I never liked sauerkraut. It was offensive I couldn’t imagine putting it in my mouth and dripped its rancid liquid everywhere. But our purple sauerkraut was still crisp, had very little liquid and very little smell. It gleamed like strips of scarlet silk on our Shabbat table. The beets were like deep rubies and the kimchi was just fun and exotic.

I love cooking. I love cooking for other people. Being unemployed gives more time than I would have if I were working. So I feel like I can try new things. Although pickling is a way of preserving fresh foods, it has also been preserving my sanity as I have tried to find a new job.

The week before Rosh Hashanah this year was not at all what I had expected.  On Sunday, while recovering from the flu, I paid bills, gave tzedakah and sent out a few holiday cards.  I got up and went to work the next day just like normal.  Except it wasn’t a normal day - when I got to my office, it had been cleaned out.  Instead of our holding our Monday morning staff meeting, my boss presented me with a pink slip.

Still a little under the weather and definitely shocked, I made my way home and baked brownies.  In a moment my entire life had changed – for the better or for the worse I wasn’t sure.  I did know that all my expectations were tossed on its head for that morning, that week, the upcoming holidays, my moving plans (I had been looking for a new apartment), my career path.  I won’t lie, I didn’t like my job, but the crappy paycheck was far better than no crappy paycheck.  I got laid off the day Ben Bernake had announced the recession was “likely over” but I had been job hunting for over a year already, so I didn’t see my newly acquired unemployment status changing as quickly as it arrived.

The next couple of days were a bit of a blur.  I told my roommates that on account of my dramatically decreased salary, I was going to need to move.  I didn’t know where I was going to go, but paying rent for an apartment I wasn’t living in didn’t make much fiscal sense (I had been de facto living with my boyfriend for the last several months). Luckily for them they found someone new right away, which meant that by the end of the month was likely going to be jobless and homeless.

While so many of my friends were thinking about apples and honey and wishing everyone a sweet new year, I was virtually “pounding the pavement” in my pajamas in front of a laptop looking for a direction in my life.  Where was I going to find a job?  Where was I going to live?  At a time of year of introspection and forward thinking, I had dropped a few rungs on Maslow's hierarchy of needs.  Instead of thinking about being inscribed in the book of life for 5770, I was wondering about how when I packed all my worldly possessions into a Uhaul shortly after Yom Kippur, where that U-Haul was going to go – which puts things in a whole new perspective.

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It’s pretty easy to eat local food in New York City.  Scattered throughout the five boroughs are farmers markets and CSAs are plentiful.  Since I moved to Brooklyn I’ve joined the Park Slope Co-op that displays a map of its farms and suppliers on its website.  There are also plenty of restaurants that feature local and season foods on its menu (I recently went to Nick and Toni’s Café, which I highly recommend).

And for those desiring to gather and produce their own local fare, we have illicit urban agrarian societies in New York that go foraging or keep bees.  But as it turns out, not all local foods are created equally.

Monday’s Daily News ran an article on toxicity of local fish – and despite the danger, how many low-income people are turning to fishing as a source of food.  This raised all sorts of conflicting thoughts for me.

1. OMG! we have polluted our local waters so badly that we shouldn’t eat what they produce.

2. We have a society where we have hungry people eating toxic food.  What can we be doing about that?

3.  Another question comes to mind, similar to the one raised the other day by Liz Schwartz, but is “eating locally” elitist?

I’m curious about others thoughts and concerns.  Please leave a comment!

Cross-posted from The Jew and the Carrot 

Seeing that I've been dating someone for a respectable amount of time now, and that things have been going rather well, it was recently decided that I should probably meet the other woman in his life – his mother.  It made sense because a few weeks ago I had convinced him that the 12-hour train ride to meet my Christian family in rural Pennsylvania was going to be fun.  And I even took it to be a good sign that he didn’t break up with me immediately upon returning to Brooklyn.  In fact, shortly thereafter he mentioned that his mother was coming to town and perhaps I should meet her.

I had met previous boyfriend’s parents before, but only once since I had decided to convert to Judaism.  I had been dating a wayward young man who had been raised in a strict Orthodox family.  My Conservative conversion was never going to be good enough for his family – which was clearly articulated to me through him prior to any actual familial introduction.  When I finally met that boyfriend's mother her first question was, “Well, are you going to miss Christmas?”  Yikes!  I will say that for all of the “you must break up with the shiksa” telephone conversations I occasionally overheard him have with his parents, his family was always kind or at least passably indifferent to my face.

Fortunately, in my current relationship, I was not aware of any prejudices against me arising from my Christian upbringing.  My boyfriend did say that his mother asked if our relationship was serious.  To which he responded, “No ma, it’s not serious, we tell jokes all the time.”

All joking aside, I do care about him a great deal, but who knows if years from now I will be looking back reminiscing about this weekend as the time I met my mother-in-law.  Truth be told we’ve only been together since Purim, so there was no sense in getting the cart before the horse.  But I was still nervous anyway about meeting his mother.

One of the ways I alleviate stress is by cooking, but since I’m without easy access to my own kitchen I resorted to my other nervous tic – cleaning.  My boyfriend really hates change and is not the meticulously neat and tidy (or crazy) person I am, so I knew I would have to trick him into my stress-reduction plan to clean his apartment.  When we talking out our weekend plans, I worked in trips to his place to pick up dirty laundry around trips to my place where I have laundry in my building.  I even snuck out early one morning to pick up bagels – and a new shower curtain.

When the appointed day arrived, my boyfriend found me scrubbing the bathroom floor wondering aloud if we should replace the shabby (and ugly) bathroom rugs. “No, my mom bought them for me,” which made me glad I hadn’t already pitched them out.  But we got her call earlier than we expected that she had landed and was on her way to get a cab.  I was still at his place nervously tidying up.  One of the first things she noticed was how clean the place was.  “This is not my son’s apartment,” she said eyeing the small vase of flowers in the bathroom.  I couldn’t tell if that was a good thing or a bad thing.  

The next night over dinner I again found myself nervous and talking up a storm.  But this was where we got it out in the open – my Christian family and my conversion.  To my relief she appeared rather curious about why anyone would choose to be Jewish, and what exactly was the process I was going through.  “Ah, you probably know more about Judaism than most Jews!” she declared.  Our only potential sticking point was our conflicting views on Israel (I recently took part in the New Israel Fund’s video Love, Hate and the Jewish State expressing opinions I would gather from our conversation she would disagree with) but I wisely kept my mouth shut.

So, as I hope my relationship with my boyfriend continues to grow, so will my relationship with his mother.  I find it such a relief that my family history does not appear at all problematic to her – and, in fact, she seems pleased her son has found a nice Jewish girl.

There is a cheesecake sitting in my (boyfriend’s) refrigerator right now. At some point late last week I got it in my head that with Shavuot just around the corner I should make a cheesecake. Since I’m doing a time-share with my boyfriend’s kitchen, permission had to be granted by the relevant roommates, which was how I found myself late last night remembering how much I disliked baking.

But I’m terribly sentimental about food and of course my cheesecake comes with a story…

I went to Israel for the first time with the organization Livnot that in part markets their programs for people like me that (at the time at least) don’t know all that much about Judaism. Not only that, but I should also point out that I didn’t speak or read any Hebrew (sadly that hasn’t changed much, but I’m working on that). During the trip our group leaders referred to the participants as what sounded like “hevray,” which they told us was Hebrew for roughly “a community of friends.”

I found it endearing, but didn’t think too much about it until later in the program when I began to wonder why in all the literature the organization gave us they addressed us as cheese. “Hey Chevre, we are hiking Masada tomorrow so be up early…” Needless to say it took me quite a while to figure out that the chevre in this case was not the creamy goat’s cheese I had grown fond in France, but in fact that affectionate term “hevray” they had been calling us.

So after my, “oh, duh” moment, it gave me an idea. I loved chevre (goat’s cheese) cheesecake and had been working on my own version for a while. Since saying goat’s cheese cheesecake always seemed so redundant and silly, and not everyone knows what chevre cheesecake is, I could call me concoction Friends Cheesecake.

Okay, it’s a little corny, but here is the recipe used last night. I’ve been developing this over time, so I’m really interested in comments if anyone else gives it a try.

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How do you feel about Israel?

It seems like a pretty simple question, but any diaspora Jew can tell you that their thoughts on Israel are layered, complex, and emotionally charged. Makom and the New Israel Fund are organizing an event on June 18th in New York City called "Love, Hate, and the Jewish State." Jewcy is cosponsoring this event, and we'll be encouraging panelists and participants in the discussion to continue their dialogue here on the website.

You can learn more about the event here or sign up on Facebook. Below is a video of young Jews discussing their complicated feelings about Israel and social justice - you might recognize a Jewcy contributor or two in the mix.

 

 

I met someone special at Purim this past year.  It wasn’t love at first sight, not at all (after all, I was wearing a mask when we met). And it took some persistent and clever wooing on his part, but I am now very smitten.

It’s been a few months now, but my heart still races whenever I see him.  I get this big goofy grin on my face when I am with him.  He makes me want to be a better person.  In the past I’ve described myself as a conscientious omnivore, but he really challenges me (in good ways) to think about my food choices.   Needless to say things were going quite well.   We had gotten to the point in our relationship where he offered me some space in his apartment to keep some of my personal items, like a toothbrush and some clothes, stuff like that.

And that was just around the same time my lease in my apartment was up – so I moved.  Downsized along with the economy.  But what had been an hour-long commute between our separate boroughs, now became a 10-minute walk (shorter by bike).  And in my new place I would have a garden for the first time – all good things that somewhat made up for the fact that the apartment I was moving into was significantly smaller than my last one.  Whereas over the last two years I’ve been able to host 30-person sit-down dinners, Passover seders and other fun foodie events, the new place did not offer such accommodations.

But I didn’t despair since my new roommates appeared accommodating and understanding that I had lots of kitchen stuff and welcomed me to put it to good use in our dollhouse-like space.  That was until my stuff arrived crammed into my tiny U-Haul and seeing box after box fill this tiny new apartment brought dread to the dollhouse residents.

Storage seemed like the only plausible solution, but not having access to my kitchen tools seemed like an unfortunate punishment.  After talking to my boyfriend and his roommates, they offered me space in their comparably palatial kitchen.  I, in turn offered to cook for them to express my gratitude.  I seemed like a good deal, until I began to move myself in.

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I really love it when my boyfriend gets excited about a meal.  He stops, breathes in. “Oh,” he says quietly, “oh, wow” a little louder.  That usually makes me pause.  “Oh this is amazing,” his eyes go wide and a smile begins to play across his face, “I can’t believe how good this is.”  Sometimes he reaches across the table to include me in the moment, sometimes he revels in his experience alone.

We had one of those moments last night.  Earlier in the day, I had been bored at work so I checked out Facebook and noticed an invitation to several restaurants with a focus on sustainable food that were donating a portion of their proceeds that night to the Brooklyn Food Conference.  Since I was planning on being in the neighborhood of one of these restaurants, I decided to check it out – boyfriend in tow.

Cheryl’s Global Soul was warm (except at the seats next to the door since New York City is still a little cool) and cozy with artistic wood paneling reminiscent of Noah’s Ark.  Cool jazz played forcefully through the speakers giving a funky and young vibe although the crowd was eclectic from the young family seated next to us to the older genteel woman relishing her pork chop alone.  The menu was unassuming, just a sheet of paper in plastic that didn’t mention at all that the vegetables were procured at the nearby farmer’s market, but the wait staff was knowledgeable enough to let us know where the fish and meat was farmed when we asked.  And catching on that we were into the local and sustainable thing, our waitress discussed at length which local and organic wines were available that night.

Cheryl herself, a commanding presence in the room, choreographed every aspect of the evening.  From welcoming new patrons, to ensuring her customers have everyone they needed (including extra napkins to wipe up what appeared to be very juicy chicken at the table next to us) to the food exiting the semi-open kitchen, which I could occasionally glimpse a few tantalizing details of the cooks preparing our dinner.

Although my boyfriend’s reaction may have been slightly reminiscent of that iconic scene from When Harry Met Sally, he wasn’t kidding that the food was really quite good and the portions were remarkably large.  After we were seated a large plate of soft crusty bread was quickly brought to our table with a bowl of salted olive oil we enjoyed dipping into again and again.  We splurged (after all, the more money we spent, the more that was being donated to a good cause) on an appetizer of pumpkin ravioli drowning in sage butter.  Had it been socially acceptable we probably would have licked the plate, but instead resorted to dragging more of that soft bread into the last slicks of butter and pumpkin filling.

I ordered the trout, farmed raised in Maine and on the “good” fish list which came to the table grilled and with the head still attached.  A rarity as most restaurants shield us from what they we really eating, but without the head you are missing the best part – the fish cheeks.  My fish was served with jasmine rice and black beans.  So simple and so delicious.

My boyfriend ordered the vegetable tagine, which was remarkably complex in flavor and filled the large bowl with local carrots, zucchini, celery as well as (although probably not local) chickpeas and tofu.  The dish was spiced with turmeric, cardamom, and slightly sweet with cinnamon and was that tamarind we tasted?  Tired from his long day at work, my dining companion perked up when the food arrived digging hungrily into the generous portions.  We only got through half of our meals, and had the rest packed up, making me look forward to lunch tomorrow.

We left the restaurant smiling, contented with good food, nice atmosphere and the knowledge that we had discovered a new cozy spot with a solid menu that was unpretentiously making a real effort to do the right thing by buying fresh and local.

Cross-posted from the Jew and the Carrot 

I don’t typically cook a lot of meat.  During my dinner parties I’ll sometimes have one meat dish, while everything else will be vegetarian friendly.  Dating a vegetarian has also sharply curtailed my meat consumption.  So in the menu planning for my “traditional” Passover Seder my co-host insisted on brisket.  I agreed, but only if it was conscientious meat (the fish I put into my gefilte fish were all on the “good” fish list).  To him this meant kosher, to me this meant sustainable so we started searching for kosher sustainable brisket.

This was a bit more challenging than we expected.  I had heard about Kol Foods the organization that provides kosher sustainable meat.  The problem we faced was that we only wanted one brisket and they sell their product in much larger quantities.  Of course we thought about asking around to see if we couldn’t find someone who might want to share a box, but because it was rather last minute (the meat order deadline was that day) it didn’t seem likely.  So a little Internet searching later we came across some organic kosher brisket that could be delivered in most parts of Manhattan.  That seemed like the logical compromise so we ended up with two three-pound chunks of meat, a coupon for our next order and a complimentary oven mitt.

But once it arrived, I wasn’t really prepared for the long flat flaps of meat I had sitting in front of me (see picture).  I had always thought brisket was more like a roast, but these were thin, wide and long.  How do I cook that?  I’m not even sure I have the right pan.  Mark Bittman’s How to Cook Everything was helpful on the basics, it even has a pencil drawing of a cow letting me know where the brisket comes from.  But doesn’t everyone has that relative that has that great brisket recipe – I felt that the pressure was really on.  And Passover being such a big food holiday, I turned to the maven of Jewish cooking – Joan Nathan.  In her Jewish Holiday Cookbook she published her mother’s brisket recipe.  It looked good, but I had thought you cooked brisket in wine.

Years ago, before I ever decided to become Jewish I worked for a Jewish man who shared his brisket recipe with me.  Well, actually to be more accurate he told me a wonderful story (he is an amazing story teller) about making brisket every year for Passover.  It’s a fantastic tale full of misadventures in the butcher shops with intimidating zaydes, lots of wine drinking and the family politics of keeping everyone out the kitchen while you cook.  However the story never really got around to giving out too many details about the “how to” of the brisket.

So I have a couple of resources at hand to help the basics, I have a bottle of kosher for Passover wine ready to help me get through the dinner preparation (and maybe splash on the meat?) but what can I do to really make this brisket stand out?  Because after all the effort put into procuring the meat, I would hate to prepare it badly.

 

Cross Posted from the Jew and the Carrot

Not too long ago, I was in New Orleans on a three-day work conference.  Having never been to the Crescent City before, I decided to seek out many of the city’s culinary delights.  But after I had tucked into a bucket of boiled shellfish, enjoyed a platter of jambalaya,  étouffée,  and maque choux, at Mother’s Restaurant (World’s Best Baked Ham), slurped down a fried oyster po’boy and munched on a muffuletta – I was acutely aware that the only kosher thing I had enjoyed during my brief stay was a bucket-sized plastic cup of beer.

So, what could be kosher in New Orleans a city famed for its Creole cooking – a cuisine dependent on many non-kosher foods?  According to one kosher-keeping Tulane alumni, and a couple of rabbinical students, it is tough to keep kosher outside of one’s home in NOLA.  Before Hurricane Katrina ravaged the city there had been several vegetarian restaurants and the Creole Kosher Kitchen in the French Quarter – although to date none have reopened.  Possibly the only kosher restaurant left in town is Casablanca and the Kosher Cajun Deli located in the suburb of Metarie.  Café du Monde, the French market cafe famed for its beignets (fired dough doused in powdered sugar) and chicory coffee received its kashrut certification in time for Chanukah this past year.  But are there any traditional New Orleans dishes that are kosher?

One traditional dish NOLA revelers are treated to during the Mardi Gras season (Fat Tuesday can fall on any Tuesday between February 3 and March 9) is the King Cake.  Twelfth Night Cake also known as King Cake is a braided yeast cake smothered in brightly colored royal gaze and sprinkles. A bean, coin or even a glass figurine is baked into the cake (this token represents Baby Jesus) and whoever finds the token in their slice of cake is crowned the “King” and is obligated to make the cake next year.

Mardi Gras is the celebration whereas Christians clean their kitchens of things that would be forbidden during the following 40 days of Lent – like a more debacherous Biur Chametz.  This celebration manifests in various ways around the world – from the classy masked balls in Venice to the near-naked debauchery in Rio – New Orleans’s traditional Creole-influenced Mardi Gras celebrations involve weeks of parades kicked off with the Krewe du Jieux and the Krewe de Mishigas.

So, looking at recipes of King Cake, it sounds a lot like challah (except obviously for the Baby Jesus part) as challot are sometimes covered in sprinkles or baked with chocolate chips.  I’m told there is a similar practice (at least in part) once a year when some Jews place or imprint their house key into the Schlissel challah.

But what else do people enjoy in the Big Easy?  Anyone else know any other good kosher Creole dishes?

 

Cross-posted from the Jew and the Carrot 

To say that my love life has had its ups and downs is probably an understatement.  But with Valentine’s Day right around the corner, it seems like a good enough time to reflect on my romantic situations (kind-of like a Aseret Yemei Teshuvah on my love life) to see what I’ve learned from the people I dated in the past year.

This time last year I was flirting with a handful of guys, but not really dating anyone special.  I had broken up with my boyfriend over New Year’s and by February I had several new suitors.  Each had their positives as well as their negatives, but no one really stood out.  However it was the Episcopalian and the Guy-Who-Taught-Me-The-Word-Nebbish who both demonstrated why I ought to be more cautious with men still pining over their ex-girlfriends.  It was also during this time of causal dating that I got very good at clearly articulating expectations during the non-date date.

Spring rolled around as did a few friends who set me up with their Nice Jewish Boys.  My favorite was Appendicitis Boy who missed our first date on account of having his appendix removed (you only get to use that excuse once).  He was sweet, far more intellectual than he cared to admit, had terribly unhealthy habits (like smoking, drinking too much, and chili dogs) and a caring person if emotionally unavailable.  The only marriage prospects he offered would have been a quickie Las Vegas drive-through wedding with the promise of subsequent annulment.  I'm not a big fan of Vegas.

The summer was hot and sultry and during one steamy rooftop concert, I met a man who would have been perfect – if only he didn’t have a cat.  We went on several dates and everything was going fine until he mentioned the orange fur ball waiting for him at home.  Not only am I not a cat person, but I’m terribly allergic – making Fluffy an instant dealbreaker.  

But then I started looking for a new job and decided to put dating on the back burner for a while.  Interviews and first dates have a lot in common, but I needed to focus my energy on jump-starting my stalled career instead of chasing/being chased by boys.  Which of course meant  I met a guy.  Ari was wonderful even if he and I didn’t share the same tastes in food, and he really broke my heart when he ended things.  So I became even more determined not to date while looking for a job.  Since I was single, I ended up taking very good friend as my date to my sister’s wedding.  It was terrific to have such a great friend fly out to Tucson with me, but even so I was sharply aware that I didn’t have someone special of my own while surrounded by my family.

Winter began and as others began coupling, I continued to dodge the dating bullet and focused on my career prospects.  But my resolve weakened after the tremendous response to a post I had written wrenched me out of my dating hiatus.  New Year’s found me home sick on the couch with a new boyfriend and a No Reservations marathon.  However, Bike Boy and I were clearly not right for each other and by the end of January I was over both the cold and the boy.

So what did I learn?  That I seem to be spending a lot of time with Mr. Wrong and have no real prospect on finding Mr. Right. (but it hasn't been for lack of trying!)  I still haven't yet made my big career move. (not for the lack of trying either!)  But I'm not sure whether or not I should get back in the dating saddle.  I know that I want to be with someone who appreciates good food, has a sense of humor (particularly one compatible with my own) is emotionally available, intellectually curious, who doesn't have any cats and might actually want to get married someday.  This person would also get big bonus points if he were Jewish.

Now, why is that so hard to find?

When my roommate moved in this fall he told me he practiced his religion 18 Sundays a year starting at 1:00pm in front of his 50 inch television, with a couple of beers and maybe some pizza or chicken wings. He is a very devout practitioner. I’ve seen him watch multiple games in a day, frequently swearing and yelling at the TV even occasionally jumping out of his seat in jubilation (or rage).

So, with his Highest Holiday coming up this Sunday, we decided to open our apartment to the community of football fans could share in good food and bad beer. We're doing our part in keeping the Super Bowl the most watched television event of the year. But as our guests started respond to our invitation, I couldn’t help but notice an absence of positive responses from my Jewish friends. But had made me wonder if I had not noticed before, but did Jews not like football?

Maybe my Jewish friends, most whom are generally social justice loving, lefty, and nebbish just aren’t into football? But at a peace rally a few weeks back while we shivered in the cold, I noticed one friend keeping warm in a NY Giants hat. So I started to ask around. Turns out some Jews do like football. As one yid who works in a sports marketing firm said, “sure, Jews like football, they like to bet on it and they like to own it.” This was relayed to me during a drunken Shabbat evening, where I was also told that a third of all NFL team owners are Jewish.

But do Jews play football? After all my first exposure to football was the Friday night high school football game – an obvious no-no for observant Jews. Even college football is played on Saturdays – again problematic for the same reasons. And there is this issue of touching footballs a/k/a “pigskins.” Can Jews touch the skin of a non-kosher animal? A friend’s mother says the 614th mitzvoth is “Jews don’t play football,” but I haven’t yet gotten a good explanation to why. Although not every Jewish mother got that memo because Alan Veingrad, Ron Mix and a few others play and have played professional ball.

So, Jewish or not, if you plan on partaking in the great American tradition of Super Bowl Sunday, here is a super easy, really yummy bean dip recipe you can make for your party.

Cream Cheese Bean Dip

1 package (8 oz) of cream cheese
1 can (15.5 oz) of black beans
garlic powder to taste

Take the cream cheese out of the package and soften the cream cheese either in the microwave (a minute or two in a microwave safe bowl stirring frequently) or on the stove (on low heat stirring frequently).

Stir in the beans and add garlic powder to taste.

Serve warm with corn chips.

Recipe by Dena Fleno

We all know that “in a relationship” status on Facebook doesn’t guarantee a ‘Happily Ever After.’   Just because a Nice Jewish Girl is dating a Nice Jewish Boy doesn’t mean that they are automatically right for each other, as I discovered with Bike Boy.  Although our relationship started sweetly enough, we ended it with a mutual understanding we really were not a good match.

Unfortunately, I haven’t always gone through such amicable splits – like the guy who dumped me a few days after we put a $500 deposit on my credit card for our vacation in Sonoma or the guy who told me after several weeks of, um...intimacy that not only was he not over his ex-girlfriend, but if he was he would rather be dating someone else (how low on this list was I?).  Okay, so I’ve never been dumped by post-it note or text message, but I know that my boys have trolled on-line dating sites before we ended things and have been cheated on more times than I’d care to admit (on the bright side two of my exes eventually married and had children with the women they were cheating on me with).

So what does Judaism say about breakup etiquette?  Isn’t the Ketubah just a pre-nuptial agreement that states that the husband must provide food, clothing and marital relations to his wife, and that he will pay a specified sum of money if he divorces her?  It sounds pretty good until you consider the misogynistic process of a traditional Jewish divorce and how her ex-husband can refuse to grant a Get, thus denying her the ability to remarry.

But what are Nice Jewish Boys and Girls taught about dating?  Since I’m thinking about casting my lot exclusively within the Tribe I’m curious about what I could come to expect among the yids.  Anyone have any breakup tales to share?

Writing for Jewcy has really spiced up my dating life. A few weeks ago some guy asked me out after I contemplated Jewish dating and I blogged the date.  But things never went any further and in fact I met someone new at the Jewcy Holiday Party.

Getting to know this new guy, we’ll call him Bike Boy, only proves what a small small Jewish world we live (and date) in.  During the initial stages of the “getting to know you” dance we both realized we were active in the organization Hazon although he was into the biking and I’m just there for the food.  And we discovered it was possible we could have run into each other before – in fact we realized we were at the same Purim party last year.

Having so much in common as well as a few mutual friends (as we would later discover through Facebook) really made me quickly feel comfortable with Bike Boy.  And as we discovered on our first date, we had a lot to say to one another (which ended around 1:00am when he finally looked at his watch and commented, “you are not going to believe how late it is!”)  A second and third date quickly followed - so lets just say things have been going very well.

However, I couldn’t help notice the other day that his Facebook profile proudly proclaimed that he was – single.  Okay, I realize it has only been a few weeks but we never really discussed what our relationship really was.  We’ve done plenty of things that could be easily identifiable as dates, but I have never really heard him refer to me as his girlfriend even though I’m pretty sure he is not dating anyone else.  We talk endlessly about food and current events and he even spent New Year’s Eve sitting on the sofa with me, a box of tissues, some Theraflu - although I was asleep by 11:00pm.  (It wasn't the most exciting of New Year's Eves, but it was sweet of him to stay with me when I was sick.) 

So how do you begin the are-we-ready-to-move-into-the-“in a relationship” Facebook status conversation?  I’m usually pretty upfront with these things, but he seems to duck the personal “what are we doing” conversations.  And I’m not sure I want to spring my thoughts on our relationship on him through a Facebook relationship update request (although probably blogging about it isn’t too subtle either).

My first real experience with a Jewish prayer services took place several years ago in someone's living room where I, with little idea of what I was doing, davened and shared in a pot-luck dinner.  My then-boyfriend (who had suggested we attend) was of course late that evening, so I had to walk in alone to the small group of 20-and-30-somethings gathered for the biweekly independent egalitarian minyan – Kol haKfar.

Of course, I survived that first Shabbat evening. In fact, over time, as I continued in my Jewish learning, I found myself drawn to the independent minyan scene. I generally liked the communities and felt far more comfortable in the casual nature of the davening in apartments, church basements, and parks (weather permitting) on various Friday nights.  Sure, I was utterly lost at first, but it wasn’t any better at shul.  At least at minyan some guy (after my boyfriend left for India) would more often than not lean over my shoulder to point out where we were in the service and usually ask for my number.  

Being willing to travel on Shabbat opened me up to many communities (New York is great like that) which I made part of my weekly routine – Kol Zimrah, Hadar, Tikvat Yisrael, Romemu and even Altshul in Brooklyn.  Then by chance the minyan in closest proximity to my apartment, Techiyah of Harlem announced that its founders were leaving the city and the minyan was in need of administrative assistance.  Since I’m a total sucker for doing time-consuming thankless things for free, I volunteered to help out.

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Last week I kvetched whether or not my decision to be Jewish included an exclusivity clause in which required me forthwith to only date Jews. Among the varied comments on the post was one pro-Jew dating response from a nice Jewish boy who bolstered his argument with an invitation for drinks. More than a little curious and after some off-line discussions I agreed to meet him out for drinks, a little take-out and trivia night at a local bar. This was how it went:

7:28 – I’m sitting in a cute neighborhood coffee-shop/bar full of 20-somethings tapping away on their laptops waiting for Hebrewzzi to arrive. The music is good and I’m sipping on a $3 draft beer. Not so bad, the place has a very comfortable feel. The front door is open because it is a freakish rainy 60 degrees in New York City in December. Only two days ago is was bitterly cold with the occasional spastic cough of snow swirling down from the sky. I guess anything is possible.

7:34 – My stomach growls. Lunch was inadequate and too long ago. I hope he gets here soon so we can order food.

7:49 – Hebrewzzi arrives, but doesn't know what I look like. He calls my cell and waits to find the girl at the laptop who picks up her phone. We engage in the usual conversation, inquiring how one’s trip was and if the directions were helpful. I sense a slight bit of unease. Either one of us could be totally weird or crazy or both. After all he doesn't really know anything about me beyond what is on the blogs. This is really the blindest of dates.

7:53 – He’s read me on the Jew and the Carrot so he knows my love of food so in lieu of flowers, he has brought me a loaf of banana pumpkin cranberry chocolate-chip bread he baked himself. The bread is good, moist, a little dense. The flavors are very Fall-like although the enthusiasm of the cranberries overpower the pumpkin flavors. I think it is thoughtful of him and take a few bites to satiate my growling stomach.

8:01 – He grabs the menus from behind the bar so we can peruse our dining options – from the looks of things our best choices appear to be sushi, Thai or burritos.  But he tells me he doesn’t eat seafood or meat or tofu. A knot forms in my stomach as I’m immediately reminded of a guy I recently broke up with that was a dreadfully picky eater.

8:04 – Thankfully without too much fuss we settle on Thai – lots of vegetable options.

8:07 – Trivia night starts. It’s loud. I decide we will play on the same team. I call us Team Jewcy. The bar is pushing Mike’s Hard Lemonades for only a dollar.  He says they would have to pay him to drink those.  Hum.

8:10 – In between the trivia questions he tries to start a conversation. He asks me what I do for a living.  Yawn.

8:17 – The trivia questions start. The moderator comes over our table frequently to look at our sheet and I’m pretty sure to also look down my shirt.

8:23 – Hebrewzzi has an obscene amount of knowledge of pop culture – which is good because I’m completely useless with these types of trivia questions (I also suck at Boggle, Scrabble and Wii tennis). Although, neither of us could name five out of the last six American Idol winners.

8:27 – Our food arrives. The moderator comments to the crowd how trivia night and dinner at the bar makes the perfect first date. He has no idea.

8:38 – I’m on my second beer. I had ordered the Tom Yum Goong, which is great but very spicy. I’m drinking my beer way to fast.

8:55 – End of trivia Round 1. Hebrewzzi doesn’t know the national origin of cars as well as he thought he did (I didn’t have a clue). We are in 3rd place. He’s not terribly competitive, which is nice since neither am I. The food is good, the setting is nice – but its a shame I’m not actually getting to talk to him.

9:28 – Trivia Round 2. Okay, trivia night is officially a bad idea when trying to get to know someone. The moderator has clearly taken a liking to me (or my breasts) and keeps checking our answers, offering clues and obvious hints. Because of the game there really is no real good chance to interact with each other. Neither of us are any good at ‘naming that tune’ and listing a movie is was played in. However, I did know Mark Felt was Deep Throat.

9:51 – We’ve tied for last place. A ‘rock, paper, scissors’ game later with the other last place team and Hebrewzzi gains us the prestige of being the official last place team.  We win a bag of pork rinds (how appropriate!) and two Blow-Pops. We also won an extra“funny answer” prize and the moderator tosses my breasts a package of Hostess cupcakes. We rock. But to be fare we did very well on the actual trivia questions – it was the score skewing questions like “for ten points list 10 American wars in order of most America casualties” that killed us. Really? Who knows this stuff? (apparently the Columbia doctoral students seated next to us)

9:59 – Hebrewzzi is settling our bill. The moderator pulls me aside and says I should come back on more Wednesdays. He asks me to sign up for their email list. I dodge his sign-up list and furtive glances and we make it out the door into the unseasonably warm soggy weather. We are off to find another bar, one that is quiet and where we can actually talk.

10:07 – Another coffee shop/bar but this one only has two couples in it. A young lesbian couple and a woman and man in the midst of a break up. I hear her rip his heart out but then resort to tired clichés – “I want to stay friends” “ I want you to be happy” “I just don’t feel what you said you feel for me” Kinda sucks. I want to move tables, but there isn’t really anywhere else to go. The lesbians leave so it is just us four and the bartender.

10:17 – We tuck into some hot cocoa and conversation. I’m ignoring the fighting couple and the sound of the guy’s heart breaking so near to us.

10:19 – We have an easy back and forth. Hebrewzzi sounds like a nice, decent guy. Appears to be honest, sweet, thoughtful. It’s sometimes hard to tell about these things, but he doesn’t seem the type to pursue you and then not call after you’ve slept together.

10:34 – Hebrewzzi asks the “Why Judaism” question. It is a long answer – in fact I’m writing a book about it. He clearly has strong opinions about his Judaism, about his Jewish identity. But as promised, he isn’t religious and is not comfortable with it. I can understand that. I’m not all that comfortable in church services any more, but I do appear to have more of a regular Jewish practice than he does. And then there is the issue of geography. We are not geographically compatible. I’m a Manhattan girl and he is Queens boy. I realize there are trains that connect the two, but that is something to think about.

11:14 – We close the bar. At some point the defunct couple had left. The bartender cleans up around us seemingly undisturbed by our being there. Around us chairs are placed on top of tables, the floor is swept, and the coffee machine is washed. It is time for us to make our exit.

11:26 – We are standing next to the train stop ready to part ways. I think he is waiting for me to say something like, “so, how about we do this again sometime?” but he’s not saying it either so maybe he is on the fence? I’m not a big fan of rejection so I prattle on with some inane story about something totally irrelevant.

11:34 – Okay, I’m getting tired although he has a much longer trip home than I do. We say good night (again) and I turn away at the moment I think he is timidly leaning in for a kiss? Oh, I hate this awkward first date ritual – the uncertain first kiss game. For me, even the best first dates shouldn’t be obliged to end with a kiss. I tend to feel this action is far too formulaic and artificial at best. And as much fun as this date was with the evening of trivia and all, I didn’t really get much of an opportunity to get to know him. If I’m going to kiss him, I’d like to get to know him better rather than kissing him out of some ritualistic requirement.

I know there is some stupid “wait a couple of days to call” rule to first dates. However, I would have to assume Hebrewzzi is going read this post anyway. So I'll say it, he was a really nice guy. I know, I know that is totally a turn-off for some people, but he really was nice, polite, courteous. He offered to pay for dinner and our $3 beers (although I bought the cocoa) which I appreciated (I'm not old-fashioned - just broke). Sure there were moments of awkwardness one might expect when you've meet that person randomly online but I’d go out with him again - without trivia or computers.

But to be honest, the evening didn't convince me one way or another if I should only date Jews. Sure, it might have offered the suggestion that perhaps someday I should only date that yid. And ready as I am to do my final dunk in the mikvah, I'm not ready to completely swear off the goy.

I have been following with amusement and bemusement the courtship ritual of Hebrewzzi in the comments to Mia Rut’s post To Date a Jew. But not with wistfulness. It's been a quarter century since I had to play the dating game and I thank God for that. I was never good at it (or at any other game) and it was stacked against me.

A couple grafs below in this post I am going to blow Ms. Rut's cover. I know who she really is and what game she's up to. But first let me say a few words about the issue at hand.

Ms. Rut, nearly-converted, wonders whether she should date only Jews. And, new to the Jewish dating scene, she discovers something that Jewish girls have always known: all the Jewish guys out there are "obnoxious or arrogant or creepy and weird or too young or too old or gay or otherwise in some other way wildly incompatible."

Now, this is an incontrovertible fact based on the experiences of many generations of Jewish women (well, a few, the ones postdating the generations in which Jewish women were married off by their parents in their early teens).

A curious fact that Ms. Rut does not mention is that Jewish men have accumulated, over many generations (or at least those since the ones in which their parents married them off in their early teens), a similar data set. Ask the guys. Ask Phillip Roth. They'll tell you that all the Jewish women out there are not only obnoxious, arrogant, creepy, and weird, but also that they have moustaches.

Now we know why the Jews are just a fraction of a percent of the world's population. With such major incompatibility built into our genes, it's a wonder we've survived at all.

And this is the reason why Jewish parents have, through the course of evolution, been programmed to browbeat their progeny to marry other Jews. Obviously, if Jewish men and women were naturally attracted to each other, this would not be necessary. No, the race survives only because of the nagging gene.

But let me get to the point. Back in that nasty, brutish, and not-at-all-short period in which I had to date, I took seriously my responsibility to the tribe. I limited myself to dating Jewish women. This was not difficult in my case; the reaction of the female sex to my phone voice was such that I could easily have limited myself to dating no women at all. Quite naturally, I attributed this to the fact that the women I called saw through me and realized from the minute I said "hello" that I was obnoxious, arrogant, creepy, and weird.

Then came that awful year in which, in the space of just a few months, two women I had gone out with and who seemed to have overlooked my debilities told me that they had been two-timing and that they had decided that the other man was more worth their while. This, as you can imagine, was a horrible, castrating experience.

But, being a scientifically-minded kinda guy, I sat down to analyze the situation. I made note of the fact that both of these rejections had occurred on Tuesday evenings. I plotted out a graph of all the rejections I'd been subject to since high school (and I had quite a good-sized sample). They'd all been on Tuesdays.

Why Tuesday, I wondered? I put together another graph with the days of the week on the horizontal axis and the whereabouts of every Jewish woman I knew on the vertical axis. And I discovered that none of them were ever around on Monday nights. (Of course, there were some outliers, but these were obviously decoys meant to lead me off the track.)

So Hebrewzzi, your blog-based wooing of Ms. Rut is doomed. Here's the cold truth: every Monday night all the Jewish women in the world gather to plot out the humiliations they will inflict on Jewish guys during the week to come. Usually, they are so eager that they can't wait and they carry out their scheme very next night. Mia Rut has recently been inducted into this sisterhood. And you're at the top of her hit list.

Ask the obvious question: given the great Conspiracy of Jewish Women, how did I ever break free? How is it that I have been living happily with a Jewish woman for nearly 24 years?

It wasn't easy, but here’s the secret. I found a Jewish woman who was willing to go out with me. And when she was looking the other way, I married her.

The story has a tragic ending, however. All my sacrifice, my decision to forego all those beautiful shiksas, has been for naught. You see, my wife and I have produced four children. Two strapping guys, Mia. Two vivacious girls, Hebrewzzi. And none of them are obnoxious, arrogant, creepy, or weird. You get what I mean? They're not Jewish.

Read more by Haim at South Jerusalem

A couple of years ago I decided to convert to Judaism. No, I didn’t do it for a nice Jewish boy, I did it for a bunch of other reasons. Let me tell you, it kind of sucks to go through that alone. I had tons of stupid questions and often no one to ask them to. One question that seemed to come up a lot was: should I only date Jews?

To be clear: mostly when I say "date" here, I'm not simply talking about the joys of foreskin (versus none) because a drunken hookup is just a drunken hookup, be it with a goy or a rabbi-in-training. No, I'm talking about trying to find someone who will share endless holidays in faraway hometowns with embarrassing members of our extended families.

Of course my rabbi is unanimously in favor of my meeting a nice Jewish boy, even though he has never introduced me to any. My Christian parents are far more indifferent, although they would just prefer I stop bringing home losers. And I guess if I really stop to think about it I guess I'd like to meet someone who shares in most of my interests. Let's be honest, there are a lot of Jewish holidays when it sucks being alone. I mean, try having a Shabbat chicken dinner by yourself while your passive-aggressive vegetarian roommate sits in the living room having loud phone conversations with her obnoxious friends. Not a lot of fun on so many levels.

I live in New York, so compared to other parts of the country it should be relatively easy to meet that nice Jewish boy, right? I mean, there are lots of kinds of Jews. I guess I would need to find someone of the relatively same practices that I have. So, I've met guys at minyan. But just because they go to shul it doesn't mean they are not obnoxious or arrogant or creepy and weird or too young or too old or gay or otherwise in some other way wildly incompatible.

When I first hit the New York City young 20s/30s (which is code for singles) Jewish scene it was kind of weird how frequently I got asked out. Was it because I was blonde? Or because I didn’t look like their mothers? So I tried JDate, which I'm pretty sure is a requirement for any single girl who is converting. But that was a $39.99 I wish I could get back.

So what's a girl to do? Is it really that important that my partner be Jewish? Shortly after I decided to convert I got involved with a nice Protestant. It wasn't enough that he wasn't Jewish, but he was an actual practicing Christian and he went to church every Sunday. Other than that things were great. He was smart and sexy and funny. Sure, he worked long hours, lived with his parents, and had a terrible allergy to chocolate, but we got along great. He accepted my Jewishness while I tolerated his Protestantism which even led to some great discussion on religion. Things eventually didn't work out, but our breakup wasn't over religion.

I really can't speak for all single women converting to Judaism. I just know that in my heart of hearts I'd just like to meet someone I’m compatible with. And although I waver on the implementation of this, that probably means I want to meet someone who is Jewish (even if it means that does seem to shrink my options quite a bit). True, there are some days I just like to going on dates, regardless of the potential walk-down-the-isle consideration, but someday I'm sure I’ll meet the nebbish boy of my dreams.